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Weekend Political Wrap-Up, Paul Ryan Edition
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Esquire Blogger Sees Paul Ryan, Shreds His Safety Net
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The Spectacle Blog
Ann Coulter has now written an unqualified defense of Romneycare. What she doesn’t appear to realize is how useful her column will be to defenders of Obamacare.
She writes, “It’s not as if we had a beautifully functioning free market in health care until Gov. Mitt Romney came along and wrecked it by requiring that Massachusetts residents purchase their own health insurance.” Coulter points out that many conservatives and libertarians believed “mandatory private health insurance was considered the free-market alternative to the Democrats’ piecemeal socialization of the entire medical industry.” She argues that the Heritage Foundation and the Manhattan Institute were conservative think tanks that backed Romneycare.
Every single on one of these arguments could be used for Obamacare. Obamacare is mandatory private health insurance purchased through exchanges with subsidies and expanded Medicaid thrown in. That is also the basic architecture of Romneycare. Obama will argue that his plan wasn’t a government takeover of health care because it’s “not as if we had a beautifully functioning free market in health care until President Barack Obama came along and wrecked it.” He can also point out that many libertarians and conservatives were desperate enough to support his approach when the Democrats were touting policies to its left.
Coulter goes on to say that Romneycare passed by overwhelming majorities in both houses of the state legislature, including Scott Brown’s vote. But Brown was only one of a handful of Republicans in the legislature. Those overwhelming majorities were overwhelmingly Democratic. And when you look at the promiment photo of the Romneycare signing ceremony, you will see not the leaders of the Heritage Foundation and the Manhattan Institute beaming with Romney but the Democratic leaders of the state legislature and Teddy Kennedy. Continually dropping Bob Moffit’s name doesn’t alter this reality.
Finally, Coulter defends the individual mandate on policy grounds. It’s no worse than other examples of government coercion, she says. The Constitution doesn’t create an unalienable right not to buy health insurance, she argues. The individual mandate is necessary to deal with the free rider problem created in part “the 1946 federal law essentially requiring hospitals to provide free medical services to all comers.” Coulter writes, “The hyperventilating over government-mandated health insurance confuses a legal argument with a policy objection,” even suggesting, messy constitutional issues aside, Obamacare wouldn’t be as big of a deal if all it did was require people to buy health insurance.
Leave aside the facts that many of us do oppose the individual mandate on policy grounds as well as legal ones, and that the federal law she blames for the free rider problem passed in 1986, not 1946. Every one of these arguments can and will be used to defend Obamacare. And virtually every one of them is wrong, as concerns both Obamacare and Romneycare.
The individual mandate is less about the free rider problem than making the ban on pre-existing conditions sustainable by forcing healthier individuals into the insurance market. The costs of expanding coverage in this fashion have far exceeded the costs of free riders. None of Coulter’s examples of government coercion involve forcing two private entities into a contract with one another. The Constitution doesn’t enumerate the rights of the people, but the powers of the federal government.
Coulter’s entire argument hinges on Romneycare being constitutional and Obamacare being unconstitutional. I’ll let pass for a moment the problems with her apparent endorsement of untrammeled state government power and acknowledge, as I have before, that states have police powers that the Constitution doesn’t grant to the federal government. Obamacare raises a constitutional issue that Romneycare doesn’t.
The number of people who will find this distinction compelling in a general election is vanishingly small. Worse, the swing vote on the Supreme Court doesn’t evaluate the constitutionality of laws based on the ratifying public’s original understanding of the Constitution (though the court should). A critical mass of justices will look to see whether the president and Congress were acting on a mainstream view of acceptable government power. Coulter has given them a list of examples to bolster this view. Defending Romneycare undermines the arguments against Obamacare by making them looking like partisan point-scoring.
Pete| 2.2.12 @ 12:07PM
Do I need another reason not to vote for Romney EVER? Seriously RomneyCare is socialized medicine at the state level and with a few tweaks it can easily be nationalized. Yep. I look at the pigs, then at the farmers and I can not tell the difference.
Bob S| 2.2.12 @ 12:13PM
Unbelievable.
On second thought, nope, the kool aid tastes mighty fine and the ability for self deception still reigns in the hearts of - I was gonna say men, but. . . .
Anyway.
What's not to like about neo-conservatism, boys and girls?
First there was Geo. W. B.
Then there was G. W. Obama.
And just like there was Bob Dole and John McCain, now we have Mitt Obamacare.
Wow, ain't crony democracy grand?
