Justice Scalia, expressing his deep concern for young people during hearing on the health care law:
SOLICITOR GENERAL VERILLI: To live in the modern world, everybody needs a telephone. And the — the same thing with respect to the — you know, the dairy price supports that — that the court upheld in Wrightwood Dairy and Rock Royal. You can look at those as disadvantageous contracts, as forced transfers, that — you know, I suppose it’s theoretically true that you could raise your kids without milk, but the reality is you’ve got to go to the store and buy milk. And the commerce power — as a result of the exercise of the commerce power, you’re subsidizing somebody else –
JUSTICE KAGAN: And this is especially true, isn’t it, General –
VERRILLI: — because that’s the judgment Congress has made.
KAGAN: — Verrilli, because in this context, the subsidizers eventually become the subsidized?
VERRILLI: Well, that was the point I was trying to make, Justice Kagan, that you’re young and healthy one day, but you don’t stay that way. And the — the system works over time. And so I just don’t think it’s a fair characterization of it. And it does get back to, I think — a problem I think is important to understand –
JUSTICE SCALIA: We’re not stupid. They’re going to buy insurance later. They’re young and — and need the money now.
VERRILLI: But that’s –
As the country gears up for implementation of the major provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), this month’s Kaiser Health Tracking Poll takes a step back and examines views on health insurance more broadly among some key subgroups, including young adults, the uninsured, and those with pre-existing conditions. The poll finds that the large majority of Americans want and value health insurance. More than seven in ten young adults – a special focus of outreach and enrollment efforts – say it is very important to them personally to have insurance. Cost remains the biggest barrier for the uninsured, with four in ten citing the expense of coverage as the main reason they don’t have it. Roughly half of those under age 65 believe they or a household member has what would be considered a pre-existing condition, and a quarter of them say they have either been denied insurance or had their premium increased as a result. With the expected marketing effort for the ACA’s health exchanges still not in full swing, negative views of the law continue to outpace positive views, with 43 percent unfavorable and 35 percent favorable. However, unfavorable views are a mix of those who feel the law goes “too far” in changing the health care system (33 percent) and those who feel it “doesn’t go far enough” (8 percent). The poll also shows that differences in how the law is branded may make a difference in how it is perceived by the public. When asked how they feel about “Obamacare” rather than the “health reform law,” higher shares express both favorable (42 percent) and unfavorable (47 percent) views, and Democrats are more enthusiastic.
Among the public overall, 87 percent say it is “very important” to them personally to have health insurance, 88 percent describe health insurance as “something I need,” and two-thirds (68 percent) say insurance is worth the money it costs.
Even among younger adults – a group that many have speculated may be resistant to getting coverage under the ACA – more than seven in ten rate having health insurance as “very important,” and similar shares feel it is something they need and that it is worth the money. Overall, just a quarter of those ages 18-30 feel they are healthy enough to go without insurance.
An advocacy group called “Young Invincibles” argued exactly this during the health care debate. They even submitted a brief to the Court with polling info that came out roughly same as that quoted above, but apparently Scalia didn’t read it.
MaryJane
god took the wrong Tony.
Villago Delenda Est
Antonin Scalia demonstrates, yet again, that he’s a fuckhead.
This is news?
PeakVT
One way to find out what people think is to ask them
Altogether too science-y for conservatives.
Botsplainer, fka Todd
Hey, since it is Cole’s birthday, is there a birthday thread anywhere?
Josie
I think young adults are smart enough to know that, even if you are supremely healthy, accidents can happen and people can become ill. All three of my young adult sons have health insurance, although the cost to them is a bit of a hardship (Texas). It does not surprise me, however, that they are all more in touch with reality than Justice Scalia. Actually, that is not a high bar.
Kay
@PeakVT:
Here’s Kaiser:
They had to cast around for something different than “some say”, I guess.
Infamous Heel-Filcher
@Villago Delenda Est: The proper greeting when one meets Scalia is “objection, you’re honor, assumes facts not in evidence”.
Infamous Heel-Filcher
@Villago Delenda Est: The proper greeting when one meets Scalia is “objection, your honor, assumes facts not in evidence”.
