Cuccinelli says Va. will sue over health-care bill

[underpants]

Source: Richmond Times-Dispatch

Virginia will file suit against the federal government charging that the health-care reform legislation is unconstitutional, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli's office confirmed last night.

Cuccinelli is expected to argue that the bill, with its mandate that requires nearly every American to be insured by 2014, violates the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution. The attorney general's office will file suit once President Barack Obama signs the bill into law, which could occur early this week.

Cuccinelli's argument is that the mandate included in the reform bill creates a legal conflict between the federal government and Virginia.

"We believe the federal law is unconstitutional as it is based on the commerce clause. Simply put, not buying insurance is not engaging in commerce," the attorney general added.

"If you are not engaged in commerce, the federal government cannot regulate this inaction. Just being alive is not interstate commerce. If it were, Congress could regulate every aspect of our lives."


Read more: http://www2.timesdispatch.com/rtd/news/state_regional/state_regional_govtpolitics/article/HEAL221S1_20100322-000603/332103/

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FICA
Commerce clause
Necessary and Proper clause
the 10th Amendment

Read the Constitution Mr. Attorney General

[No Elephants]

1. Not the Commerce Clause, dufus. The Due Process Clause and the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, MAYBE.

But you'd need a healthy, twenty five year old as a plaintiff in the case with Virginia, not only a State.

[still_one]

13. Does that mean that I can get rid of my car insurance? /nt

[Recursion]

18. Yes: don't drive a car

You can't opt out of having emergency rooms treat you (on my dime if you don't have health insurance), though.

[still_one]

20. no, if I am in an accident, they will bring me to an emergency room if I am unconscious

and who pays for that?

Same thing also applies to social security, is that unconstitutional?

[ladywnch]

26. I thought 'dufus' was spelled 'doofus'. A 'doofus' by any other spelling

would still be as stupid.

[Craftsman]

Dup

[Craftsman]

2. The AG of TX has said the same.

[FSogol]

3. Using State resources to pursue political battles? Time to Impeach. n/t

[cyclezealot]

7. The court might be the final hurdle..

I say , tell this dam Virginia Attorney General Freak, if the court gets in the the way of democracy, we should demand Roberts, Scalia, etc be impeached and will push Congress to do such..
Let's start this movement. They already gave us Citizens vs FEC , giving corporations control over our politics.
That alone is enough to demand the justices be impeached...

see story below...
on 3/19/10:
Will Supreme Court Kill the Obama Health Care Reform Plan?
.
CBS reports that Idaho Will Sue If Health Care Bill Passes.
The Virginia attorney General has similar plans.
The rogue five right wing radical extremists who are running the reputation of the Supreme Court into cesspool territory could decide on whether the congressional vote on Health Care goes into law.
.
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Will-Supreme-Court-Decide-by-Rob-Kall-100319-129.html

[DCBob]

4. Dont they need an actual case to sue?

The bill isnt even law yet..

[Lasher]

5. The search is on, activist judges wanted.

So now the GOP thinks activist judges are good guys.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

6. This is the asshole that thinks Obama is a Kenyan, right?

[NeedleCast]

25. Yup

Easilly the most emberassing politician elected in Virginia in the last 50 years, and that's saying a lot.

[Paulie]

8. Let them play games

Adding in a Medicare part E option fully falls under the federal side. :)

[spicegal]

9. I just pulled out by little handy dandy copy of the Constitution and fail to see where

it supports his claim. If the court uphold his assertion, then I suppose it would also be unconstitutional to mandate home and auto insurance. Or, why not make the grounds for getting rid of Medicare and Social Security, since we're forced to buy those "products" as well, like it or not. I'm going to email Kooinelli's office today.

[S_B_Jackson]

12. A small point, if you don't mind....

then I suppose it would also be unconstitutional to mandate home and auto insurance

The federal government does not mandate either. Insurance for your automobile must only be maintained if you drive on public roads or have decided not to post a (in Texas) $5000 bond with the state. As for homes, the mortgage holder can require insurance, but you own the home free and clear, there is no requirement - other than common sense) that you carry insurance of any type.

[MARALE]

17. So I guess that you are not mandated to have health insurance

if you do not go to the doctor or hospital. would anyone know if you have or were paying for insurance if you didn't? I don't know what the bill mandates. does it mandate that if you are getting treatment, you must have insurance, or even if you are not getting treated.