Tobyw| 2.2.12 @ 12:47PM
The Boston Globe has a two part article on Romney Care consisting of 24 smallish pages. I suggest you read it, it corresponds with my understanding of the bill.
http://articles.boston.com/201.....al-mandate
http://articles.boston.com/201.....ealth-care
Resist We Much! | 2.2.12 @ 12:47PM
Ann (Coulter) Disaster
http://predicthistunpredictpas.....aster.html
Your Inner Voice| 2.2.12 @ 12:50PM
The effect of this endorsement by the GOProud advisor Ann Coulter is that it demonstrates the subversion of previous stands (and her future credibility) by the Party Establishment choice for the nomination and her submission to him, as well as a picture of what will happen within the party when they nominate and attempt to support the next GOP loser. Romney is the end of movement conservatism in the GOP.
StanO| 2.2.12 @ 1:28PM
All of this discussion is just so much trash talk until there is a solution for dealing with people that don't get insurance. If you don't like individual mandate, there must be an alternative, until there is the huge cost of illegal alien care, emergency room care, and delayed care will continue to crush the system and increase the cost for all of us who are responsible.
I for one propose that the mandate is enforced the minute you ask for care anywhere or anyhow. If you ask for someone else to pay for your care then you have to accept enrollment and permanently.
kingsmill| 2.2.12 @ 4:33PM
Emergency room care has not declined under Romney care. Court decisions have ordered coverage of resident aliens under Romney care. Overall costs have ballooned. Care has declined and premiums continue to rise. Liberal policy does not work.
Eric| 2.2.12 @ 2:00PM
It seems that Coulter has allowed her dedication to Romney's presidential bid to undermine her principles. Blaming Democrats for bad law in this case is to ignore the 600 pound elephant in the living room: government has no legitimate reason to administer health care insurance for private citizens.
Elias| 2.2.12 @ 3:16PM
Principles. I wonder if she ever had any...
Mr. Antle points out errors in her column, of fact, judgment, and misrepresentation. Seems this is a pattern for Ann. I used to love reading Coulter's columns, her scathing wit, when it was directed at liberals and RINOs. I read her faithfully every week for years. Until I found her lying through her teeth about Rick Santorum to imply he was in favor of illegal immigration here: http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48423
In supporting her man Romney, she said Santorum voted against E-Verify. What she left out was that Santorum DOES support E-Verify, he just voted against the McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill of '06, which contained a weak, voluntary E-Verify provision.
Does Coulter have principles? Apparently not. She is, after all, a lawyer and will say anything to advance her cause. Just like obama.
You Don't Say!| 2.3.12 @ 10:17AM
How about that, a conservative talking head misrepresenting the facts when attacking a political enemy. Who'd have thought such a thing possible?
The funny part is that you only recently noticed her pattern of lying because before it was directed at "liberals" and "RINOS" under the guise of that "scathing wit" you so loved.
You admit you enjoyed the practice when it was aimed at those with whom you disagreed, but when she employed it toward Santorum you suddenly saw through her.
If only conservatives could be as discriminating when it comes to the misrepresentation of those with whom they disagree. Imagine what might be accomplished with honest commentary rather than hysterical fearmongering.
Rocco| 2.3.12 @ 9:53PM
The utter and ostentatious sanctimony and blind hypocrisy of liberals is never in short supply, and always entertaining in a warped and sick sort of way.
Preach us another sermon about "fairness," you who were probably "much OK" with the mainstream media and their leftist string-pullers trying to pin blame for the Tucson shootings on any conservative figure who was currently in the public eye; you who were probably "much OK" with the Journ-O-List template of branding "racists" any and all Americans who disagree with the leftist-totalitarian agenda of ruling-class elitist sophists. (And those are just two of literally thousands of occurrences of liberal hypocrisy, double-standardizing, and false-witness-bearing.)
Mike| 2.2.12 @ 2:03PM
Wow. She's gone Arianna Huffington.
Tim the Enchanter| 2.2.12 @ 2:30PM
Things like this happen when you start to pal around with the likes of Bill Maher.
Your Inner Voice| 2.2.12 @ 2:56PM
Things like this happen when you become an advisor to a group dedicated to undermining the family, starting with unholy matrimony of physically opposable parts(GOProud) in contradiction to what much of your career as a pundit for conservatism has been claimed. Ann once again proves the elitism of the super rich who no longer need to go by the rules and laws that the low-born must adhere to, as she and Romney are above both the US laws and God's laws. She no longer needs either and finds them both a roadblock to the power she now feels she deserves.
Your Inner Voice| 2.2.12 @ 2:58PM
...and which she expects to receive in reward for this toadying when the Bishop Romney ascends to power.
