Here & There Column 4-24-12

Supreme Court Handles Controversial Subject

President Obama's Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act, more readily known as ObamaCare is now under the scrutiny of the United States Supreme Court who will rule soon on whether ObamaCare is constitutional.

Liberals and Conservatives have solidly taken sides which at times draws away from the real meaning of this legislation.

Is there anyone who does not believe that we do need better health plans for all?

I don't take a lot of faith in polls but some have said public opinion at the present time does not support this act as passed.

Reviewing background information when talking about ObamaCare points out that the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution says that "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Part of the decision by the Supreme Court is part of the law that ObamaCare requires the States to set up and pay for a vast sprawling new bureaucracy of so-called Health Care Exchanges and enforcement agencies , even through the States had no say in writing or passing the 2,700 page ObamaCare law.

Several federal courts prior to this Supreme Court hearing have ruled that ObamaCare is unconstitutional and the Amicus Curiae legal brief now before this court states that the law as now written undermines the sovereignty of the states with their mandate, that the law requires the states to pay for and administer an expansion of Medicaid and that ObamaCare threatens individual liberty by requiring individuals to purchase a product (health insurance) under the interpretation of Congress' Constitutional power to regulate commerce.

Many are concerned that ObamaCare takes decisions away for you and puts government bureaucrats in charge of deciding what kind of health care you receive or even whether your medical condition is treated at all.

One could ask is ObamaCare really has anything to do with improving your healthcare or will give you more affordable health care?

The honorable body known as our Supreme Court (which itself tends to sometimes become very political on issues) will make the decision on the fate of this act and Constitutional liberties.