Just a provide even more of an exclamation point on Rob McKenna’s hypocrisy over the Commerce Clause, here’s a page that the Marijuana Policy Project put up shortly after the Gonzales v. Raich decision came down. In Gonzales v. Raich, the Supreme Court ruled that the Commerce Clause gives the federal government the right to arrest people who are following their state’s medical marijuana law. This decision (which was agreed upon by both the more liberal members of the court and Scalia) is why most legal experts believe that the challenge to the health care reform bill’s mandates will rejected.
What’s interesting about that page is that, of the 10 states that had medical marijuana laws at the time of the decision, all but two of the respective state Attorney Generals publicly affirmed that their state medical marijuana laws were still valid despite the ruling. One of the two who sat silent was Rob McKenna. In fact, I can’t find a single public statement from McKenna at that time standing up for the Washington voters who’d voted overwhelmingly to allow marijuana use among seriously ill individuals. This is why the Seattle Times editorial claiming that McKenna’s opposition is somehow rooted in his deep convictions about the Constitution is such a joke.
Instead, Josh Feit gets this one exactly right:
I’ll tell you exactly what Rob McKenna was thinking: Charlie Crist.
Sure McKenna may have jeopardized his shot at winning the governor’s race in 2012, but he has to make it through the primary to even have a chance. And even in a top-two primary (or especially in a top two primary), he needs the Republican base.
Feit thinks that McKenna’s gamble could work and get him to the Governor’s Mansion. I’m not so sure. But for the Seattle Times not to be able to see through his transparent bullshit – well, that’s pretty much what we’ve come to expect from them.
Lee and your pot-smoking KlownMates–
McKenna’s lawsuit is costing the taxpayers ZERO!
Florida is paying the costs.
McKenna may save State Taxpayers a bundle…you known, Obam-Mao’s smoke-and-mirrors unfunded mandates to the states LIKE US!
You KLOWNS have used nebulous arguments.
Why can’t you be more like Michael who said BRING IT ON!
McKenna discussed a likely lawsuit in DECEMBER.
You KLOWNS seem to actually believe there was no warning and it will cost us a fortune…when the exact opposite is true.
Whining about this is precisely what the Constitutional Conservatives are truly angry about.
But, you don’t want to get it.
You think high-pitched screeching will somehow make this go away. Seemed to work in getting Oba-Mao elected…I’ll grant you that.
But your Alinsky tactics have a half-life with the average American. You have MORE than blown thru that.
Leftist Screeching==Worried Unconstitutional and if so, trouble in Leftist Paradise.
Grow up!
The useful idiot @1 keeps the site counters whirling.
@3
Cynic-Al should work in a movie theater because he is so good at projecting.
OK Mr. Cynical. I get it now. We will sit down and be quiet. Just let us know when its ok to speak again….
Bob
Think 1980. Think the 1970’s. Slade Gorton kept going to court with the Indians Tribe over treaty rights (mainly fishing rights). He kept losing over and over again. He was told that he was going to lose but that did not stop him. He did, however, build a base of right wing support. That support voted for him in 1980 when he won his first senate election.
Rob McKenna wants to do the same thing, regardless of how much taxpayer dollars he spends.
@3
At least he’s sitting in his mom’s basement with his Spiderman pajamas leaving idiotic comments and not throwing bricks through Maria Cantwell’s office window.
@1: hahaha the idiot Klynical is at it again.
I love it when a dumbnut like Klynical cannot even grasp the hypocrisy argument that Lee is making.
Look, for all the crap about the “principled stand” of McKenna, it seems he ignored his principles when it came to the pot laws but suddenly found them when it came to opposing health care for all.
McKenna is a typical republican hypocrite and Klynical is too damn stoopid to see it.
Thanks Lee, good post! Hypocrisy is never so delicious as when it is pointed out in the face of “righteous” praise.
Let’s not overlook the fact it was Republicans who wanted insurance mandates in the first place.
http://www.dailyfinance.com/ar.....40/?cid=10
@7
Thanks!
@8
That’s a point that can’t be pointed out enough. Mandates have long been a Republican alternative to more robust progressive health care ideas.
