Healthcare

Firebagger Bait

A small victory for the healthcare reform law:

DETROIT — A federal judge on Thursday rejected an attempt to stop some key provisions of the new national health-care law, saying Congress has the authority to require people to get insurance by 2014.

The ruling — the first in a challenge to the Obama administration’s health care overhaul — came in a lawsuit filed in Michigan by a Christian legal group, the Thomas More Law Center, and four people who claimed lawmakers exceeded their power under the Constitution’s commerce clause. But U.S. District Judge George Caram Steeh in Detroit said the insurance mandate, and the financial penalty if someone skips coverage, are not illegal. He said Congress was trying to lower the overall cost of insurance by requiring participation.

I sincerely hope progressives won't put any steam behind the anti-mandate efforts. We should be focusing all of our HCR efforts on passing a public option.