Politically Lost
I have a feeling that section 5 of the VRA is going to be curb stomped shortly and our friend Scalia will write the majority opinion complete with sneering willfully ignorant bleetings about what the framers intended. I’m saving my ire for that day. On this issue, uncle Tony is only showing a little leg and not really letting his freak flag fly.
Kay
@Josie:
I was talking to one of my sisters about this, and she thinks they’re more plugged in to this than we were at that age. It’s true for my two oldest kids, although not the third, but he’s on the very low end of 18-30 and different than the other two in lots of other ways.
Ruckus
One way to find out what people think is to ask them
Which is why tony will never do that. It might get in the way of his preconceived notions.
Yatsuno
Kay Kay Kay…you know full well Fat Tony will do anything to make sure his agenda is pushed through. What does law, precedent, or the other two branches of government matter to him? We really should all just shut up and let him rule like the doge he imagines himself to be. After all he’s the smartest guy on the Court. Just ask him.
Eric U.
I think it has become more obvious that you can’t afford to be without health insurance. When I was 20, you could still afford to go to the doctor and pay for it yourself.
Kay
@Politically Lost:
It sucks, but I think you should look at it as a political opportunity. The field on this has changed since 2006. I don’t think conservatives understand how important voting rights have become not just to a core constituency of the Democratic base (AA) but to big chunks of the base. It’s really changed since I’ve been following it, so since 2004. The blanket cable news coverage in 2012 helped a lot, but for online sources I think TPM deserves huge credit. They really took it mainstream, online, anyway.
Ruckus
@Kay:
I had health insurance 18 to 55 at which point I no longer got it from work and was unable to afford individual coverage. It is quite possible that without it I would not be here now. And I knew that when I was 18. I think many give people under, what 40 or 50, too little credit with having a brain and even a rudimentary ability to observe the world around them.
Ruckus
@Eric U.:
You might have been able to pay for a Dr. visit or even some labs, but have a major problem? Not many could pay for one of those 30-50 yrs ago and of course even fewer could afford it today.
Yatsuno
@Ruckus: I know a lot of my friends when I was in college used the university clinic like mad for a large variety of things. Young’uns ain’t dumb, they know full well they need to have that health insurance card in their wallet or else they could be in huge trouble. The real issue is a lot of them work in places that don’t offer it, and that hopefully will change with ACA.
schrodinger's cat
Lymphoma a type of blood cancer particularly afflicts young people, and if you don’t have insurance you die. Happened to someone I am close to, not the dying part but the Lymphoma diagnosis. Also too, accidents. The young are not invincible. Insurance gives you peace of mind.
Kay
@Ruckus:
Oh, I agree, you have to ask. I don’t encounter a lot of young people I talk to about health insurance except as it applies to their children. To a person, they think the Medicaid coverage for their kids that is available to working class and lower middle parents in Ohio is really, really important. I was surprised by how universally they feel that way, because in health/risk jargon little kids are technically “low risk”-most of them are healthy. They want it for their kids, even if all they need now are well baby check-ups and immunizations.
Ruckus
@Yatsuno:
Yep.
Eric U had a point. 40-50 yrs ago an operation might cost a month’s or three income. A hardship but probably doable. That same operation costs is now what, 1-3 years income? The only time I had that much laying around was when I wasn’t working, had no prospects and my bank balance was about 2 weeks worth of food. So that wouldn’t have helped much.
aimai
@Kay: I think parents are actually pretty well aware of the importance of health insurance precisely because being pregnant and having children really pulls you into the health care system on a regular basis. I was really surprised, when I first had a child, at how full service the attention was for babies because I was a long way from having had a primary care physician myself. But after a few dozen late night calls to the doctor’s service because of coughing, or fever, you start to really know how important access and insurance are to getting things treated in a timely manner. While you might imagine, when you are young, that you “never need a doctor” the truth is that babies, toddlers, and little kids see doctors and nurses all the fucking time. Teenagers involved in sports who have parents with health insurance see doctors all the time.
I guess what I’m saying is that the right wing/Scalia model of young adults as health and insurance “free” by choice is an historical anomaly fostered by our terrible health care system. There’s no period of your life in which you don’t need a primary care physician to run problems by or health insurance to cover accidents and pre-existing conditions. These people simply believe something that very few in the actual population of non-white/non libertarian people believe.
