Legal Commentary

The Most Progressive Legislation In 40 Years

By Big Tent Democrat

One of the arguments forwarded during the health bill debate was that the provisions would get stronger over time, as a constituency for new services developed. I thought it a doubtful assertion at the time (consider that no new government program - yes, a public insurance program - was created) and I imagine folks who argued that assertion are thinking it is doubtful now too. From today's NYTimes:

For starters, Republicans say they will try to withhold money that federal officials need to administer and enforce the law. [. . .] “They’ll get not one dime from us,” the House Republican leader, John A. Boehner of Ohio, told The Cincinnati Enquirer recently. “Not a dime. There is no fixing this.”

[. . . ] Senator Orrin G. Hatch of Utah, a senior Republican on the Finance Committee, has introduced a bill that would eliminate a linchpin of the new law: a requirement for many employers to offer insurance to employees or pay a tax penalty.

[. . .] Republicans say they will also try to scale back the expansion of Medicaid if states continue to object to the costs of adding millions of people to the rolls of the program for low-income people.

What you will have left is an individual mandate and state based exchanges (with inadequate subsidies.) Would that still be "the biggest progressive accomplishment in 40 years?"

Speaking for me only

Full post as published by TalkLeft on September 21, 2010 (boomark / email).