Just some friction in The Machine

Posted 8:12 PM by Gerald Klaas
Interesting article in The Washington Post today. The authors cite several Supreme Court cases that they believe would be used to test any health care mandates. Their conclusion seems to be that Congress won't be able to come up with a law that will pass constitutional muster.

Posted 11:55 AM by Gerald Klaas
According to Yahoo News, the White House appears ready to drop 'public option'. I wonder who finally figured out that government run health care is unconstitutional?

Back in June, the Wall Street Journal published an opinion piece suggesting that government-run health care may be unconstitutional because it would be impossible to implement without violating the right to privacy established in Roe v. Wade.

Personally, I think it's much more likely that the Supreme Court would invalidate a public health option based on "takings" violations of the 5th Amendment as in the case of
RAILROAD RETIREMENT BOARD v. ALTON R. CO., 295 U.S. 330 (1935) .

What most people don't know is that Social Security taxes, according to the Supreme Court case Helvering v. Davis, are "true taxes, their purpose being simply to raise revenue . . . available for the general support of Government." Our government convinced the Supreme Court in 1937 that there is absolutely no connection between Social Security taxes and the benefits paid. People have no right to Social Security benefits regardless of how much they've paid into "the system", therefore it's not an insurance or annuity program as was found unconstitutional in the Railroad Retirement v Alton case.

Maybe the White House has figured out that the Supreme Court may well overturn forced government "insurance".