someone here recently asked if legal challenges to HCR (now the law) had merit...

[thotzRthingz]

Since the HCR LAW places an unfunded MANDATE (burden) on the STATES, with no "opt out" provision, some legal challenges could succeed?

ref. one such lawsuit: http://www.theind.com/news/5951-its-official-la-signs-on-with-fla-in-legal-challenge-to-hcr

The cool thing would be:

a MANDATE could be struck down, by the courts (but the remainder of the "reform provisions" would still stand)... and with certain STATES choosing to OPT OUT (following any successful challenge)... that could open the door to a Federal GOVT run system (i.e., a "public option" eventually morphing into "single-payer").

[Motown_Johnny]

1. that is my dream too....

[thotzRthingz]

2. Could it be that this was "the plan" all along? I mean to say... DEMS had to weigh the

possibility... right along with their distasteful having "played ball" with the FOR-PROFIT lobbyists. Knowing that the REPUKES would look for an opening to challenge an "unfunded mandate" could have been their backdoor (to an eventual single payer system).

Were they that smart... or is this an unintended consequence? Either way, I would really like to see this scenario to played out! ;)

[frazzled]

3. Stop passing on right-wing misinformation: there is indeed an opt-out provision

The State Waiver for Innovation, in which they can opt out of the mandates if they present a workable alternative plan (including single payer).

Ron Wyden explains it:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/24/wyden-health-care-lawsuit_n_511748.html

Speaking to the Huffington Post on Tuesday, Wyden discussed -- for one of the first times in public -- legislative language he authored which "allows a state to go out and do its own bill, including having no individual mandate."

It's called the "Empowering States to be Innovative" amendment. And it would, quite literally, give states the right to set up their own health care system -- with or without an individual mandate or, for that matter, with or without a public option -- provided that, as Wyden puts it, "they can meet the coverage requirements of the bill."

"Why don't you use the waiver provision to let you go set up your own plan?" the senator asked those who threaten health-care-related lawsuits. "Why would you just say you are going to sue everybody, when this bill gives you the authority and the legal counsel is on record as saying you can do it without an individual mandate?"

The provision actually was taken directly from Wyden's Healthy Americans Act -- the far-more innovative health care reform legislation he authored with Republican co-sponsors. In that bill there is also an individual mandate that would require Americans to purchase insurance coverage. But states that found the mandate objectionable could simply create and insert a new system in its place. All it would require is applying for a waiver from the Department of Health and Human Services, which has a 180-day window to confirm or deny such a waiver.

[Greyhound]

4. So we can count on you for the first billion? n/t

[frazzled]

5. Your reply doesn't even make sense

You said there was no way for the states to opt out of the mandate. There explicitly is. End of story.

[Greyhound]

6. Your assertion that this meaningless, unfunded, ill-defined pacifier is a real option

is disingenuous at best.

Where is the model? Where is the money? Do the citizens have to continue to pay extortion to mass-murder inc. while the "state health care system" is built?

[thotzRthingz]

7. "OPT OUT provided they can meet the coverage requirements of the bill" is also an UNFUNDED MANDATE!

[inna]

10. No, YOU stop passing on RW misinformation.

Shame on you.

:thumbsdown:

[unblock]

8. are "unfunded mandates" even unconstitutional?

i thought they were considered loathesome but i didn't think they were actually unconstitutional.

in any event, if that were it, they could simply make other funding (e.g., highway funds) contingent on this.

[thotzRthingz]

9. GOVT mandating purchases of PRIVATE (for profit) PRODUCTS is questionable...

if not unconstitutional... but that remains to be seen (if/when the courts hear arguments of this nature).