Thread by @kurteichenwald

1. Nothing is more infuriating to me, who believes Trump must be defeated, than to watch democrats arguing about forbidding private insurance under single payer.

Private insurance is going nowhere. The solidification of a conservative Supreme Court (thanks 2016 protesters!)...

2...makes such a proposal impossible - & it likely would have been impossible even under a liberal court. In other words, democrats are losing voters who want to keep their insurance for absolutely no reason.

The fundamental constitutional issue at play is freedom of contract...

3...which precedent and plenty of founders' writings have found implicit in the Constitution through lots of different ways - some through the Due Process clause (not so much anymore), some through privileges and immunities clause, then lots of other have been cited over the....

4...years - 9th Amend, 10th Amend, 14th Amend (yup) and 13th Amend (unbelievably, but yes) and even the 1st Amend. The precedent makes it clear that, particularly through the 9th Amendment, there is a freedom to contract. Now, there are variants through various cases, which....

5...originally declared that contracts could only be adjusted through state police power (starting with Allgeyer v. Louisiana). One of the keys on this was Lochner v. New York, a terrible decision but one that has not been fully reversed. This held that states could not....

6...regulate working conditions because it served as a violation of contract. But, this was about the contract of individuals not capable of truly negotiating contract because of powerlessness. It was undercut by West Coast Hotels v. Parrish....

7...which made it legal for states to establish minimum wage laws. The finding, which explicitly dealt with "the right to contract" (thus making it clear such a right existed) could be restricted by the state to protect "the community, health and safety, or vulnerable groups."...

8...but it has NEVER been held that means an otherwise lawful contract of one person can be cancelled to benefit a second person. That is the essence of the argument for pushing aside private insurance - "we need to get rid of it to benefit all with single payer." It is an....

9...an extreme interference with private contracting which has never been adopted by the court. Essentially, if someone can't enter into a private insurance contract, the government is establishing it has the right to interfere in contracts NOT for the benefit of the contractee..

10...but the benefit of people not in the contract. This falls fundamentally under the concept of property rights and economic liberty. And seriously? People think that one of the most conservative courts of all time is going to undermine property and contract rights? I could...

11..cite all the cases that establish this expectation is lunacy advanced by people who both dont know the precedent and live in a fantasy world, but here is the bottom line: Many people with private insurance like their private insurance....

12...saying "you cant keep it" loses votes for NO REASON, because this is a proposal that will never survive the courts. If you say "outlaw insurance" you are making a purely political argument based on anger, not a constitutional one. And constitutionally, aint gonna happen. fin