The first negative speaker (arguing against the resolution) in the Braver Angels debate, Garrett Neaves, argued to disabuse the notion made by most deficit hawks that the federal government should act like an American household, and endeavor to spend no more money than it takes in. Rather, he said, federal spending should follow the precepts of early 20^th Century economist John Maynard Keynes. 

“Deficit spending by our government is almost always essential to avoid causing a recession,” Neaves said. "And because every dollar being spent is also a dollar of income to someone receiving that dollar, whenever a dollar is being saved rather than spent, someone is not getting that dollar as income."

Neaves said that the federal government is not like a household, but more like a scorekeeper, deciding who should receive tax money. Deficit spending is the foundation of an economy based on fiat currency. The U.S. dollar only has value because the nation’s citizens must have them to pay income taxes. 

On household spending versus federal spending, he said "In order to be responsible for ourselves, we need to be good savers, and in order to avoid a recession, we need there to be enough spending." 

It’s an economic theory that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt employed to pull the U.S. economy out of the Great Depression but found its nemesis in 1981 when Ronald Reagan took office and preached the theory of supply-side economics, which posits that job creation is made by private employers and not the government, and therefore tax cuts for employers is the way to grow employment and stem any economic downturns.

But recessions and economic downturns in general lead everyone in an economy to hold on to their savings. That leaves only the government to willingly flow more money back into the economy by spending on federal and state programs and pay for it by printing cash or buying up its own bonds. 

"Our federal government is nothing like a household," Neaves continued. "The federal government is our monopoly creator of dollars. We can decide to have our federal government spend as much as is necessary to allow us to save as much as we want without causing a recession."

Neaves made the distinction between the often-confused federal deficit and debt. In short, the deficit is the difference between the taxes and other revenues the government takes in over a fiscal year and the amount it spends on myriad programs in that same year. Federal debt is the accumulation of years of deficits when they are not paid off, usually by printing cash (an inflation risk) and/or buying back its own bonds. "Deficit and debt fear has been a highly dominant weapon used to manipulate us for the 50 years," he said.

Under Q&A, Neaves was asked why re-institution of the gold standard wouldn’t work. 

“The gold standard was a choice,” he replied. “The government issues currency, and the currency has a real and tangible value.”

Another question regarded government-issued bonds during World War II.

“I think we should use bonds to achieve public purpose,” Neaves replied. “Bonds were sold to regulate people so they wouldn’t buy refrigerators and cars” as the factories that otherwise assembled consumer goods converted to the war effort. “Because they were sacrificing by not buying cars, they should get a return (from bond interest) for the sacrifice.”

The second negative debater, Ethan Ableman, works in Washington reading the texts of appropriation bills, and says deficits are necessary for expenditures that fall outside the boundaries of such spending bills. 

“Unlike the federal budget, nearly every single state has a balanced budget requirement.” State legislatures find it next to impossible politically to raise taxes to pay for budget shortfalls, so they have to cut spending to such necessities as infrastructure and public schools. Pandemics, natural disasters and other emergencies fall outside both federal and state budgets, with “part of the federal budget set aside, but only so much” for such agencies as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Ableman said.

“If Congress had to balance the budget during the pandemic, people would have died (as a result) for sure.” Operation Warp Speed, for example, former President Trump’s effort to speed up approval of COVID-19 vaccines, cost $10 billion in deficit spending. 

“Even if we don’t like the monetary theory, there are times when the government needs to spend large amounts of money very quickly,” the second negative concluded.

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Should the federal government be as fiscally responsible as the average American household about spending more than it takes in? Supply Siders, Keynesians and at least one young debater speaking for a post-cash economy discussed, in a very civil manner, the meaning and weight of a federal deficit on the U.S. economy on Zoom Thursday night. 

In debate-speak, affirmatives are speakers who are in favor of the resolution and negatives are against it. For this resolution, affirmatives believe deficit spending is a major risk, while negatives believe it is not a big problem.

