Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Another unconstitutional overreach by the Feds

This time in implementing Obamacare:  a provision considered and explicitly rejected by the Congress is implemented by HHS in its enabling regulations.  If the bureaucracy can implement that which Congress rejects then we no longer govern ourselves.  Hat tip Wesley J. Smith of NRO.

When I learned today that the federal bureaucracy had promulgated a rule compensating physicians for the time they spend counseling patients on end-of-life health-care decisions, I wasn’t surprised. A similar provision was dropped from the Obamacare bill, but anyone who understands the profoundly bureaucratic nature of contemporary government knew that that was not necessarily the end of it. The 2,700-page law is destined — if it is not rolled way back or repealed — to generate over 100,000 pages of enabling regulations. In such a milieu, that which can’t be obtained legislatively, can often be gotten through the bureaucratic back door. In fact, as I’ve noted elsewhere, one commission created by the law, the Medicare Independent Payment Advisory Board, can even enact laws over the president’s veto.

No comments:

Post a Comment