Posted on 06/10/2017 2:50:09 AM PDT by GonzoII
He could simply not enforce is.. not enforce the penalties, right? Obama did it on immigration. Unfortunately trump might be still holding on to his initial belief stated that he thinks government has a role in healthcare.
For the record, we have no wall, amnesty for dreamers. He has been good with getting rid of some, not all of Obamas Christian white death policies. Foreign policy.. who in their right minds sells arms to Saudi Arabia.. we were attacked on 9/11 by their idealouges. That was a deal our children and grandchildren will die for, if history is reliable.
He never took the bully pulpit on the budget... did he sign a budget without wall funding and without full repeal? He is Bush.. dragging us into direct conflict, a proxy war with Russia in Syria because a dead child’s body washed up in front of cameras.. /rant.
“Reconciliation amounts to ‘my-way-or-the-highway,’ not both parties working together to solve the nation’s problem as Americans expect them to.”
You mean sort of like the passage of ObummerCare, except without the Louisiana Purchase, Cornhusker Kickback, and other legislative shenanigans?
How does ALLOWING competition across state lines become a jurisdictional issue? I could see how PREVENTING competition could be a jurisdictional issue.
My point here is that competition is natural human behavior, so allowing competition is a passive involvement, whereas preventing competiton is an active involvement.
The idea here is to discourage monopolies, which involve barriers (usually government imposed) to competition.
Can the removal of such barriers be construed as a federal jurisdictional intrusion? I would think the federal intrusion would be the imposing of the barriers in the first place.
In short, NOT removing barriers to competition across state lines is the federal intrusion.
States have the right to regulate insurance companies doing business within their borders. The federal government does not. If an insurance company wishes to do business all they have to do is comply with the same regulations that other companies do.
“States have the right to regulate insurance companies doing business within their borders. The federal government does not.”
Your inference that this is a ‘states rights’ issue is misconstrued.
The Constitition is all about protecting individuals from the state and protecting the states against the federal government. To that end, it carefully limits the scope and authority of the federal government and specifically enumerates the few roles that are the purvey of the federal government. Among them are national defense and interstate commerce.
We all know the very reason for granting power to the federal government (congress) to “regulate commerce among the States” was to insure free trade among the states and prevent a State Legislature from imposing discriminatory laws upon out-of-state business entities doing business within a state.
These anti-trust protections were reinforced by the Sherman Act under Truman, but then destroyed (in the insurance industry) in1945 by McCarran-Ferguson, a FEDERAL law which exempted the states from federal (and constitutional) anti-trust protection within the insurance industry.
The McCarran-Ferguson legislation was designed by insurance lobbyists representing the largest insurers to disrupt free trade among the States and snuff out competition. As with all anti-competition legislation, its drafters and defenders do not admit the true purpose (monopoly), but instead claim some noble benefit to consumers, anti-quackery, etc.
One such “noble” argument used by the insurance monopolies, who desperately want to keep McCarran-Ferguson in place, is to invoke the boogyman of “federalization”. They say that to repeal McCarran-Ferguson would be a violation of states rights.
This clever fear-mongering is tailored to appeal to us anti-big-government conservatives who are naturally inclined to resist the “federalizing” of anything.
That’s usually a good instinct, but in this case we are being hoodwinked. The anti-trust role of the federal government is 100% constitutional and protects individuals from monopolies by ensuring free commerce across state lines. To invoke states rights in defense of a monopoly is disingenuous and the height of chutzpah.
Anyway, McCarran-Ferguson is a FEDERAL law, so repealing it and thereby restoring competition among insurers across state lines should not present a problem to defenders of states rights.
The courts have ruled that insurance policies are not commerce, they are contracts. And the Constitution does not give the federal government the power to regulate that.
“The courts have ruled that insurance policies are not commerce, they are contracts. And the Constitution does not give the federal government the power to regulate that.”
Yes, I forgot to address that...
The courts can be wrong, and are in the case.
Look, corruption takes many forms and uses many justifications. Special interests will use any creative device imaginable to circumvent the intent of the Constitution - which was to protect Individual Freedom. This commerce vs. contract distinction is just another of those creative devices in order to circumvent anti-trust laws.
If any two parties enter into a transaction, that is trade, that is commerce. In order to ensure Individual Freedom, parties must be free to enter into mutually acceptable transactions of their own choosing. In order to ensure that, there can be no barriers which exclude certain parties from entering into transactions with certain others. Parties must be able to access and compare alternative transactions - in other words: compete in a free market.
The fact that a law is on the books, either due to legislation or a court precedent, does not make it right. Laws are subject to change.
That is what we are discussing here - what SHOULD the law be - not what IS the law.
Because you say so? Well thanks for clearing that up for us.
What? The courts can’t be wrong?
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