Health Care Bill Lawsuits - Including Virginia's - Are Going Nowhere

I posted earlier about the dubious basis for the law suits filed by mostly Republican Attorney Generals - including Cooch, Virginia's top Kool-Aid drinker - challenging the passage of federal legislation providing for health care reform (BTW, faux moderate Bob McDonnell has endorsed Cuccinelli's lunacy). CNN has a new column that looks further at this waste of time and money. On the local front, the Cooch's crazy jihad may yet bit him in his homophobic ass. It seems that the Democratic Party of Virginia has filed Freedom of Information Act requests that will hopefully expose to the light of day the fact that Cuccinelli is acting on behalf of the far right GOP fringe and that state funds and resources are being needlessly wasted. First some highlights from CNN on the bogus nature of the lawsuits:
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A state attorney general is almost by definition a candidate for higher office. The filing of lawsuits challenging the health reform law by 14 attorneys general -- all but one of them Republican -- may look good for their next campaigns, but these cases are going nowhere legally.
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The case filed by Florida and 12 other states challenges obligations allegedly imposed on the states by the statute as well as the individual insurance purchase mandate imposed by the law. The Virginia case challenges only the individual mandate, setting up against it a new Virginia law purporting to nullify it. One of the states' claims is based on a simple misreading of the health reform law.
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The lawsuit claims that it compels the states to enforce the federal law or to operate exchanges that would make health insurance available to consumers. Section 1321 gives states the choice of doing so or not, and if states elect not to do so, the federal government will enforce the law and operate the exchange in the state.
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The Supreme Court has long upheld spending clause programs that require states that accept federal program funds to comply with federal program requirements, and this law simply follows those precedents.
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The challenge to the individual insurance mandate is simply not legally credible. First, it is not clear whether the federal courts even have jurisdiction to hear the claim. Under Article III of the Constitution, courts may not decide hypothetical questions but rather only actual cases and controversies. The states are in no way injured by the mandate that individuals purchase health insurance, and thus should not be able to challenge it.
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But the mandate is clearly constitutional. The mandate requires people who have household incomes above the tax filing limit ($18,700 for joint filers) and who are not covered by their employer or a public program to buy health insurance. Those who earn less than 400 percent of the poverty level will get tax credits to help pay for it. People who are subject to the mandate but choose to remain uninsured will have to pay a tax, which will increase with their income up to the cost of a high-deductible insurance policy.
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I am from Virginia. Like most states, we are in terrible shape financially, lacking money for schools, roads or health care. We cannot afford bankrolling frivolous lawsuits.
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As for what Cuccinelli's teabagger jihad may bring back to bite him in the ass, the Richmond Times Dispatch has a story. These are highlights:
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State Democrats today blasted Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli’s lawsuit against the federal government over health-care reform as a “right-wing” pursuit “doomed to fail,“ and said they filed a Freedom of Information Act request to find out how much money is being spent on the action.
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And when the issue of state’s rights arose, so did this state’s scarred racial past.
Asked by a reporter about any parallels between Virginia’s opposition to desegregation decades ago and its current fight against health care reform, Del. Jennifer L. McClellan, D-Richmond, said “absolutely.“
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McEachin predicted that the state will lose the lawsuit. The state Democratic Party, in their FOIA request, asked for the following: —records of Cuccinelli and the attorney general’s office staff in preparing the suit;
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—records of costs to taxpayers of staff work on the lawsuit;
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—a list of conference calls or written correspondence that the attorney general’s office had with other states’ attorneys general or any national conservative groups in planning the lawsuit;
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—the names of any outside firms contracted to assist on the lawsuit;
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—and the attorney general’s full schedule since taking office.
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Obviously, it will be interesting to see (1) how much money is being wasted and (2) who Cuccinelli has been meeting with. Somehow, I suspect his meeting has involved ultra far right teabaggers and purported conservative Christian organizations.