@ 8 Roger if you own property in a flood plain does the federal government require you to buy flood insurance? I thought they did but seein’ you be a legal type thought you might have some idea.
@10 The general answer is that if you live in a designated flood zone, you’re either required to buy flood insurance or not allowed to buy it, but there are many complexities to this program that undermine efforts to generalize. The answer in a specific case depend on individual circumstances.
Flood insurance wouldn’t work if people were allowed to opt out until they experience flood damage to their property. All insurance works on risk-spreading principles. For the same reason, health insurance doesn’t work if people pay premiums only when they need health services.
Most of your lifetime health care expenses are concentrated in a few short time intervals of your life. Spreading those costs over a lifetime of premium payments keeps the insurance cost moderate. This model collapses if you allow people to pay into the system only when they’re sick.
In theory, you could protect the insurance system by giving people an opportunity to buy in at a certain age, say age 26, and if they don’t they’re permanently locked out. But that doesn’t work in practice because we lack the societal fortitude to deny medical care to nonpayers, so the cost of their care gets shifted to payers, creating the moral hazard of cost-transference from the irresponsible to the responsible.
The justification for government overriding individuals’ decisions to not purchase health insurance is avoiding this moral hazard. The rest of us are affected by their actions because we get stuck with their medical bills. Therefore, the old saying that “your right to swing your fist stops where my nose starts” comes into play. When your actions as an individual adversely affect others, society has a right to step in and regulate your behavior for the protection of others.
@10, I think you’re right, sludge puppy. Flood insurance is only offered through the federal government, though. As the free-market capitalist insurance industry doesn’t have the balls for such an undertaking.
@12 The federal flood insurance program is supposed to be self-supporting. That requires property owners to pay sufficient premiums to cover aggregate losses plus costs of administration. Given that no taxpayer subsidies are involved, there’s no reason why private insurance companies couldn’t service this market — provided federal rules requiring certain property owners to purchase flood insurance stayed in place.
This federally-regulated, privately-serviced, non-subsidized insurance market is, in fact, exactly what the health care reform bill sets up.
After 36 years of federal flood insurance program experience, though, Congress amended the law in 2004 because the program was, in fact, running a loss of about $200 million a year (that had to be made up by taxpayers) because a handful of insured properties were responsible for repetitive claims. Roughly 1% of the insured properties accounted for up to 30% of the claims. The 2004 amendments sought to set up a system for identifying these properties, and kicking them out of the program. Thus, if you own a high-risk property, or one that has experienced repetitive claims, you can’t buy flood insurance and you’re on your own if you experience a loss.
Obviously, this approach won’t work for health care, because losing a building to flooding isn’t the same thing as denying medical treatment.
Correction @13: “After 36 years of federal flood insurance program experience, though, Congress amended the law in 2004 because the program was, in fact, running a loss of about $200 million a year (that had to be made up by taxpayers) because a handful of insured properties were responsible for a disproportionate share of claims.”
My favorite thing about that airhead Cynical guy: he almost NEVER tries to actually argue the actual subject at hand.
Instead of trying to explain McKenna’s blatant inconsistency here, Mr. Cynical goes all Puddy on us, claiming the libs are dummies ‘cuz they smoke too much pot.
Then Cynical procedes to prove to us that he’s even MORE stupid than the stoners. A very effective strategy.
@15
It’s the patented Amy Holmes deflection strategy (Amy Holmes is a brain-dead twit who shows up on Bill Maher’s program once a season to humiliate herself). As soon as someone effectively points out the hypocrisy of the Republican position, you put your fingers in your ears and start screaming “Nancy Pelosi is a socialist!” and “Democrats do it too!” and hope that people are so annoyed by you that they don’t have any desire to engage with you and point out how absurd that is.
The Pupster doesn’t know much about insurance or floods for that matter but had read recently about people being required to buy flood insurance. The thinking was if one is required to buy flood insurance then it stands to reason that one can be required to buy health insurance.
While there is a lot to disagree with in the health bill the legality of requiring one to buy health insurance may be acceptable if the same can be said of flood insurance.
Thanks for the comments.
SP