Broccoli, schmoccoli

Justice Antonin Scalia was his usual colorful self (sarcastic and snide) in questioning the lawyers about the health care reform law.

Pursuing the consequences of the government requiring people to make a particular purchase, he said, if the government can require you to buy health insurance, what's to stop them from requiring that you buy broccoli or burial insurance?

Broccoli, schmoccoli.    That's a bogus claim and quite silly of Scalia to bring it up.

First, there is no national crisis concerning broccoli that needs to be fixed.

Second, if some people choose not to buy broccoli, the rest of us are not required to pay a higher price for our broccoli in order to provide others with the necessary broccoli they refuse to buy but will consume anyway.

Third, people can easily get through life without eating broccoli.   Preferring Brussels sprouts instead is perfectly fine.   You might come closer to a valid food analogy if we were talking about people who refuse to purchase any food for themselves at all and routinely turn up starving at soup kitchens and asking to be fed.   But that's not what Scalia said.

Fourth, about burial insurance.   The cost to the government (meaning all of us) for burying (or cremating) paupers is a relatively small amount compared to the cost of hospitalizations and surgery that health insurance covers.  Burying paupers is not bankrupting the country.

So, Mr. Scalia.   It sounds like you're planning to reverse yourself by voting against this law, which seems to call into question the same legal point that you wrote a favorable opinion for in the past.   How do you justify the inconsistency?   Do you realize your partisan contempt is showing?

Emerson said:   "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."   But he wasn't talking about the Constitution.   He was talking about compulsive, nit-picky snobs in their daily lives.

Ralph