Braver Angels’ (braverangels.org) was founded in late 2016 to “bring Americans together to bridge the partisan divide and strengthen our democratic agenda.” Sounds more than a bit like the philosophy that drives The Hustings as a political news website. This post on the Braver Angels debate presents the opening arguments by the four scheduled debaters on the subject of federal deficit spending. 

Arguments by affirmatives for the resolution are in the right column. Arguments by negatives for the resolution are in the left column.

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What is your position on the resolution: “Deficit spending is a major risk to the U.S. economy”? Let us know at editors@thehustings.news.

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Affirmative John R. Dykers led off the scheduled Braver Angels debaters with a moderate, balanced view of the place of federal budget deficits in the modern economy. (Affirmatives argue in favor of the debate resolution.)

“It is likely that we can all agree that this is always the discussion. There must always be a balance of the problems on which we are spending the money, (which) must also be balanced against the tolerance of those who lend the money through the bond market,” he said. “If spending makes us as a nation a more effective producer of goods and services, and a more effective entity to repay the money,” and the spending creates more income to be taxed, then the circular nature of such spending is worthwhile.

This circular nature of the economy – the “multiplier effect” – only works if the deficit spending doesn’t overheat the economy and trigger high levels of inflation, which the U.S. has not experienced through several cycles, well before The Great Recession of 2009-10.

While deficit hawks often point to the portion of debt held by China, for example, it is not one of Dykers’ serious concerns. Japan holds about 5%, and China slightly less than 5% of our debt through bonds, he notes, while other countries hold about 30% with the rest held in the U.S. (by financial institutions and largely through 401Ks, by individuals). In the Q&A, moderated parliamentary style by debate chair Luke Nathan Phillips, Dykers was asked, “How do you know when you’ve spent too much?” 

Interest rates and bond prices, Dykers responded. When interest rates go up and bond prices go down, it’s a sign that we’re in for high inflation and an overheated economy that could result in high unemployment and financial pain for many Americans.

But, he added, “it’s so complex, it’s hard to know when that happens.”

Despite trillions of dollars of coronavirus relief programs through the Trump administration and to President Biden’s $1.9-trillion American Relief Plan Act (ARPA) and proposed $2.3-trillion infrastructure package, the Federal Reserve’s target rate for interest remained in March at an historical low, of 0%-0.25%. 

“We’re now such a global economy that inflation pressures are now down from when we were a local economy,” he said. “Often this is signaled by the bond market.”

The second of the two affirmative speakers for the resolution, software engineer Bett Bollhoefer, argued from the point of view of younger generations who are looking forward to a post-cash economy. 

“It’s not a major risk for the economy,” Bollhoefer said. “It’s a major risk for the citizens.” Her peers are “looking for places to put their money” with returns “higher than inflation.” 

In other words, crypto-currency, like Bitcoin appears to be the future. Currency by fiat, such as the U.S. dollar has no inherent value. Cash is through with, she posits, and this is what her peers looking for a currency of value greater than inflation are saying.

Bollhoefer likened recent quantitative easing – in which the Federal Reserve bought up government bonds in order to push more money back into the economy for consumer spending – to “giving every citizen a (currency) printer.” 

But deficit spending would build infrastructure projects and improvements “that we’ve been ignoring for years,” one debate audience member maintained.

“If the government is spending money for infrastructure, then the money has to come from somewhere,” Bollhoefer replied.

Opening arguments by the affirmative debaters didn’t fall closely in line with those of traditional deficit hawks, but the Braver Angels audience-member debaters, whom The Hustings will cover in the next post this weekend, will provide a more hard-line point of view.

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By Chase Wheaton

President Biden recently upheld what is probably one of his most contentious campaign promises by establishing a commission of 36 experts and scholars to study the Supreme Court, and while conservatives may be up-in-arms about what this could mean for the future of the Court, progressives are relieved that we may finally see some long overdue change to this powerful institution. And although, personally, I am not expecting much tangible reform to come from either this commission or the Biden administration, it is nevertheless a step in the right direction and proof of the impact that progressive ideologies have had on President Biden’s agenda and his priorities in office.

