Critics of income disparity, wider now than at any time since 1928, most often decry it in moral terms. Both the poor and the rich are said to be “undeserving” – the poor of their less than modest circumstances and the rich of their opulence. We’re told that the poor deserve – are entitled, have the right – not to be poor. The rich remain…
A standard defense of Mr. Obama’s signature legislation is that something is better than nothing. Trying is better than not trying. Giving it the old college try beats sitting on the sidelines. These are banal bromides, of course, but does their theme nevertheless apply to Obamacare?
Like many old sayings, this one has a surface appeal but its true wisdom…
Last July, President Obama declared that his signature legislation “is doing what it’s designed to do”, which, back then, was providing “more choices, better benefits, check rising costs.” Six months later, with millions of cancelled policies, unwanted benefits and higher costs, it’s impossible to believe Obama’s design claims. Not even the Government’s objectives can be so thwarted so quickly.
Once it became law, the White House spent little effort selling the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to the American public. Until this year, of course. There was a big marketing push before the law was passed. Most memorable are the President’s promises that we can keep our policies and doctors. There were others as well.
(Article first published as “It Takes a Government: Ideology Gaffe or Grammar Goof?” on Blogcritics.) Many describe it as the biggest ideology gaffe of this election year. The speaker says, in essence, that it was merely a grammar goof. Either way, it was a gift to Mitt Romney that, at least temporarily, takes the heat off his tax return dust-up. The mistake, because it certainly was that, was President Obama’s announcement to…
(Article first published as “With Unlimited Taxing Authority, Who Needs the Commerce Clause?” on Blogcritics.) In a decision with so many moving parts that Rube Goldberg would be envious, the U.S. Supreme Court last week upheld ObamaCare’s individual mandate. Writing for a majority of the Court, Chief Justice John Roberts concluded that the mandate is a tax rather than a penalty. As a tax it passes constitutional muster. As a penalty it does not. ObamaCare’s Medicaid expansion provision did not fare…