RSA
@PeakVT:
When you’ve got ideology, you don’t need no stinking data.
Eric U.
@Ruckus: sure, it would have been a problem 40 years ago, but nowadays an ER visit can mean instant bankruptcy. Being admitted overnight might cost more than some people make in a year. In our area, you have to be admitted to the hospital to have any testing done at all. I’m sure this is pretty common now that doctors aren’t compensated for their own testing. It’s just outlandishly expensive.
Rick Massimo
I semiseriously think that if you asked Scalia, he would sincerely ask why on earth he should read such a thing.
R-Jud
@Eric U.:
I was billed $15,000 for an overnight admission back in 2001, when I was 21– roughly half of my yearly salary at the time. I was unlucky enough to fall ill during a week-long gap between the end of coverage under my college plan and the start of coverage under my employer’s plan.
I shudder to think what it would cost now.
merl
I say fuck health insurance. Probably because I get excellent care through the VA
gelfling545
I happen to know a great many young people in the 18-30 group. Most of the young folks I know who have been able to have coverage on their parents’ plans until 26 have been very enthusiastic about “finally” having insurance. A couple of people I know who are about to age off their parents’ plans are hoping to hold out until 2014 without disaster striking. Many of those whose parents did not have insurance have had to apply for emergency medicaid for things like appendectomy, broken bones, & other serious conditions and are well aware of the value of having insurance. I don’t think my experience is outside the norm. People who don’t have insurance want it. The only complaints I have heard have mostly been from 50 somethings who somehow believe that the insurance they already have will be somehow devalued if other people get it too – a position I do not understand. I know one person, also 50 something, who is afraid he will not be able to afford it (one man business with seasonal income swings). Everybody else is pretty psyched about it.
BGinCHI
How can there be a god when Fat Tony’s heart is beating and James Gandolfini’s just stops?
What a fucking world.
Ruckus
@Kay:
WP etted my comment so I’m going to try again.
Young people are not dumb due to age. Mostly they are uneducated and inexperienced. And in today’s world they are connected. I work with a guy who is 23, runs out of money for lunch the day before payday but has an iphone and lives on it continuously. I’m not saying he learns anything of much value there but he is connected. When I was his age my connection to others was who I could speak to basically one on one or in small groups. The dynamic is much broader today. He has the ability to learn and be exposed to much more than I did. He is going to know more people in trouble without insurance just by exposure, let alone our system is much worse for the bottom half than it used to be.
Baud
@aimai:
I wonder how young people fall into this category — healthy and wealthy enough to get non-crap insurance but choose not to. (And not on their parents’ plan).
aimai
@Rick Massimo: To quote the man himself it probably wouldn’t comport “with his belief or his knowledge” so there you go, why bother to read it?
Hoodie
My sense is that a lot of kids today have a generally heightened sense of insecurity as it is, uncertainty about education, job prospects, etc., Not a big surprise they’d be concerned about health care and insurance. A lot of young people also have kids.
This generation in some ways may be more like my parents’ generation (Depression) than they’re like their own parents, who largely came up in the Neverland of the Reagan era, when people enjoyed the benefits of the heydey of the New Deal/Great Society while at the same time thinking they didn’t have to pay taxes and make other social contributions to support it. I can’t tell you how many of my contemporaries are still clueless as to how much more expensive college is now than when they went and how diminished their kids’ generation’s prospects are in relation to what was available to them when they came of age. They’re starting to learn as their kids grow up, but a lot of them still hold tightly to their illusions and comfort themselves with platitudes about smartphones and flat-screen TVs.
Kay
@aimai:
It was interesting to watch, for “never married” parents, because all 50 states put in what is a health insurance mandate for unmarried and never married parents thru the child support system. It went in under Bush, through a rule change, not a law. States then adopted it with “enabling legislation” at the state level. It says (to unmarried parents) if health insurance for your kids is available at “reasonable” cost and you’re over 150% of poverty level, you have to buy it for your kids. If health insurance isn’t available (and you make more than 150% of poverty) you have to pay “cash medical support”. That’s Ohio but all states have a version.