Citizen Jerry| 2.2.12 @ 6:54PM
You think Bishop Romney is going to ascend to power? I'm not so sure. We have a squishy moderate Democrat Light against a REAL Democrat. Most people will go for the real deal.
As for Annie, she's been writing screeds for so long, she's become a screed. For this Reagan conservative, she's a complete embarrassment.
Your Inner Voice| 2.2.12 @ 9:43PM
I think The Bishop of the Magic Undies thinks he is going to ascend to power, as does his new squeeze, Annie, and some of the Establishment elite., which was enough for her to agree to do such dirty work, in anticipation of a cabinet post, DoJ, or a Supreme Court nomination.
George S| 2.2.12 @ 2:59PM
It boils down to two choices -- and only two choices:
Do we, the people, as a matter of policy proscribe that those who cannot afford medical care be left on their own? Or do we subsidize them to help pay for medical care.
If you take the latter argument, then you have to argue increments or degrees of assistance. Once you do that, then the costs associated with medical care rise. Once they rise, they have to be controlled. Therefore -- and eventually -- we get RomneyCare at the state level and ObamaCare at the federal level.
Once government gets into the game, health care costs will rise. Once government gets out, healthcare costs drop. I will argue that the drop in cost will make it more accessible BUT at the cost of denying care to the first comers. A sort of reverse Ponzi.
We cannot have it both ways: compassion AND freedom to control our health care decisions.
Coulter is right. Romney is not the problem. Entitlement to medical care (Medicare and Medicaid) is the problem. ObamaCare is not the solution but the natural progression.
ayrnieu| 2.2.12 @ 3:40PM
What lovely comments, here and to her post on HE. Not-Romney's got the 'rabble vote', all right. I'll keep waiting a bit for any serious objection to him, or any serious support for either let-felons-vote or attack-from-the-left, but you don't have a whole year to get bored with saying that Coulter is dead to you, etc.
seriocomic222| 2.2.12 @ 6:46PM
For me, it all comes down this: a state issue vs. a federal issue. I don't care how much Romneycare looks like Obamacare; the game changes when it's Washington D. C. telling all 50 states and 300 million plus people to go this route. I hope the Supremes see it this way.
Brent| 2.2.12 @ 7:13PM
This article just shows how completely irrational conservatives have become. Of course a defense of Romneycare is a defense of Obamacare! The only reason the right hates Obamacare is because a Democratic president passed it. Had a Republican president passed it, it would have been mostly supported by the right.
Look at the 2008 GOP presidential primaries. Mitt Romney got the endorsement of almost all conservatives (Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, William Bennett, Mark Levin, Dennis Prager, Glenn Beck, Hugh Hewitt, Laura Ingraham, Jim DeMint). If Romneycare is a travesty now, why wasn't it a travesty in 2008?
AM| 2.2.12 @ 7:41PM
We didn't have Obamacare then. The architect for Romneycare was the architect for Obamacare. I know for Rush that he was more for Romney because he thought he was better than McCain. Now that Obamacare is here and drawn up by same people as Romneycare, this means we are not going to get rid of Obamacare. This is all smoke and mirrors. Obamacare is going to lead to single payer and the elites on both sides want this because it is one way to control the people.
Your Inner Voice| 2.2.12 @ 9:49PM
Back in 2008 Juan Amnesty McVain was the party Establishment pick for the POTUS nomination and those names you dropped loathed Juan then (as the left leaning party pick forced on us) as much as they loath Mittens now, and most did not endorse him until the last minute as a protest vote. It was not effective then and they will be too chicken to get in an endorsement until way too late this time.
Carolynn | 2.2.12 @ 7:27PM
Tell it to her personally, I'm sure you have a line into Coulter. Why are you trashing this Icon. Stop cannibalizing each other, we're sick of it.
Scott| 2.2.12 @ 8:44PM
thank you
Jody| 2.3.12 @ 7:10AM
Yeah, quit complaining everyone and fall into line like you are supposed to do. You are making people who don't understand fighting for your beliefs, principles and what you consider to be right nervous. Afterall, it isn't like we are on the brink of fiscal disaster because we have encouraged these political toady's to spend us into the toilet - oh, wait...
John| 2.2.12 @ 7:57PM
Yes, Romneycare is bad policy. It deprives people in Massachusetts of liberty.
I hate Romneycare. That said, the NY Slimes calling Romney's opposition to Obamacare an "almost comical contradiction" confirms they don't understand -- or they just don't give a damn about -- the Constitutional limits placed on the national government by article 1, section 8 and the 10th Amendment. Moreover, they apparenetly never read Federalist No. 45 in which Madison makes it clear that federal power was to be very limited in scope:
"The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government, are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course
of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State."
