“Unconstitutional”
A lot of people at yesterdays regrettable townhall meeting were yelling that this or that detail of the proposed healthcare plan was “unconstitutional.” They had read their pocket constitutions and decided that this made them an expert on constitutional law. Apparently the U.S. Constitution prohibits everything they don’t like—and only the things they don’t like.
The proposed bill does not do anything about malpractice suits. Malpractice suits are tort law and tort law is (generally) state law. To limit or cap awards in malpractice suits would thrust federal law into an area that had traditionally belonged to the state. It might even run into some actual constitutional problems. If the healthcare bill is constitutionally problematic (and, for the most part, it isn’t), some sort of federal tort reform is constutituionally unthinkable.
I enjoyed whispering conspiratorily to the booing people who didn’t know I wasn’t on their side, “Wait—wouldn’t that sort of thing be unconstitutional?” They didn’t know—but either way, it didn’t bother them.
