Comments about ‘Letter: Court ruling institutionalizes notion of taxes to coerce people’

It is a fair point, but as Justice Roberts stated, we have controll over our taxes with our votes.

At least Thomas you could be more original and thoughtful than the broccali argument.

Overwrought. Tax laws are full of examples of this. Don't pretend otherwise. Hardly unique, let alone serving the greater good.

The government already has the right to draft men to go to war. Force one to serve on a jury. Why the big broo ha ha about health insurance?

Taxing a person who doesn't have health insurance is nothing in comparison to being drafted to go to war. Especially when one considers that we (all of us) end paying many of the medical expenses for people who don't have health insurance anyway. Shouldn't those who can afford the insurance pay for it themselves? Why should the rest of us have to pay for those people?

Newsflash: The government has been using taxes to coerce behavior for generations now.

Higher taxes on alcohol and cigarettes.
Gas taxes for those who own cars.
Restaurant taxes.
Tax breaks for having kids or making charitable donations.

Taxes have always been used to shape public behavior - this is nothing new.

And I am still confused as to why people think it is a bad thing to make people who use the health care system help pay for the cost of it. For years conservatives have been arguing that those who receive welfare should have to do community service to help pay for the benefits they are receiving - this law simply says if you can afford health care and choose not to purchase it, you will pay a penalty so that other people are not on the hook for the total cost of your care when you get sick. Why is that such a big deal?

Next time somebody in utah howls about increasing 'sin' taxes, i'll expect to hear from you, buddy.

Congress passed the ACA. The President signed it into law.

We must not forget that Congress passes all laws, and unless they have a super-majority, each law requires the signature of the President.

WE decide who sits in Congress. We decide who sits in the White House.

We citizens can easily fix the problem. All we have to do is to make a list of those who voted for the ACA and then see that those people never serve in public office again. It is OUR responsibility to clean house.

Those elected officials did not do what we, the people, asked them to do. We asked them to vote against the ACA. They voted for it over the objection of 59% of the people.

They had their day, now we will have ours. We do not have to sit back and take it any more. If Congress passes an unpopular tax, we can change Congress.

Forget about the ACA. That is history. We can make new history by putting people in office who respect the Constitution and who respect the people and the states that they represent.

It's time for a change in America.

Thomas, why not state what is really bothering you about the ACA. All the wailing and gnashing of teeth is more about POTUS than the ACA. Obama pushed it though even though it is mostly a Heritage Foundation rebuttal to Hillary Clinton. In Utah we keep adding fees for this and for that because we don't believe in over taxing. Do you catch the irony here? This is about personal responsibility because your so called tax will effect roughly 1% of people who can afford insurance that refuse to buy it. I have seen savings already to my healthcare budget and the ACA isn't even fully implemented. I must say in the interest of full disclosure that I believe this should only be the first step toward a single payer universal system that covers all of us. There is something wrong with so many people get rich when one gets cancer.

All this does is take a hidden tax -- the one we were all paying in extra medical costs because we were being forced to pay for those without insurance -- and bringing it into the open.

It's not much different than when Obama took the costs of wars started by President Cheney and his little friend off the hidden credit cards they were using and put it out front where we could all see what was happening.

It's called "Honesty." Isn't that something conservatives claim to revere?

Seven days ago - heck, even three days ago (Thursday, the day the ruling came out) - the ACA was referred to as "Obamacare." (Conservatives used to call it that in derision, then the Democrats started taking the name back - but both sides were using that term.)

Now that it has been ruled Constitutional, conservatives are calling it the ACA.

Anyone else notice the change in terms?

No organization owns my vote, I will give it to whoever I feel will serve the nation best regardless of the letter next to their name. I fully agree that "VOTERS" at the polls will have the final word on President Barack Obama's health care law come November. This is a win for Obama. This is his bill. There's not really any doubt in people's minds. Obama's Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, has made it clear that he will run against the law. He has to. Is the Uglund House Romney's second home?. "We are Republican voters, but don't get into a Republican convention?" Party conventions are invitation-only. Without media credentials or a slot in Florida's delegation, you won't get through the Secret Service's security perimeter around the convention venues. All the GOP cares about is more big guns for the hunters, subsidies for the Koch Brother's and their "Rich and Famous" friends. That's "welfare for the rich" government, subsidies to big business, pork-barrel Pentagon contracts to weapons makers, huge tax breaks for wealthy individuals, and colossal contracts for reconstruction to politically connected companies like Halliburton.

Our own Utah government has issued a tax on those who don't wear safety belts.

So that's ok.

But it's a bad thing for health care (something that is far more important than seat belts)?

Amazing where our priorities are in this state.

Oh please. We do not have a broccoli crisis in America. And we never will. We do have a health-care crisis. ACA isn't the perfect answer. Indeed, it would be far better if it hadn't been based on Romneycare and a Heritage Foundation proposal. But hopefully this can be a start. We will need to shape it in coming years so that it meets our needs and keeps costs contained.

We might ask why the Republicans have not come up with a plan to replace the Affordable Care Act. Well, the reason is that they already did come up with such a plan. It now goes by the nickname Obamacare. Irony, I suppose, isn't their strong suit.

I've always said that as soon as children can vote, republicans will run on a platform against taxes and brocolli.