Expand Social Security
Our president has said that the Supreme Court ruling his health-care plan Obama-Care as unconstitutional would be an unprecedented action. The major argument I have encountered for its constitutionality has been that the Supreme Court did not overrule the constitutionality of the Social Security Act nor the Medicare Act. It is a ludicrous and possibly specious argument.Social Security and Medicare are financed by taxes and have eligibility requirements. Therefore, not everybody is covered. “Obama-Care” requires everybody to buy an insurance product or pay a penalty. Failure to buy the product or pay the penalty could result in jail time, or something like community service time.
The key phrase is “financed by taxes.” The 16th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, enacted in 1913, gives the Congress power to lay and collect taxes on incomes from whatever source derived without apportionment among the several States and without regard to any census or enumeration.
So, why didn’t the Obama Administration just expand Social Security instead of using the Commerce Clause to finance the extra health care stipulations now in Obama-Care? Original Social Security has been changed and expanded many times already, so why not again? Is there another reason for expanding the application of the Commerce Clause, maybe something else we would be required to buy or do?
Bob Druktanis
Sharpsburg