I (and many others) believed there would be this huge push-back from lower and middle income parents when we went for training on it, but it never materialized. They bought the insurance when it was available, or signed up for Medicaid, or paid the cash medical order, no real resistance or even complaints that I heard. I’m convinced people want coverage for their kids.
Chris
@PeakVT:
Although they do believe in variations of this – “the only way to know for sure if I’m a racist is to ask me.” Since their basic creed is that it’s not fair to call them racist based on their actions, as the only way you can really be racist is if you’re that way in your heart, which conveniently only they can determine.
DavidTC
‘Young people choosing to not get insurance’ was a thing back in 1992. It is not a thing now. That was because back then you could actually pay for medical care yourself.
Young people now don’t have health insurance simply because they can’t _afford_ health insurance.
Young people may be somewhat bad at judging risks, but they’re not _idiots_.
Stella B.
My nurse’s 21 year old got smacked in the eye playing basketball with his little brother. He tore a retina, but since Obamacare allowed him to be on his mom’s insurance, he got to keep vision in both eyes. Some Republicans would not see that as a good thing, I guess.
Kay
@Hoodie:
I think that’s where I’m ending up. Can you blame them? I went to my oldest son’s college graduation right at the height of the financial crisis and we were laughing. He was even laughing. EVERY SPEAKER was telling them “you are so screwed”. The “adults” were completely losing their shit. It affected me. I told him to take this absolutely horrible job (he ignored me, thank God, and got a better one) because I was convinced he was going to run out of money. He was much calmer than that. It was just his reality.
Ruckus
@Eric U.:
Yes, look at #20 where I basically agreed with you.
I spent 4 1/2 hours in an ER once and never saw a Dr. or had an exam. At the end, 11:30pm, I was the only patient and the entire staff was sitting around on a break. I walked out in disgust. When they told me I had to sign a form to leave I told them to go fuck themselves, the only thing I would sign concerning that night was a lawsuit. This was in a hospital in a midwestern white bread town where the sidewalks rolled up about 9-10 on a Sat night.
I did get a bill from the hospital, I believe it was around $800 which my insurance didn’t cover. I called and told them if they didn’t stuff this bill and the insurance co bill where the sun doesn’t shine I would sue them for malpractice and explained why. About a week later I got a notice that I owed them nothing.
Petorado
Conservatives confuse being an a-hole with leadership and think political will is the ability to be as self-serving as possible without having a hint of conscience. Scalia’s the most ardent practitioner of these values.
Ruckus
@efgoldman:
He has peons for that.
Sure doesn’t look/sound like he uses them.
Ruckus
@Petorado:
Really? Tony? I would have given the honor to Darth. Not that they aren’t in the same class of assholes but still.
Yatsuno
@efgoldman: There’s a Sicilian equivalent but I can’t recall it right now.
OT: I GETS NEW KITTEH TOMORROW!!!
Debbie(aussie)
This is not meant to rub it in at all, honestly, but…. I have just experienced excruciating pain in my right rib cage(already suffer from chronic back pain and fibro). After second visit to Dr he has ordered a spec CT scan, went to radiographer and am booked in for Monday bulk billed to Medicare, no cost to me. I don’t know what the cost is. I thank the FSM every day that i live in Aus, as I would probably be dead but for our health care system.
geg6
I have to agree with the concensus here: kids today are well aware of how close to the financial abyss they are, especially in the realms of health care and student loans. They may not be incredibly savvy about it, but they ask questions and seek out information just like you would expect such an inquisitive and plugged-in demographic to be. The GOP is as clueless about young people today as they are about any other group you can name: women, ethnic minorities, LGBTs, the 99%. and Fat Tony is the most clueless and arrogant asshole of them all.
Amir Khalid
@Yatsuno:
You did mention once that your kitteh was missing, if I’m not mistaken. What happened to her?
schrodinger's cat
@Yatsuno: Photos and tell us more.