[underpants]

31. FICA

the Feds do require "purchase" of that

[CLANG]

10. Good luck with that, ahole!

[Blue_Tires]

11. cool...the commonwealth is running a deficit in the billions and he pulls this stunt...

[The Hitman]

14. Takings Clause

Maybe. Especially because the government is mandating that people give up $$ to go to a private company? But wasn't that decided in Kelo v. City of New Haven?

I think that the legal arguments favoring unconstitutionality are baloney. Unfortunately we now have a conservative activist Supreme Court which is pissed off (see Roberts/Alito and Obama). I don't think Cuccinelli has a leg to stand on at the trial or Circuit level. But after Citizens United I don't think there is anything the Roberts court won't do to strike down any progressive law.

I say court-packing. Now.

[cmd]

15. Would that be a frivolous law suit

or Republican tort reform?

[fasttense]

16. So, they are only fighting the mandate. So all those poor

health care insurance corporations wont get all those extra customers.

This is a win, win.

[66 dmhlt]

19. A Rebuttal by Yale Law Prof. Jack Balkin

(NOTE:Below is from a detailed point-by-point rebuttal to Randy Barret's 3/21/10 WaPo article "Is health-care reform constitutional?". Links to that article, as well as those buttressing Dr. Balkin's points, are in my Source link below.)

The most likely constitutional challenge will be that the individual mandate to purchase health insurance is unconstitutional because it forces people to buy insurance. Barnett omits to mention in his op-ed that the mandate is actually structured as a tax: if you don't buy insurance, you are assessed a tax for each month you fail to pay premiums. Barnett argues that individual mandate must be unconstitutional because the government can't require people to do anything; however, the government can make you pay taxes. It does so every year. Congress pretty clearly has the power to pass such a tax under its powers to tax and spend for the general welfare. This is an easy case for constitutionality.

Congress also has the power to require the individual mandate under the Commerce clause, despite Barnett's objection. That is because Congress can regulate economic activities that have a cumulative economic effect on interstate commerce, and as Justice Scalia pointed out in Gonzales v. Raich (a case, by the way, that Barnett himself litigated and lost in the Supreme Court), Congress can regulate even non-economic activities if it believes that this is necessary to make its regulation of interstate commerce effective. As I've explained elsewhere ...

Source:
http://balkin.blogspot.com/2010/03/if-you-cant-stop-bill-just-have-another.html

[bluestateguy]

21. From the party of tort reform that is agianst frivilous lawsuits

In other words they want unelected judges to legislate from the bench.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

22. Sheesh, I'm tired of paying for this guy.

Virginia income taxes are due May 1. I have no choice but to pay them. I'd like to think that I was paying for something useful, but clearly that is not happening with the money that I'm paying for this loser. I'm sure he'll have lots of assistants from Regent U. law school on the case, sucking even more money from the public teat.

It's classic money laundering. Money is taken from the public and handed to proponents of Republican causes, where it goes around in circles, never to emerge again. It's all perfectly legal. See: Iraq, and any number of other situations where this has happened.

Money laundering and millennialism - that's the Republican party in a nutshell.

[AlbertCat]

23. Commerce....defined

Commerce:

Noun
1. The activity of buying and selling, especially on a large scale.

2. Dated social dealings between people

3. archaic Sexual intercourse


Seems to me the Health Care Bill's mandate covers all 3 of these definitions.

[RedCloud]

24. First they complain. Then take the stimulus. Now act like demagogues.

[msanthrope]

27. I can't wait to read how an excise tax is unconstitutional. Poor asshole,

he doesn't have the brains to try.

[eringer]

28. Has Anyone Checked Cuccinelli's Credentials?

He is a graduate of a law school that was founded in a church basement in 1972. His boss, McDonnell, is not much better with a sheepskin from Pat Robertson's university. As a taxpaying citizen of the state of Virginia, I am sick of people like this that spend my money for such foolishness. If they have that much time on their hands, maybe the VA AG office is overstaffed.

[Arkana]

29. Yeah, pretty sure this will reach the same end as his crusade

to kill protections for all LGBT college students in VA.

[underpants]

30. Funny on the right wing talk radio channel here they had a law professor say...

that any judge is going to throw Cuccinelli's suit out of court

it was a Washington & Lee professor (missed his name) who said "Cuccinelli just says things for his political benefit"

it was hilarious to hear on the powerful WRVA which is king of talk radio around here and host of the usual suspects' shows

[dogfacedboy]

32. Frivolous Lawsuits. Aren't the Republichimps opposed to frivolous lawsuits?