The Supreme Court is arguably the most powerful body of people in our country when you consider the “terms and conditions” of their appointments and their role in our government. The Court is made up of a group of nine people who are appointed to their positions for the remainder of their lives, who are not overseen or held accountable by any other agency, group, or election process, and who have the authority to deem any federal law, statute, or code as unconstitutional with a single metaphorical stroke of their pens. Some of the most historic and significant changes in our country have resulted from decisions made by the Supreme Court, and while many of those have been positive and have contributed to the overall progress of our nation, the dangerous ideologies of the Trump-era Republican party, and presumably, its judiciary appointees, leave millions of Americans in fear that many of their human rights will be eliminated in future decisions made by the Court.

Some Republicans may view that last statement as an exaggeration, but I don’t think the Republican party is in a position to make any sort of commentary about the Supreme Court given how they’ve approached the judicial branch of our government over the last five years. To me, it is the pinnacle of hypocrisy that conservatives are upset about President Biden’s approach to this judicial reform, considering they’ve made a complete mockery of the rules and precedents of the judicial appointment process the last few years, particularly in relation to the Supreme Court. Since Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-KY, as majority leader blocked former President Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland to the Court, Republicans, at every turn, have collectively done whatever best suits their own interests and motives to successfully create a 6-3 conservative majority. And now they’re upset that the president is establishing a commission to simply explore the potential impacts of judicial reform? Unbelievable. 

Either way, regardless of the current makeup, I think it’s time for much-needed change to the Supreme Court’s structure. There haven’t been any meaningful attempts at reforming SCOTUS since FDR last tried in the mid-1930s, nearly 90 years ago, and you’d be hard-pressed to convince me that the judicial needs of our country haven’t changed significantly since then. For now, I’ll begin my 180-day countdown and wait to read what exactly this commission comes up with, and what it’ll mean for the future of the highest court in the land, before I get too carried away fantasizing about the possibility of real judicial progress and change.

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By Todd Lassa

Perhaps more than any other policy issue that the Democratic Party’s progressive-left is pushing on a moderate White House, the 36-member bi-partisan commission announced in April to study structural changes to the U.S. Supreme Court seems foisted upon President Biden. Consider that he carefully backed away from questions during last year’s presidential campaign from committing to an expansion of the Court beyond its nine justices. At the time, the Democratic candidate repeated several times that he is “not a fan” of court-stacking.

Since then, two progressive, though senior, well-established congress members, Sen. Ed Markey, D-MA, and Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-NY, have introduced a bill to increase the SCOTUS bench to 13 justices. (It will go nowhere with the current Senate makeup.)

And why shouldn’t Biden stack the Court, from Democrats’ point of view? The last Supreme Court justice appointed by a Republican president who won the popular vote was George W. Bush’s choice, Samuel Alito, who took the bench in January 2006. The last Senate-approved Democratic appointee was Elena Kagan, who has served since August 2010, just 21 months into President Barack Obama’s first term. 

Since then, former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, has blocked Obama’s choice of Merrick Garland to replace the late Justice Antony Scalia, and has pushed through Trump administration nominees Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barret, the latter of which took the bench replacing Ruth Bader Ginsberg against her dying wish, just one week before Donald Trump lost re-election. 

Now his party’s left wants Biden to push through an extra justice or four, as Franklin Delano Roosevelt had tried in his first term as president. While FDR’s attempt, though made possible by the Constitution, failed miserably, Democratic forces now have great fear that a.) Democrat’s tie-breaker-thin Senate control will disappear with the November 2022 mid-terms, and b.) the next chance it gets the Roberts court will overturn Roe vs. Wade, or at least enough of it to make it functionally useless, by 6-3 vote. 

One alternative would be for Justice Stephen Breyer, 82, to step down well before the mid-terms and give the Senate a chance to approve Biden’s nominee (as with Kagan, Breyer’s replacement would amount to a Democratic nominee for a Democratic nominee). Party leaders have been pressuring for that since Biden took office. 