Yatsuno
@Debbie(aussie): That’s actually a really big point. A lot of da yootz have international friends who have zero health care anxieties. If they need to go to the doctor they just go, no worries about the expense. It’s hardly any wonder single payer is so popular with the under 30 crowd, they see it working all over the damn planet. But we just can’t have nice things here becuz ZOMG an illegal or a blah person might just benefit. This why I really want California to pull that trigger. WA and OR would follow suit rapidly and it would be the beginning of the end.
Bubba Dave
@Infamous Heel-Filcher:
I think you mean “Objection. Your “honor” assumes facts not in evidence.
MattR
OT – But does anyone know a national charity (or a local one in northeast NJ) that takes donated clothes and gives them directly to people who need them? Every place I have looked at sells the donated items and then uses that money to support their cause.
Ruckus
@Debbie(aussie):
Good luck!
Yeah our health care system is broken, unless you are in the 60th percentile or higher, can use the VA. And the VA is good but it could be better. I’m glad for it and thank everyone that works there every time I’m there. Medicare here is not bad, it is just limited in many ways. And the craven asshole conservatives want it that way.
ruemara
Evil bastard is evil. I had no coverage from 18 through mid 20’s and the medical care I could afford was shoddy. I won’t ever have kids thanks to that. Most of my young friends have had to use University medical care, some have had major trauma and accidents. Kids know they need medical coverage. The amount of people who believed they were untouchable were few and far between. Screw Fat Tony.
Mike E
@Yatsuno: A lady where I work just adopted a kitten from her vet, and named it Mouse. She said, “I now have a cat named Mouse who eats like a horse!”
I thot that was funny.
cckids
@Kay: In my own experience, kids who are in college now or just out of college grew up through the years of health insurance/health costs being in the news more & being brought to their attention more. When I was a kid (60’s into the 80’s), sometimes we had insurance, sometimes we didn’t, we still got taken to the doctor & it wasn’t a big deal. Now, without insurance, it can become a major decision – head to the doctor or see if things get better at home.
My own kids peers are VERY conscious of insurance & medical costs. I think it is much more of a big deal to their age group than olds like Scalia realize.
Daniel
I’m 48 and have been generally very impressed how aware the core of the Obama coalition (18-30) are about a whole range of issues, particularly healthcare. Technology never ceases to amaze; today I heard of a newly formed group in Rio called “Occupy Brazil”.
Whatever one thinks about the Occupy movement (I’m mixed”), that detail is telling. The challenge is getting these people to the polls in 2014. If they had turned out just a bit more in 2010, Pelosi would still have the gavel.
O/T–I am girding myself for some Scalia/Thomas/Alito antics this week (Monday and/or Thursday). I just hope that Roberts with an eye on history (see his healthcare vote) and Kennedy will stop the evisceration of the Voting Rights Act. Affirmative action is doomed, I’m sure….
geg6
@efgoldman:
They may be in a position to do more damage (though that is very debatable), but can you deny Scalia’s enormous cluelessnes and arrogance? I don’t actually find McConnell to be clueless. I think he understands perfectly the consequences of his actions. He is a small and evil man. But he’s not clueless. I think Fat Tony is the poster boy for old white Tea Bagging male cluelessness.
Yatsuno
@Amir Khalid: She ran away. :( I was holding out hope she would come back but she never did.
@schrodinger’s cat: An old friend of mine from college had a small litter of kittens. I just happen to live really close and so I decided to snatch him up. He’s coming named as Bandit but I’ll see as I get to know him if I’ll keep that or if he tells me his name issomething else. LOTS of pics will be taken tomorrow and I’ll get an e-mail to AL as well.
gelfling545
Just a little public service announcement: If you are anywhere around the WNY area, Buffalo Paws & Claws has some lovely kittehs for adoption into approved homes. My daughter volunteers there twice a week as a kitty cuddler (and litter pan cleaner!) and has taken some fine pictures of the prospective adoptees. There is a family of kittens just ready to find their forever homes right now, as well of some older cats of distinguished character. If you have not yet met your kitty quota, give them a look.
cckids
@Yatsuno:
I was one of those kids; one of the major shocks when my son started college 2 years ago is that the university clinic doesn’t do NEARLY the stuff they used to, and they charge for lots of things that used to be included in your fees. He has a friend who cracked a wrist; the clinic looked at it, charged him $200 for an X-ray & sent him to the ER for casting, at another $800. Yikes.
