Legal Commentary

?We Have to Pass the Bill So That You Can Find Out What Is In It?

By Eugene Volokh

From a speech on health care by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (caught by The Wall Street Journal?s Best of the Web). Here?s the context:

You?ve heard about the controversies within the bill, the process about the bill, one or the other. But I don?t know if you have heard that it is legislation for the future, not just about health care for America, but about a healthier America, where preventive care is not something that you have to pay a deductible for or out of pocket. Prevention, prevention, prevention ? it?s about diet, not diabetes. It?s going to be very, very exciting.

But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy. Furthermore, we believe that health care reform, again I said at the beginning of my remarks, that we sent the three pillars that the President?s economic stabilization and job creation initiatives were education and innovation ? innovation begins in the classroom ? clean energy and climate, addressing the climate issues in an innovative way to keep us number one and competitive in the world with the new technology, and the third, first among equals I may say, is health care, health insurance reform. Health insurance reform is about jobs. This legislation alone will create 4 million jobs, about 400,000 jobs very soon.

It?s going to be very, very exciting!

Full post as published by The Volokh Conspiracy on March 11, 2010 (boomark / email).