Senate Republicans engaged the “nuclear option” and eliminated the filibuster for Supreme Court nominations in 2017, making it possible to confirm a nominee with only 51 votes (Senate Democrats eliminated the judicial filibuster for all but the top court in 2013).

Biden’s bi-partisan commission, announced April 9, consists of 36 legal scholars, former federal judges and practicing attorneys, according to The Washington Post. The president has given the commission 180 days to produce a report, which makes it due October 6, two days after the Supremes return from summer recess for the new court calendar. 

Theoretically, Breyer could bow to pressure and announce his retirement in time for a Biden nominee to matriculate through the confirmation process by early 2022, although it must be noted that there cannot be a nominee as liberal as Trump’s three nominees are conservative, if the White House wants to count on the votes of Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin III, of West Virginia, and Krysten Sinema, of Arizona, to assure a majority. 

More importantly, Biden has not charged the bi-partisan commission with the task of issuing recommendations, “but rather,” the Post reports, “providing an analysis of a range of proposed changes to the court.” There are no expectations that President Joe “not a fan” Biden might act on any proposals in time to add Supreme Court justices before the ’22 mid-terms. 

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By Stephen Macaulay

Biden said, while running for office, that he’d establish a commission to look at the Supreme Court. So he’s established a commission: the “Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States.”

Certainly a descriptive title.

The White House describes it as being a “bipartisan group of experts on the Court and the Court reform debate.”

There are 36 people on the commission. One of the problems that I see with it is that 35 of those people are all employed by universities. Sherrilyn Ifill is president and director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund. She is the only one not lecturing or having a TA teach while otherwise engaged.

Not that I am anti-education.

But wouldn’t it be better to have more people who make their livelihoods by practicing law? Yes, many of the people on the commission have appeared many times in front of judges, even Supreme Court judges. But people who are making their daily bread by working briefs undoubtedly think differently about what the issues are than people who are getting a paycheck from an Ivy League school.

And another thing: 36 people? At some point meetings are going to be face-to-face meetings, not things occurring on Zoom. Thirty-six people.

A major league baseball team has 26 players and there are only nine in the game at any one time.

Thirty-six is rather, well, organizationally silly.

Oh, and I failed to mention that there will be public meetings as part of this so more people can chime in.

Something tells me there isn’t going to be a whole lot of substance.

So what is the purpose of this commission?

“The topics it will examine include the genesis of the reform debate; the Court’s role in the Constitutional system; the length of service and turnover of justices on the Court; the membership and size of the Court; and the Court’s case selection, rules, and practices.”

Let’s be clear here. The whole point of this exercise was originally promulgated because one Party thinks that there is too much influence on the Court on behalf of the Other Party.

Who’s who can be switched around depending on who holds the presidency and Congress.

To stick with the baseball metaphor, when an ump makes a bad call, there is a chorus of “Throw the bum out!”

Same thing here.

While there is no denying the importance of the Third Branch, it is notable how little space its establishment takes in the Constitution: Article III, Section 1, opens, “The judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish.”

That’s it.

And as for the lifetime appointments? That goes to the second sentence of the same: “The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behaviour, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services, a compensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.”

In other words, as long as they’re exhibiting “good behaviour,” they’ve got a job.

(By the way, those two quoted sentences make up the entirety of Article III, Section 1.)

The number of people on the Court?

Nowhere is it specified.

It is largely a case of tradition.

Arguably tradition is losing ground in the U.S. (and elsewhere), and more’s the pity for it.

Conservatives — real ones, not those who claim to hold conservative values then support people who fly in the face of them — think tradition has value.

Values, arguably, are losing ground in the U.S. (and elsewhere) and more’s the pity for it.

I maintain that the “Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States” will write a comprehensive, meticulously footnoted document that will be filed on a shelf in a building somewhere that is analogous to the warehouse at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

This commission, however, will have a negative effect. People who have no greater knowledge about the judicial system beyond repeated watching of Matlock are going to maintain that the politicians have corrupted the Court.

And when people stop believing in something that is far from perfect but still good, we have a serious problem.