Amir Khalid
@Yatsuno:
Ah. I’m sorry about that. Still, you’re getting another kitteh now.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Villago Delenda Est: He ain’t on my team asshole.
JPL
@MattR: It’s not unusual for local charities to have a resale shop and still hand out coupons for qualified people to receive clothing for their children and themselves. The extra money might be used to pay those that qualify electricity and rent. Call around but try to stay with local charities. I volunteered at one for over ten years and they also had a food bank.
Steeplejack
The depressing “meta” part about this is that Scalia exists in an insulated environment that exacerbates his worst tendencies: lifetime job security, cosseted by lots of bright staffers to do the heavy lifting and, if necessary, serve as courtiers and yes-men, and working with peers whose “collegial” relationship prevents them from calling him out as the asshole that he all too often shows himself to be.
Similar: When Sandra Day O’Connor said in April that the Supreme Court might have made a mistake in hearing Bush v. Gore in 2000, her demeanor in subsequent interviews was incredibly casual, almost dismissive, like: “Eh, stuff happens. Good times.” And she creepily referred to the 2000 court as “it,” like it was something separate from her that she wasn’t involved in.
But I digress. Back to the main point: fuck Scalia, that out-of-touch asshole!
PurpleGirl
@Yatsuno: Great. Details, please. And tomorrow a picture of the kitteh.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
I, too, am wondering who these mythical “young people who don’t want health insurance” are. When I was in my 20s working crap jobs, I ALWAYS signed up for whatever health insurance was available, no matter how bad it was. And that was in the mid 1990s. I don’t think I ever heard anyone say they were deliberately going without it.
Is this another of those things where 25-year-old libertarian male computer programmers in Silicon Valley were presumed to speak for the entire generation?
burnspbesq
@Politically Lost:
If you’re right (and I’m far from convinced that you are), a Scalia opinion opinion invalidating Section 5 would probably do far less damage than a Thomas opinion.
A Scalia opinion would likely hold that Section 5 is not “appropriate legislation” within Congress’ purview under the Fifteenth Amendment. Thomas, who believes that nothing that’s relevant to Constitutional interpretation happened between 1861 and 1870, would find a way to essentially read the Reconstruction Amendments out of the Constitution.
This is a very good concise take on Thomas’ originalism.
http://balkin.blogspot.com/2013/06/justice-thomas-originalism-and-civil-war.html
PurpleGirl
@MattR: What kind of clothes? If you mean women’s business-type wear, there is Bottomless Closet and another whose name I forget. Outside of that I don’t know.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@MattR:
I usually have only heard of that when they’re looking for very specific items, like winter coats or business suits. Otherwise, they strongly prefer to sell the donations because then they can actually buy the sizes they need for their clients.
What kind of clothes are you trying to donate?
Brother Machine Gun of Desirable Mindfulness (fka AWS)
@Infamous Heel-Filcher:
FTFY.
burnspbesq
@Rick Massimo:
Why should he read it? It’s not in the record that came up from the Court of Appeals, and there’s no way to know, simply because somebody put it in an appendix to an amicus brief, whether it’s even a tiny bit reliable.
mdblanche
@Kay: “A few have conjectured…”
MattR
@JPL: Thanks. I think I’ll ask around my condo complex for suggestions. I don’t mind if a local charity sells some stuff to help pay the bills or, as you mentioned, provide financial assistance to others. But I would prefer that the majority of the clothes end up in the hands of people who need them, and not with someone who sees it in a thrift store and thinks it looks cool (especially things like rarely worn suits or nice winter jackets that no longer fit)
@PurpleGirl: @Mnemosyne (iPad Mini): Kinda just answered your questions in my comment to JPL. I have pretty much an entire wardrobe of clothes that no longer fit. Suits, dress shirts, jackets, jeans, other pants, shorts, t-shirts, sweatshirts, sweatpants, a couple pair of sneakers I haven’t worn in several years, some dress shoes I may never have worn. I will check out Bottomless Closet to see if they have a men’s branch. I can always split the donation between two groups.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@MattR:
For men’s business wear, try Career Gear:
http://www.careergear.org/
For the casual wear (t-shirts, jeans, shorts, etc.) a general donation is probably best, but it looks as though Career Gear will make your donations available to men who actually need it for job interviews and work.
