You can't simply rewrite law by executive fiat.

All those Signing Statements that they said had the force of law, even though that was not what Congress passed.

I can't put it any simpler than that.

Legal or not. That is a fact.

You guys say it's not an excuse for the bad things, and I agree--but you don't get to turn around and use the argument for things you agree with.

during the whole debate of just making medicare for all that all it takes to change existing law is 50 votes in the Senate and majority in House. So it's not too unreasonable to think that a few repubs that are in competitive races wouldn't vote for it.


On edit: you wouldn't have to start at -9 months - just 21 would be fine with children in families covered until 21. Same thing, different language.

Things are not what they seem in the US. The US is technically in a state of emergency, and there are already dozens of laws that allow the President to use that state of emergency to exercise other powers as well.

Including this one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemic_and_All_Hazards_Preparedness_Act

I'm not sure about it, but I think it's possible that President Obama can use this law above to enact a form of universal health care, making DHHS a health care provider "for the duration of the emergency," which some argue has never ended since 1919.

When/how did we go into a state of emergency?

President Obama extended the SOE by another couple of years in September, 2010, probably in part to make it a non-issue in this election year... until the general election, that is, when it may become an issue of considerable prominence.

However, prior states of emergency had been declared and never revoked. For example, Tricky Dick Nixon's people at one point suggested that the various illegal acts he had authorized were covered under a State of Emergency declared by President Truman in 1950, which had never been relaxed. Once Congress figured that out, they enacted an automatic sunset date of two years after the declaration, which has made tracking the current SOE much easier.

Prior to 1950, however, a similar legal situation had been created by the Sedition Act of 1918 and the Red Scare of 1919. And of course, prior to that were the mass-revocations of civil rights as a result of the Civil War and Reconstruction. Though that state of affairs was aggressively pruned back by Congress in the 1870s, it helped set the precedents necessary to create the current situation.

Obama could have prevented this from ever happening by keeping a public insurance option, single payer universal health coverage, and medicare for all on the table during the initial push to enact health care reform. Instead, he abandoned ALL of that in favor of requiring all Americans to maintain health insurance executive's obscene profits. He has even said that they "deserve" to be profitable. Only in a nation that lionizes greed does anyone get up in the morning deserving profit.

couldn't pass one. Don't blame Obama for the lack of enough progressives in the Senate.

...but every attempt was made-- successfully-- to keep all non-profit driven alternatives OFF THE TABLE. Obama is just as complicit in that as the senate republicans. He could have used his leadership to spark a national debate about single payer universal health coverage, a public insurance option, and Medicare for all. Candidate Obama promised not to sign ANY health care reform bill that lacked a public option, but president Obama worked hard, along with members of congress from BOTH PARTIES to stifle any debate that might lead to lowered insurance industry profits. It's clear who their real constituency is, and we're not it.

and where they weren't. Obama just didn't try to beat their heads against the wall of Rethug opposition.

They worked hard to make it that way. THEY WERE COMPLICIT.

Seriously-- why do you want to maintain greedy middle man insurance company profits? Why would any liberal want to do that?

eom

(For the reference, see Bernie Sander's comments that there was only 8-10 votes in the Senate for single-payer)

Ok, let's say Reid and Obama bust their asses, and triple the votes for single payer. They still lose, 30-70.

What would be remembered is that the President devoted a year of energy to something everyone knew was a lost cause from the beginning...much like FDR's court-packing plan in the late 1930s.

It's called "separation of powers." Look it up.

"you want in, you buy in", self funding?

Executive orders have limited functions and this isn't one of them.

Think about it. If Presidents could just write their own laws, as long as no funding was required, then President Bush could have outlawed abortion with the stroke of his pen on an Executive Order.

But no President of the U.S. has that kind of power, thankfully.

.. but expanding the scope of an existing one.

Small but crucial difference.

when he outlawed abortion.

What you propose is not remotely close to constitutional.

The full Part A premium is $450 and the full Part B premium is about $320. With prescription drug coverage, that's over $800 per person per month.

because right now its soley for the 65+ crowd which means that they most likey have health issues or about to have one. Now way a medicare buy in would be $800 for the average 40yr old

Expansion of existing law in almost all cases requires input of Congress. Expansion or Contraction, whatever. In fact I would bet that someplace in the many many pages of statute that set up medicare and the rules that govern it there is language prohibiting changes like this without input from Congress. The committees that writes these laws and has oversight never gives up control!

The courts would never go for this either.

Sure there are laws on the books that Admins don't enforce much but anything that has $$$$ involved then Congress is all over it always.

Many of the laws passed by the Bush Congress vastly expanded Presidential powers during a state of emergency (we're still operating under the SOE declared in 2001), during wartime (check), or in times of severe economic crisis (which apparently can be declared by the President at will).

As I've pointed out previously, all this already adds up to enormous power which this President simply refuses to employ, in part I think because he is confident that he can artfully tie his opposition in knots rather than use executive powers he may not personally believe will survive a Constitutional challenge.

But if he wanted to do so, I think that tomorrow the President could act on the existing state of emergency, restrict the power of his opposition through continuity of operations laws, activate FEMA and the rest of Homeland Security, and begin opening federal healthcare facilities staffed by Disaster Medical Assistance Teams, along with a dozen other laws which work in concert to give the President the authority he needs to do damned near whatever he wishes.

That was what made the Bush Administration so frightening. They had successfully drawn to the executive branch all the power they needed to steal America and hold it indefinitely. Fortunately for us they screwed it up so bad in eight years that they didn't want to clean up their own mess, and walked away.

The fact that this President won't touch this idea has a lot more to do with his personal integrity rather than his inability to act.

I would not go for this either and I desperately want reform in health care.

As a constitutional attorney I would protest this type of power grab with everything I have. Declaring a state of emergency or using one that was created for another purpose to make huge changes in society has always been the purview of despots and tyrants. This would never stand here and I would fight it even if it puts me in the slammer.

...if they thought it might come to that. Now just think about how every time the Republicans go behind closed doors to "negotiate" with the President, they come out endorsing his plan....

Funny how that's been working out for the President, isn't it?

What you are suggesting requires changes to existing law. So by definition it requires Congress.

You can't unilateral change the scope of a law that requires funding via the budget without input from Congress. You can bet that the law itself has provisions limiting what a branch of gov can do to it without input from the other branch/branches.

Executive orders are overwhelmingly used where Congress has not acted (fills a void)

Additionally, this would be bad for something like this because another administration can wipe it away with the signing of a pen stroke.

I have also never heard of anything so significant being done by executive order. It is a huge and unprecedented use of Presidential power that I will tell you 100% would not survive challenge in Federal Court.

and all the posters who are mentioning the use of wartime powers-Well this is different all together. The President has huge powers given to him via existing law on where to and how to deploy our military. These powers have been used for centuries and even the War-powers act has not constrained them much.

This is a different animal and effects domestic policy and almost 20% of our total economy. It also requires funding which will require input from the House. To do this via executive order only would create a Constitutional crisis in an election year.