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Affirmatives arguing for the resolution, “Should government provide health care for all citizens?” took a full, universal coverage position in Thursday evening’s Allegany County Day of Civility debate, which means they favor a single-payer system that would not eliminate private health insurance for those willing to pay.

“In America, it has been proven the better your income, the better your health,” argued Jessica Thayer, lead-off affirmative and president of Frostburg State University’s debate club. Health outcomes have “ties with other issues in society,” most notably poverty versus wealth, and race. 

Between 2011 and 2013, 38% of families earning less than $22,500 per year reported being in fair or poor health, while only 12% of those earning $47,000 or more reported the same, Thayer said, and the uninsured rate by 2018 was 9.7% of Black Americans, versus 4.7% of white Americans. Several states, she said, still have not accepted the Medicaid expansion made possible by the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act.

Meanwhile, the biggest supporter of the health care industry, according to Thayer, the fast-food industry, concentrates drive-through restaurants and convenience stores in poor neighborhoods. 

“Counties with poverty rates of more than 35% have obesity rates 145% greater than wealthy counties,” she said. “Universal health care can ultimately be the only thing standing between life and death for people in poverty.” Thayer added that “universal participation causes no compromises or deterioration of rights.”

During cross-examination in the parliamentary-style debate, negative debater Isadore Johnson pointed to inequalities in such universal care systems as those in England and Israel. 

“We are an extremely wealthy country with great inequality,” Thayer responded. “The poor are left with absolutely no choice at all.” She added that, while universal health care here would not necessarily level the playing field, it would be an improvement over the poor having “no choice at all.”

Brent Thomas asked Johnson whether he would accept subsidized health care as a reasonable alternative.

“It is possible and would be less-bad than universal health care, but would be less good than private insurance,” he replied. Obamacare attempted that, Johnson continued, but was unsuccessful.

The second affirmative in the debate, Logan Carlile of the FSU debate club, noted that the federal government has tried to address the old, sick and poor since the 1930s, and indirectly countered negative debater Johnson’s citation of a long waiting list at the Phoenix VA hospital, saying the Veterans Administration health care has an overall approval rating of more than 80%. 

A system based on for-profit health care is “immoral, leaving people without proper treatment,” Carlile said, noting that 31 million Americans have no health insurance coverage, and 2 million citizens per year die without coverage.

“What would happen to health care insurance?” asked an audience member identified as “H Sack.”

It would not be eliminated as an option, Carlile maintained, though the “middle-class pays a large portion of its income toward premiums.”

FSU debate team secretary Delanie Blubaugh, the third affirmative, spoke of three countries that have had success with universal coverage; Australia, Canada and Brazil. 

All three co-exist with private health care options. In Australia, for example, private insurance pays for faster services for non-emergencies, and the country’s system is decentralized, with a high degree of social participation. 

From the audience, Sierra Widmar asked, “How would universal health care affect the cost people are paying?”

“Consider public health care as equivalent to public education,” Blubaugh responded. 

Lauren Nordquist, the final affirmative, also an FSU debate team member, asserted that “medical costs, in general, would significantly decrease,” to balance the cost of higher income taxes that would pay for the service. Further offset would come from more healthy people able to produce and consume a capitalist economy. But when Kendall Kidwell, a debate audience member, asked whether the federal government might choose specific treatments for those covered by a single-payer plan, Nordquist left that issue open for criticism from the negative side.

“It is possible for one mandated procedure to be chosen,” she replied.

Annette Ritter wrapped up the affirmative-side position on government-provided health care for all citizens – universal care – with this: “The U.S. does not have a health care system. It has a health insurance system.”

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The Allegany County Day of Civility presented a Zoom debate by Braver Angels/Bridge USA and the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) Thursday, April 8, on the resolution: “Should government provide health care for all citizens?”

The debate was organized by the Allegany College of Maryland and Frostburg State University, and sponsored by Allegany County Choose Civility, the Allegany College of Maryland’s Peace Club, its Democracy Commitment Committee, the Frostburg State University Debate Team, FSU Communication Leadership Lab and The Hustings. 