MattR
@Mnemosyne (iPad Mini): Thanks. That looks good and I can get to Jersey City without much effort. Will poke around to see if there are any local charities in the more immediate area that can use those clothes, or the casual wear for that matter.
cckids
@Mnemosyne (iPad Mini):
I did that too, until 1983; I was 20 & had my first son, got him added to my insurance plan. They paid less than 1/3 of the OB/delivery costs & I had to fight for that, they weren’t going to cover at all because I was unmarried.
Then, 4 months later, when my son was diagnosed with CP, they dropped him like a rock. And refused to pay the costs of the testing that diagnosed him. Bastards. And insurance companies have not gotten any better in the years since.
Kay
@burnspbesq:
Then he should not pretend he’s relying on anything other than pulling it out of his ass.
They do this a lot. Kennedy is the worst, IMO.
Their speculation on ID in the Indiana voter ID case was like a seminar in cluelessness: “why, one needs ID to board a plane!”
Remember when Kennedy became a physician and psychologist in the abortion case? There is NOTHING that man doesn’t know.
Ruckus
The concept of having health insurance goes far deeper in our culture than just not dying before the alzheimers kicks in. I have, and still do, participate in a sport that has a lot of risk. I worked in this sport as a hobby for 20 some years before becoming professionally involved full time. At events participants have catastrophic insurance for things that happen at that event only. For the over 30 years I was involved directly, every participant was highly urged to have their own health insurance as well. Decades ago the young would be on their parents insurance and the kids and their parents would take the risk of participation because they knew they could get care. Now? How many people want to take risks at all because they have no or very little actual coverage? Does this sound callous, that people take risks they shouldn’t take because they can get care? What is life like without taking risks? Can we be too protected from risk? How about risk of crime/terrorism and giving up our personal liberties for “less” risk? How’s that going?
My point is that as part of the great unwashed we have had our risks changed. We don’t get as many chances/choices to select the risks we are willing to take. That has in many ways been taken away from us. But is wasn’t replaced with anything on the reward side. We are poorer, we are less healthy, we have fewer choices in work, we have fewer choices in retirement. We just have less in so many areas.
Mike G
@Kay:
Maybe we should have a retirement age for the SC. For every brilliant, wise and experienced senior there are a rash of self-entitled old-man-yells-at-cloud assholes, who blast whatever angry opinion is rattling in their skull and make up a legal justification afterward.
O’Connor openly said she voted on Chimp v. Gore because she wanted a Repuke president to pick her successor for her impending retirement. She’s a fucking traitor to her oath of office.
Ruckus
@burnspbesq:
I agree with Kay.
Let’s see. He doesn’t give a shit about precedent. He doesn’t give a shit about over 200 years of constitutional law. He shouldn’t give a shit about anything anyone else says either?
So what the fuck is he up there for? What a huge, hateful, waste of protoplasm.
Infamous Heel-Filcher
@Bubba Dave: Lol.
/Let’s eat Grandma!
Ruckus
@Mike G:
Every time I bring up any kind of discussion of terms limiting political service I get shouted down as being an asshole who doesn’t want to give people a chance at a valuable career.
Personally I think all politicians should have terms and this includes the SC. They should be long enough to allow the people to prove themselves but not so long that they stink up the place too badly. This still leaves elections to make decisions but takes out people like turtle and fat tony. But part of this also needs to be election financing reform or the whole thing will still stink like an overflowed cesspool.
Kay
@Mike G:
I just wish they’d be more straightforward about it. Kagan and Ginsburg stuck to what was presented, the commerce clause, how insurance is unique, the cases, you know, facts.
Roberts does it too, he’s just smarter about it. In the VRA case: “are people in
the south more racist than other
people?”
We don’t know, and we don’t care. We’re
asking you to look at what state actors have done in the covered jurisdictions. No one was talking
about the general population of southeners.
MomSense
I think the idea that young kids don’t have health insurance by choice is something policy makers have been telling themselves to justify doing nothing about the uninsured and underinsured.