Bill Maher| 2.2.12 @ 8:11PM
I couldn't be more proud of my friend, Annie, then in her defense of socialized medine administered by Nurse Rachet.
Scott| 2.2.12 @ 8:43PM
Let me be clear to all you "true" conservatives.... I don't give a damn who the republican nominee is. I want Obama out! Anyone but Obama. Stop the freakin litmus tests already.
Becka James| 2.2.12 @ 9:22PM
I am a true conservative, and because I am, I do give a damn who the nominee is. Anyone but Obama is lame. If we aren't going to nominate a conservative, then we are going to lose. Obama will flatten Mitt Romney and Ron Paul. He will not beat Gingrich or Santorum. And as for your freakin litmus test - you need to get one. Just what are you, anyway? One of those "precious" independents we are all supposed to care about?
Your Inner Voice| 2.2.12 @ 9:57PM
The Bishop of the Magic Undies will be just as successful this time as Juan Amnesty McVain(the Other Soros candidate, and recent Romney endorser) was last time. Why accept Marxism-lite when I can get the commie-in-chief to give me a free pass to rape and pillage that horrible 1%? The One is the real deal, and with him in again I'll never have to work another day of my life. The Bishop is just a shiny, fake piece of glass. Viv la Revolucion!
Jody| 2.3.12 @ 7:14AM
What good will it do us if we do manage to elect a liberal Republican like Romney? Seriously - does anyone really think he is going to have the courage and principles to fight for the substatial reforms that are needed to stop the fiscal disaster to which we are heading? We are going to have to do some major cutting to the federal gov't to even get back to simply no deficit spending much less running a surplus to begin to pay down this huge debt and the $100 trillion in future spending we have promised with no way to pay. If collapse and ugliness are coming I would rather real liberals be in power so that there is no question who is responsible.
Daniel| 2.2.12 @ 10:34PM
Coulter is a social conservative, not a constitutional conservative. She would defend replacing constitutional government with a Christian theocracy.
Your Inner Voice| 2.3.12 @ 9:40AM
Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it...Half of the signers of the Constitution had Divinity degrees(Theology) http://www.freerepublic.com/fo.....3314/posts
The Constitution was specifically designed to protect the people and their religious beliefs (a main reason people came to the continent to begin with) from gov't incursions on the liberty they had just won from tyranny with their own blood.
Ann Coulter merely believes that she can shove aside certain personal principles for the moment to get a politician in her pocket, to acquire power, (now that her success as an author makes her wealthy) with which she thinks she will then use for "good". She seems to have forgotten that she can't dig her foundations with the devil's shovel and not get slivers.
The biggest mistake any conservative can make is to abandon moral principles for pragmatic purposes, as conservatism ONLY exists in its principles, the only thing it has to differentiate it from the pandering of progressivism.
To imagine conservatism outside of social conservatism is PURE FANTASY as no such animal exists. A healthy society starts with the tradition nuclear family in ALL its traditional roles, based in traditional Judeo-Christian Biblical principles, and expanding out from there. That is how its (The US) laws were formed and written, and without a consistent application of those basic principles across society this country, like all of the others before it, WILL IMPLODE, as it is now doing.
Brooklyn| 2.3.12 @ 12:14AM
What happened to the tea party? Weren't we suppose to nominate people who represented our principles? Romney's not a small government guy. If we are to continue to add to our gains of 2010, clearly we have to nominate true conservatives with a conservative at the top of the ticket. That's Rick Santorum. Ann Coulter has lost her way.
Your Inner Voice| 2.3.12 @ 10:53AM
Ironically, one of Ann's parents was Catholic.
dmm| 2.3.12 @ 10:49AM
The fact that some of the arguments could be used to support Obamacare doesn't make them bad arguments. And while it's true that "many" oppose the individual mandate on policy grounds as well as legal one, many others probably hate Obamacare for one of a dozen other reasons. Coulter is right to point out that there's plenty to hate in Obamacare without fixating on the mandate.
And while it's true that most voters don't have a nuanced enough understanding of constitutional law to appreciate the somewhat technical reasons why Romneycare was constitutional while Obamacare may not be, more and more people do, and more and more people *should.* The constitution is not a set of arbitrary rules but the embodiment of principles many conservatives claim to support (hello, tea partiers?). So the fact that one act may violate the constitution would seem to be a significant reason why conservatives should like it less.
And, of course, the constitutional distinction will end up being of ultimate importance if Obamacare gets struck down. At that point, the whole issue becomes nearly moot.