Posted on 07/01/2012 3:35:32 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
White House Chief of Staff Jacob Lew touted the Supreme Court’s ruling upholding the president’s healthcare reform bill Sunday and warned Republicans to “move on” and drop efforts to undo the legislation.
“I don’t think the American people want to have this debate again,” said Lew about GOP efforts to repeal the health bill on “Fox News Sunday.” “I don’t think they want to be pulled back into decades of debate to get to where we are. We now have a law, the law is constitutional, we should implement it.”
The high court on Thursday dealt a blow to Republicans by upholding the much of the Affordable Care Act in a 5-4 ruling. Congressional Republicans and GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney have vowed though to continue efforts to undo the law.
The House is expected to vote on July 11 after returning from recess on repealing the law. Past repeal votes though have failed to garner support in the Democratic-led Senate.
Lew on Sunday said the administration was open to improving the healthcare law, but that efforts at full repeal were a waste of time.
“The president has said on many occasions that he wants to work across party lines and there are things that can be done to improve the law,” he said. “Those are the conversations we should be having and we need to move on and deal with the economy and jobs. We need to put our efforts on creating opportunities for Americans to be employed.”
Both sides are hopeful the court decision will help rally their supporters ahead of a tough November general election. Obama campaign officials are pushing Democrats to tout the healthcare bill as an example of the administration’s efforts to aid middle and working class families. Republicans, however, are seeking to use the court’s decision upholding the individual mandate under Congress’s taxing powers to paint the provision as a tax hike on families.
Lew on Sunday pushed back on GOP claims that the health bill’s individual mandate is a tax and said the overwhelming majority of Americans would be able to easily comply with the provision.
“The only thing in this bill that puts a burden on individuals to pay more is a penalty for those who can afford insurance and chose not to buy it. And to be clear that’s one percent of the population. In Massachusetts where this was tested in the plan that Gov. Romney put into place, one percent of the population ended up paying the penalty,” Lew said.
“For the other 99 percent what it means is security. They and their family get coverage, it means benefits that they get will offer better coverage and it means they don’t have to worry that if somebody gets sick they’re going to lose their health insurance,” he added.
Lew said that the court’s decision did not characterize the mandate as a tax. “What the Supreme Court said was this was constitutional. It didn’t matter what Congress called it.”
“Technically, what they said was the Congress has many powers, there’s a Commerce Clause, there’s taxing powers and it was constitutional,” he added.
During an appearance on ABC’s “This Week,” as on the other Sunday shows, Lew continued to insist that the law was not a tax.
"What is in the law is a penalty," Lew said. "For Americans who buy health insurance, who can't afford it and get it through a government program, there is no penalty. That covers 99 percent of the American people.”
When Lew was pushed to define the law as a tax, he replied, "The court found it constitutional... Frankly, what you call it is not the issue."
"We call it fair," Lew said after host George Stephanopoulos tried to get him to acknowledge that the court defined it as a tax.
On ABC, Lew also hammered home his point that the mandate's penalties would affect very few, only one percent he said.
"Let's be clear about who that one percent is, those are people who can afford health insurance, choose not to buy it and then when they get sick, they go to the hospital and the cost gets spread amongst all the people who are paying for insurance," said Lew.
Governments come and go like the breezes in the wind. What remains are we the people.
Typical Democrat Tactic
Declare Victory when you’re ahead then sue for peace
What they dont realize is... they’re not ahead.
Justice Roberts handed them a phyrric victory. He gave the obamacare back to the congress severely weakened by declaring it to be lawfully a TAX which can be dealth with by simple reconciliation of 51 votes No Filibuster allowed. In the mean time roberts gained a 7-2 vote severly limiting the use of the commerce clause. This will come back to bite the democrats hard in the near future.
It’s going to be interesting to see how this plays out. More and more people are beginning to realize that they popped their champagne corks prematurely.
But all you romney haters should by now realize. Elections have consequences. Dont make the same mistake you made in 2008.
Typical Democrat Tactic
Declare Victory when you’re ahead then sue for peace
What they dont realize is... they’re not ahead.
