Megan McArdle At Bloomberg. ‘Latest Obamacare Delay Is Probably Illegal‘

‘Ultimately, if Obamacare is going to hang together and not break down into an expensive mess, the administration is going to have to force some people to take unpleasant medicine. Until it demonstrates that it is willing to do so, the law and the insurance market remain at risk.’

I think many Americans see a role for the government to play in regulating competitive marketplaces and all the shenanigans found therein.  The ACA goes many steps beyond this, however, to an enormous, centrally-planned bureaucracy, freezing much of the current health-care delivery dysfunction in place and controlling these markets from above.  To many still supporting this law in principle if not in practice, there is knowledge enough, technology enough, and political leadership enough to make this happen and thus meet their moral and ideological commitments.

It’s the right thing to do.

So, is there necessarily knowledge, technology or political leadership enough to meet the demands this law places upon all of our heads?

Ed Morrisey at the Fiscal Times:

‘Hayek took von Mises’ argument a step further. Not only would such command economies fail, Hayek argued, but they would produce increasingly arbitrary governance and eventually erode the rule of law altogether. “[T]he use of the government’s coercive powers will no longer be limited and determined by pre-established rules,” he predicted. “The law can, and to make a central direction of economic activity possible must, legalize what to all intents and purposes remains arbitrary action.”

In order to make the law what you want it to be, you may have to selectively enforce the law in the meantime.  That’s not exactly a good definition of fairness, justice, nor equality under the law.

Richard Epstein still has some good ideas:

‘As I have noted before, there is only one type of reform that can make progress in meeting the three goals of a sensible health care system: cost reduction, quality improvements, and public access. That reform requires massive deregulation of the many market impediments that are already in place. Lower the costs, drop the excessive mandates, and thin out administrative costs, and people will flock back to the system voluntarily.’

Related On This Site: From The New England Journal Of Medicine Via CATO: ‘The Constitutionality of the Individual Mandate’From If-Then Knots: Health Care Is Not A Right…But Then Neither Is Property?… From The New Yorker: Atul Gawande On Health Care-”The Cost Conundrum”…Sally Pipes At Forbes: ‘A Plan That Leads Health Care To Nowhere’…From AEI: ‘Study: ‘Obama Healthcare Reform Raising Costs, Forcing Workers Out Of Existing Plans’