When I was a young person chronologically (and not just in attitude!) I wanted health insurance. All the young people I know want health insurance so they can get their vision checked, non aspirin between the knees birth control, allergy shots–you know the ordinary things kids do.
EconWatcher
Scalia was once an intelligent and occasionally interesting guy. But for quite some time now, it’s been just exactly like having your wingnut uncle on the Court.
BC
@MomSense: I think it’s what conservatives tell themselves all the time – the 20-30 year old cohort don’t think they need health insurance, so the mandate is soooo dictatorial. I remember a C-SPAN call-in show where a woman offered the young how to avoid the mandate – get a low-paying, off-the-books job was what I gleaned from her advice – and one of the panelists muttered that it seemed a lot of trouble to go to to avoid having health insurance to pay for medical bills. The meme that the young will be paying the penalty rather than have health insurance is so prevalent that I think they will stick to it even in the face of evidence that the only reason this age group doesn’t have health insurance is because of cost. I don’t remember a time when a political party has been openly rooting for the citizenry to fail.
EconWatcher
@efgoldman:
True. I consider Thurgood Marshal to be a major hero of the 20th century, but he held on long after his mind started fading because he didn’t want to be replaced by a Republican (and sadly, he couldn’t hold on long enough). I expect Scalia to do the same thing, although out of pure spite rather than commitment to any real cause.
Baud
@EconWatcher:
Yes. His world passed him by. The only relevance he has left consists of how much damage he can do before he goes.
jamick6000
@MaryJane: hahahah that is such a good comment
jamick6000
Dental and vision especially are important to the yutes.
Ruckus
@Baud:
I think you are right but gads what a horrible ideology. Boils down to this… ‘My life isn’t anything like I think it should be so I’m going to blow up as much as possible to pay all the rest of you back for allowing me to be an old asshole’.
Baud
@Ruckus:
When you put it that way, all I did was call Scalia a Republican. Not that insightful, I guess.
catclub
@Steeplejack: “And probably the Supreme Court added to the problem at the end of the day.”
I am sure she means the Supreme Court of Florida.
JPL
@MattR: Just make sure that you donate to the one that gives back the most. At the organization that I work for, since there are very few paid positions, there is no way to separate items. Most of the staff is volunteers. They have paid positions for Sociologists, and Psychologists and two people who oversees the charity and two store managers for the clothing side. When they were looking for a new manager, they paid twenty thousand a year and no benefits. Speaking multiple languages is a benefit for the job. It’s not something you do for the money. It’s a large facility with computer classrooms and volunteers teaching ESL.
What I’m trying to say is maybe we couldn’t assure that your items would be free but what we could assure is that the money is well used. It’s up to you though. Local charities are not GoodWill.
JoyfulA
@MattR: Many churches have variously named clothing services, where donated clothes are hung in a closet or room, and the community poor are invited to choose some once a week or once a month. I’ve seen signs for them in front of churches in Philly and here, so there ought to be some in Jersey, too.
YoohooCthulhu
Umm, wtf? Doesn’t the 18-30 group include a lot of first-time pregnant women? And isn’t pregnancy sort of unaffordable in the absence of health insurance? I’d imagine that reason alone would be a big one why “young” people would want comprehensive health coverage.
gelfling545
@jamick6000: And that’s just what they won’t be getting, as far as I have been able to tell. Medicaid offers some dental but their attitude for restorative services is antiquated -if you can still chew, pull the tooth.
cwolf
Stop the Presses!
I don’t want insurance! Insurance is a skim scam.
I just want Health Care when I need it.
If I go to a doc in the box or hospital, the first question should be “What hurts?”
In WTF amerika the first thing they say is “show me the money”
How come the 2nd amendment is non operative when a hospital murders some one for being without “insurance”
Ruckus
@Baud:
Insightful? Sure it is.
Only calling him a republican? We need to recognize our enemies for what they are. They have ceased to be the opposition and become much more than that. I truly don’t understand what they think they are fighting for anymore but they are enemies.
Lurking Canadian
@cwolf: I wonder if Floridans are allowed to shoot the triage nurse if they feel threatened.