I won’t make that mistake again
As a Democrat, I voted for Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna because I truly thought he would be the best AG and also in the interests of bipartisanship.
How dare he claim to represent my stand on the health care bill [“Washington joins lawsuit over mandate,” page one, March 23]? I didn’t elect him to declare it unconstitutional — I exercised my constitutional rights when I elected my president and other members of the federal and state governments who did their jobs, evaluated it, and supported it. State representatives, don’t give him the money to sue!
What do I get out of the health-care bill? The gradual closing of the ridiculously named doughnut hole (as if it were a tasty piece of pastry), which will help pay for my medications. My adult disabled daughter will now be able to get health insurance, in spite of her pre-existing condition. My 18-year-old grandson won’t be kicked off his parents’ insurance policy until he’s 26.
Because of this bill, I don’t have to pay for the wildly expensive emergency rooms, which will gradually begin to empty out! And I gain an easing conscience with the knowledge that the deserving poor and the homeless will have insurance. Do I want McKenna to join other Republicans in getting rid of my new benefits?
Will I ever vote Republican again? Not likely. Can’t trust’em. They want to make it look as though people who receive all these benefits are mad, while actually it’s just a small group of the “financially gifted” who will have to give more.
— Patricia Weenolsen, Seattle
Politics and hypocrisy
Thanks for reminding us again of the hypocrisy in our political parties [“Health-care-overhaul bill included big GOP idea: individual mandate,” news, March 25].
This time it’s the GOP. It wasn’t too long ago the GOP was advocating requiring each American to have health insurance and in fact created the idea.
Ummmm. It seems the good ol’ GOP has some explainin’ to do.
— Ed Wilson, Seattle
An intelligent legal scholar
Attorney General Rob McKenna has always been considered an attorney with the highest ethical standards; an intelligent legal scholar. That is why he was elected.
If he believes that the recent health-care legislation violates the Constitution, he is compelled as attorney general to pursue that violation. Anyone — Democrat, Republican or independent — would want that to happen.
If those who voted for the health-care legislation knew the legislation is constitutionally flawed, shame on them! The rest of us, whether for or against the legislation, certainly want to know it does not violate the Constitution.
Anyone who would vote to withhold funding to determine if the legislation is in violation of the Constitution must be afraid of the truth. What is happening to this great nation of ours?
— John Swanson, Bellevue
Stop the hemorrhaging
Primary to controlling our national debt is containing the daily cost of failed health care. Our new health-care bill does this by putting a tourniquet on a financial hemorrhage. Bounding this hemorrhage may very well save the lives of “45,000 people who die every year because they don’t have access to health care” (as reported by Sister Simone Campbell in an interview).
Danny Westneat [“Free to have health care for all,” column, March 21] suggests that meeting the costs to implement full health care now is necessary. These costs are often misrepresented: Increased taxes will only affect the rich and budget deficits are projected to decrease. The full cost will not be realized until 2014 — after a rebounding economy is enhanced by wage-earning, taxpaying, medically insured Americans.
I’m appalled at deterrence to this bill on “constitutional” grounds, objecting that everyone must buy health insurance from a “private” company. This requirement came about to appease the same ideologues who put a stop to the single-payer government plan successful in other nations.
Hopefully, bipartisan wisdom will replace polarized bigotry to build a bridge spanning conflicts and creating opportunities to reclaim security for American workers
— Bob Olson, Bellevue
Acting on conscience
Throughout the health-care debate, President Obama reminded voters that his job is to do what is right, not just what is popular. Indeed, amid a public backlash, many Democratic lawmakers in Congress were forced to make the difficult choice between voting their conscience or the will of their constituents.
Now Attorney General Rob McKenna is faced with a similar situation — to oppose the interests of the Democratic majority in Washington state or act on his conscience of what is right.
Those who criticize his lawsuit based merely on its unpopularity should recall how the health-care bill passed in the first place.
— Tom Goldman, Issaquah
Challenge could backfire
While cynically appealing to his Republican base, Attorney General Rob McKenna’s legal challenge to health-care-insurance reform may prove a Trojan horse. Though its legal prospects are dim in the extreme, the AG needs be careful what he asks for. He just might get it.
The process could take years and no little expense. Given its current activist streak, however, the Supreme Court just might reach for a result more consistent with the majority’s (and McKenna’s) politics.
If the court upholds the claims brought by the 12 Republican AG’s and one Democrat, the story will not end there. Assuming the current option is struck down, the public option may well suffer the same fate. In that time, however, the public will have discovered that it likes the protection the reform affords, as well as the savings that it promises. Its taste for reform will only be stronger.
That leaves only single payer as a vehicle for reform. Medicare has already met its constitutional challenges. Thus, Sen. Joe Lieberman’s hastily withdrawn proposal to extend that program could be readily expanded to embrace all Americans. The challenge could give birth to single payer.
The irony is delicious to contemplate.
— John T. McLean, Edmonds