Justice Roberts handed them a phyrric victory. He gave the obamacare back to the congress severely weakened by declaring it to be lawfully a TAX which can be dealth with by simple reconciliation of 51 votes No Filibuster allowed. In the mean time roberts gained a 7-2 vote severly limiting the use of the commerce clause. This will come back to bite the democrats hard in the near future.
It’s going to be interesting to see how this plays out. More and more people are beginning to realize that they popped their champagne corks prematurely.
But all you romney haters should by now realize. Elections have consequences. Dont make the same mistake you made in 2008.
the medicare catastrophic health care law was
Never! Lew can kiss my @$$. Americans will fight these commie maggots until the end.
I'd like to talk about Romney's past that proves he is such the "severe conservative" that he claims he is.
It just doesn't exist however.
A government program once created is almost impossible to abolish. Socialized medicine (Obamacare) is a government program that the socialists have tried for decades to get approved. How hard do you suppose it will be to abolish it?
Ironically, the Democrats probably said the same thing about Dred Scott
We don’t care about your wildest dreams Lew.
When liberals win, their win is sacrosanct and irreproachable, but when conservatives win, the fight must never end.
Got it.
this is just commies being commies.
count votes until you are ahead then demand voting stop.
“Movin’ on up to the USSR, and you bitter clingers can sit in the back and don’t do a whole lotta talkin’.”
- Barry Hussein Djugashvili Obama
Do you mean with the truth this time instead of all the lies?
“no one has found the part that makes “Obama President For Life” yet”
The HHS Secretary can now deem that necessary and proper, too. Whateer the HHS Sec’y deems is part of the law and, as with Dodd-Frank, be made law immediately, even if written on the fly.
The law is what ‘I’ say it is now applies.
Are Muslims still exempt?
White House Chief of Staff Jacob Lew is the sort of traitor who would have advised:
- John Paul Jones to surrender his Bonhomme Richard to HMS Serapis after the start of the battle went poorly for Jones.
- Winston Churchill to surrender after his army was barely able to escape from Dunkirk.
- Admiral Kimmel and FDR to surrender after the Japanese victory at Pearl Harbor.
- Generals Puller and Smith to surrender the lst Marine Division after the Chinese attack into Korea.
- General McAuliffe to surrender to the superior German force at the Battle of the Bulge.
Lew is a classic liberal - a gutless sissy who imagines that those he wants to control are equally gutless. I hope and pray that more than 70 million Americans will join in proving him wrong in November. This is not a trivial battle over whether government can tell us the flush volume of a toilet or the size of a soft drink, nor is it just another big government regulation that will double the duration and severity of the Obama recession by killing even more jobs. ObamaCare is a fundamental attack on individual freedom, one that sets a precedent for completely unlimited federal power. If this stands, the next government with totalitarian leanings, whether it is still Obama with his power grabs marketed as “for our own good” or an attack that claims to come from our side of the political spectrum, will have no constitutional restrictions on how far it can go.
The November elections are our chance to say:
“We have not yet begun to fight!”
“We shall go on to the end.
We shall fight in France,
we shall fight on the seas and oceans,
we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air,
we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be.
We shall fight on the beaches,
we shall fight on the landing grounds,
we shall fight in the fields and in the streets,
we shall fight in the hills;
We shall never surrender!”
“Yesterday, June 28th, 2012 — a date which will live in infamy — the Constitution of the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by totalitarian forces . . . No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated assault on freedom, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.”
“We’re surrounded. That simplifies our problem of getting to these people and defeating them.”
“Remember, you are Americans. Not all the Communists in Hell can overrun you.”
“Nuts!”
You are being way too optimistic. I think the best we could hope for from Willard would be another David Souter or John Paul Stevens.
“We don’t care about your wildest dreams Lew.” Right on.
Note to Jacob Lew.....keep your mouth closed.. every time you speak you spew more lies.
Note to democrats....work to remove this ACA crap or prepare to become unemployed (like the majority of “We The People”)
(please pardon me)
Like hell.
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