Constitution Mandates Health Care, Say Representatives
By John Semmens: Semi-News — A Satirical Look at Recent News In the midst of the Republican move to repeal last year’s health care legislation, several Democratic members of Congress advanced their case for the Constitutionality of the legislation.Representative John Lewis (D-Georgia) sought to rebut the Republican case for repealing the law by arguing that “the right to health care is mandated by the Constitution.” As Lewis sees it, “The Constitution’s 14th Amendment guarantees equal protection under the law. That means if one person has health insurance then it is the government’s responsibility to make sure everyone has it.”The Congressman rejected the GOP claim that forcing a person to purchase a product he may not want infringes on his liberty. “The concept of liberty is too vague to really be enforceable,” Lewis argued. “As I understand what the GOP is saying, liberty appears to mean that the government’s authority ought to be restricted in some way. I don’t see how the government can be expected to enforce restrictions on itself. I could also point out that the Constitution’s Preamble, where the word ‘liberty’ appears, has been superceded by the 14th Amendment’s subsequent guarantee of equality.”Bolstering Lewis’ point, Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) maintained that “health care is a right that the government has the power to enforce whether people like it or not. We can’t let people pick and choose which rights they want to exercise and which they don’t. Forcing everyone to enjoy the same rights is the only way we can ensure equality for all.”Meanwhile, Representative John Conyers (D-Mich.) insisted that “the Constitution’s ‘good and welfare’ clause is all the justification we need to support the Constitutionality of the health care law. We force people to do things all the time. We force them to pay for Social Security. We force them to undergo x-ray screening at airports. If the government decides a citizen’s welfare requires him to pay for health care insurance he must pay for it. We are the law makers. Citizens must do what the laws we make tell them to do.”“Besides, I think it was President Washington who said that government is force,” Conyers added. “So, with both the Constitution and the ‘father of our country’ on our side the case for compelling everyone to buy health insurance is well supported.”Hawaii Governor Deals with Obama Birth Certificate IssueGovernor Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii) assured America that President Barack Obama was born in his state back in 1961. To-date, no one has been able to produce an official birth certificate for the President.“I haven’t seen the birth certificate myself, but others have assured me that something is written down about his birth in the Hawaii Department of Health files somewhere,” Abercrombie said. “I don’t really see what the big deal is. The evidence that Obama was born in Hawaii is at least as good as the evidence that Jesus was born in Bethlehem. I don’t think people doubt the legitimacy of Jesus just because they haven’t seen a birth certificate. Why should they doubt the President’s legitimacy?”Democrat Demonstrates “New Civility” in Health Care DebateIn a bid to help strike a new civil tone in the debate over policy differences, Representative Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) compared Republican arguments for repealing the health care law passed last year to those of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels.“The President’s call for a more civil tone doesn’t mean we have to skirt the truth,” Cohen said. “And the truth is that the GOP campaign against the health care law is just like the Nazi campaign against the Jews.”Cohen contended that “repealing the health care law would set this nation on a path paralleling that which led to the Holocaust where millions are condemned to death because they don’t have adequate health insurance coverage.”“Republicans can’t deny responsibility just because their victims won’t be rounded up and shot or gassed,” Cohen asserted. “These victims will be just as dead and our nation just as guilty as Germany was for the atrocities committed by their government.”Virginia Democrat Kills Homeowner Defense BillVirginia State Senator Roscoe Reynolds (D-Martinsville) effectively killed a proposed “castle doctrine” bill (SB 876) by letting it die in his committee. The bill would have prevented criminals from suing their victims for injuries the criminals sustained while illegally breaking into the victims’ homes.As Reynolds sees it “just because a person makes his living outside the law doesn’t mean he loses all his legal rights. I mean, do you deserve to be shot or assaulted merely for being where you’re not supposed to be? Should you lose your right to sue if you are injured or disabled by hazards within the home?”The senator contended that “existing law gives homeowners sufficient protection. If an intruder attacks you or fires the first shot you are allowed to defend yourself with a measured response of appropriate counterforce. We can’t allow a homeowner’s fear to spark an excessive application of unwarranted force against an unarmed intruder. If it does, the homeowner must be held liable.”“And let’s not forget the rights of those in the legal profession,” Reynolds added. “If homeowners take to defending themselves there’ll be less work for police. If we ban lawsuits by those who break in there’ll be fewer opportunities for lawyers to sue or to defend against a suit. These are people who have invested heavily in learning their trade. They deserve a reasonable chance to make a living at it.”Administration Sues to Overturn Secret Ballot Initiatives in Four StatesIn an effort to protect workers in their own states from being denied the right to a secret ballot on whether they should be represented by a union at their place of employment, voters in the states of Arizona, South Carolina, South Dakota, and Utah approved state constitutional amendments guaranteeing this right. NLRB Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon sent letters to these states’ attorney generals threatening legal action if the states do not overturn the decisions of their voters.“It is NLRB policy that a secret ballot is not required for the purpose of determining whether a union shall represent employees,” Solomon wrote. “A petition signed by a majority of the employees is held to be sufficient for instituting union representation for all the employees. This NLRB policy takes precedence over any and every state law or constitutional provision that may be in conflict. You are hereby instructed to ignore the outcome of any ballot initiative or referendum to the contrary under penalty of sanction from the federal government for noncompliance.”The problem with the NLRB’s position that the secret ballot is intended to fix is the possibility that openly signed petitions do not rule out threats, bribery, duress, or deception used by unions in order to get employees to sign—matters that the NLRB considers outside the purview of state authority. “Whether workers need protection against these imagined fears is not for state authorities or state voters to determine,” Solomon wrote. “The NLRB will give employees all the protection the government deems necessary.”President Says He Will Shift Economy into OverdriveWith unemployment still above 9% nationwide and new up-ticks to over 12% in the nation’s largest state, President Obama spoke out on the need to “turn things around.”“For an economy to grow we need to build and invent stuff,” the president observed. “I’m not quite sure on what it takes to get stuff invented and built, but my Administration has been working hard to try to put together the right mix of bailouts, subsidies, and tax increases to do the trick.”According to the president, “one of the deterrents to inventing stuff is the uncertainty of turning a profit on what’s invented. Government can help reduce this uncertainty by guaranteeing funding for firms that are inventing the technology of tomorrow—like green energy. Right now, for example, too much wind goes to waste. By harnessing it we can push ahead toward a brighter future.”The president boasted that his new “jobs and competitiveness panel” would “provide guidance for a floundering private sector. Too many businesses are wondering what they should invent, what they should build. With government guidance coupled with government funding these questions will be answered and the country can move forward under a unified central plan.”“As Vice-President Biden observed just a while back, every great invention, every great idea of the last 200 years came from government,” the President said. “Government is the uber think tank of our civilization. If we place our trust in the brainpower that resides in government there will be no limit to what we can accomplish.”The president said that while he is hopeful that the country can move forward in a bipartisan way, the situation is so dire that he is prepared to forge ahead using executive authority. “The bright side is that even those who balk will be swept up in the rising tide of my progressive agenda for the future,” he concluded.A Satirical Look at Recent News John Semmens’ ArchivesMore Semmens Archives
