The Supreme Court Ruling on the Patent Protection and Affordable Care Act. Don McCanne, MD, Physicians for a National Health Program, June 28, 2012 Go ahead and wade through the cacophony of responses to the Supreme Court decision. It should be a fascinating excursion through society's exposed soul at its finest, and at its worst. Some of the responses you will hear will rely on refined cognitive processes and others on fundamental reflexive emotions. You will not hear much new. The sounds will only be louder and more concentrated. ... The

John Nichols, The Nation, June 28, 2012 There has been few steadier Congressional hands throughout he debate over healthcare reform than that of Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. Principled in his support for the real reform of “Medicare for All,” yet pragmatic in his advocacy for Affordable Care Act provisions that expand public health programs and allow states to experiment with single-payer options, Sanders has been in the thick of every fight over President Obama’s signature reform. And the ensuing legislative and legal battles over its implementation. ... Bernie

Socialist Party, USA, June 28, 2012 Obama’s policy was based on the original sin of allowing the pharmaceutical companies off the hook.  He then followed this up by pledging public funds to subsidize junk healthcare plans, coercing Americans into purchasing these plans and silencing the voices of single-payer healthcare advocates. This is no reform; it is just another corporate giveaway by the Obama administration. Socialist Party USA Presidential candidate Stewart Alexander condemned the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the provisions of the President Obama’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. ... Socialist

The Supreme Court’s decision will make it much harder to extend health insurance to America’s poor. Darshak Sanghavi, Slate, June 28, 2012 Just what problems have we solved now that the Affordable Care Act has been upheld? We should rightly celebrate that no American will be denied the ability to get health care because of a pre-existing condition, and that many children will remain on parents’ health plans for more time. But at its heart, the bill was designed to extend private insurance to the largest (politically) possible number ... Don’t

The chief justice’s canny move to uphold the Affordable Care Act while gutting the Commerce Clause. Tom Scocca, Slate, June 28, 2012 There were two battles being fought in the Supreme Court over the Affordable Care Act. Chief Justice John Roberts - and Justice Anthony Kennedy - delivered victory to the right in the one that mattered. ... Obama

Amy Whitcomb Slemmer, Health Care For All-Massachusetts, June 28, 2012

Jonathan Cohn, The New Republic, June 28, 2012 The Supreme Court has ruled. Health care reform lives. The decision was actually three separate rulings, with the justices taking different positions on different parts of the law. But it means that the Affordable Care Act can take effect, unless lawmakers decide to repeal it, as Mitt Romney and congressional Republicans have vowed to do. If fully implemented, thirty million people who might otherwise be uninsured will get coverage. ... Supreme

Zachary Robinson, CCDS, June 28, 2012

For an analysis of how the positions of Democrats and Republicans on health care have evolved, please see this interesting article by Ezra Klein in last Monday's New Yorker, entitled "Unpopular Mandate, Why Do Politicians Reverse Their Positions."

Klein's view is the best of the mainstream liberal pundits, who have been abuzz lately about all these Republican politicians whose flip-flopping can only be understood using theories of social psychology.

Why do politicians reverse their positions? Ezra Klein, New Yorker, June 25, 2012 On March 23, 2010, the day that President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law, fourteen state attorneys general filed suit against the law’s requirement that most Americans purchase health insurance, on the ground that it was unconstitutional. It was hard to find a law professor in the country who took them seriously. “The argument about constitutionality is, if not frivolous, close to it,” Sanford Levinson, a University of Texas law-school professor, told the McClatchy newspapers. ... Unpopular

James Haslam & Peg Franzen, Vermont Workers’ Center, June 27, 2012 “The Vermont Workers’ Center is doing exactly the kind of grassroots organizing that needs to happen across America. At a time when the middle class is shrinking and poverty is growing and the very wealthy have never had it so good, we need a movement that demands economic justice for millions of working families. The Vermont Workers’ Center is in the forefront of building that movement and I congratulate them for their fine work.” - US Senator Bernie Sanders ... Vermont

... as Court Decision Looms. National Nurses United, June 27, 2012 Five years after release of their searing indictment of the failings of the US healthcare system, filmmaker Michael Moore and the real-life stars of SiCKO, will hold a reunion Saturday night in Philadelphia. The event is at 7 PM at the Plays and Players Theater, 1714 Delancey Street. Ironically, the gathering will be one of the first major national events following the expected Supreme Court decision on the Affordable Care Act – and it will serve as a reminder that, no matter how the court rules, the national healthcare crisis chronicled in SiCKO is far from over. ... SiCKO

Huffington Post, June 27, 2012 Washington - The last thing House progressives want is for the Supreme Court to strike down President Barack Obama's health care law. But if the high court rules Thursday that some or all of the law is unconstitutional, progressives are ready to renew their push for the model of health care they wanted all along: the single-payer option. "It's easy to see it's a good idea," Representative Keith Ellison (D-MN), co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told The Huffington Post. "It's the cheapest way to cover everybody." ... Single-Payer

Donna Smith, National Nurses United, June 27, 2012 

It hurts. The stories hurt. The aching, pounding, insistent sounds of Californians telling the nurses where it hurts. This is what the Medicare for all for life bus tour is all about in California. And just as you cannot unring a bell, there is no way you can unfeel the pain people share as they demand change. 

In Bakersfield last week, we heard about an 87-year old man who is extracting his own teeth because he was worried about the cost. ... No

Bob Spoerl, Becker’s Hospital Review, June 22, 2012 The Supreme Court's decision on the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act could put in jeopardy initiatives aimed at improving the nation's healthcare system by leaving them unfunded, according to a New York Times report. The PPACA has already appropriated $100 billion to be spent over the next decade on programs such as the Prevention and Public Health Fund, as well as expanding the reach of community health centers nationwide. It's also unclear what will happen to programs such as federally financed state pools for people denied private insurance ... Billions

Largest RN Organization Availability When Decision Announced. Nurses Already Holding Free Health Screenings, Town Hall Meetings.
National Nurses United, June 22, 2012

Leaders of the nation’s premier and largest union and professional association of registered nurses will be available to speak to media immediately upon release of the Supreme Court decision on the Affordable Care Act.

To arrange interviews, contact Charles Idelson, 510-273-2246 or 415-559-8991 or Carl Ginsburg, 917-405-1060.