This column as well as the two adjacent are related to the theme.

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What’s your position on “Should government provide healthcare for all citizens?” Let us know at editors@thehustings.news. We organize the responses to the L and to the R and post all comments that meet our standards (click on “About”) over the weekend. Comments must meet the Braver Angels’ and The Hustings’ standards for civil discourse, and may be edited for length and clarity

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Negatives against the resolution, “Should government provide health care for all citizens?” argued against both a single-payer plan as well as the provisions of the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act in Thursday evening’s Allegany County Day of Civility event. 

The first negative-side speaker, University of Connecticut economics student Isadore Johnson said that “even if attainable in other countries … our country would not be good at this.” The federal bureaucracy is not efficient with health care, he said, noting that one Veterans Administration hospital in Phoenix “had a 1,400 to 1,600 patient waiting list for two years.”

According to Johnson, Medicare has higher per-capita administrative costs, so costs under a universal system “might actually go up.”  Johnson cited the Rand Health Experiment of 1974-82, in which the non-profit corporation created its own health care system and placed study subjects into different insurance systems. The experiment did not make at-risk and poor people better off with subsidized health care, he said.

“When you don’t have to pay the costs for things you want, people tend to overpay and overuse,” Johnson said. 

Private insurance pays more for pharmaceuticals, and so a single-payer plan would stifle investment for innovations in vaccines and medicines. Government health care would be run capriciously, he added.

Johnson pointed to universal care failures, citing Massachusetts (then-Republican Gov. Romney’s program, which President Obama used as a model for the ACA) and Tennessee, as well as England (“22 weeks for any specialized health care,” and they “rely on health tourists to pay”) and Canada, which underpays doctors and thus must bring in foreign medical personnel.

From the audience, Marisa Cooper asked about Rand Health Experiment co-morbidity differences between poor and middle-class study groups in the Rand experiment, and of patient non-compliance affecting the data.

“I believe they looked at a number of co-morbidities,” Johnson replied. He noted two slight improvements regarding patient anxiety and lower cases of rare diseases. "Other than that, no differences in co-morbidities" were reported. “I don’t see how (universal) health care would affect compliance,” he added.

Brent Thomas, also in the Zoom audience, asked whether subsidies for private insurance would work in the U.S.

“It is possible and would be less-bad than universal health care but would be less good than” the free market, Johnson responded. “Obamacare attempted to do this (middle-ground subsidies),” but was unsuccessful, he added.

“It boils down to a social contract,” the second negative, Luke Nathan Phillips, a Braver Angels staffer, said. “Do Americans deserve to have the same standard of services? Most conservatives and libertarians would say ‘yes.’” 

Universal care is “welfare-state insurance” Phillips says, while what we’ve got now is “welfare individualism” (the ACA) and “welfare capitalism” (employer provided insurance). A better alternative to welfare-state insurance, he said, would be “expansion of incentives and pressure on the American business community to provide better packages.” 

But Phillips concedes there is a divide between the middle-class and working class, the latter is less likely to have employer-supplied health care, and that issue needs to be addressed.

The next negative debater, Greta Wagley, of the Association of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA), has a much-different point-of-view.

“Health care is not a human right,” Wagley said. “The government doesn’t buy me a gun or give me land.” The difference in these rights is between “needs” and “wants,” and if she comes across, say, a woman in need on the street, “I reach into my pocket and help her myself,” or take her to a church or get her a GoFundMe account. 

“As long as people disagree whether health care is a right, it is immoral to consider a universal health care system,” she said, arguing that there are some medical procedures to which she is morally opposed.

The previous negative, Luke Nathan Phillips, asked Wagley whether a taxpayer who opposes government-funded road construction can make the same argument.

“There is no moral equivalent between taxpayers paying for roads, and paying for abortions and assisted suicides,” she replied.

“I pay for my own health care insurance; I think it’s a good thing to pay for,” she concluded. “President Trump reduced a lot of regulations (from the ACA). I think that’s a good thing.”

Fellow negative Connor Murnane, also of ACTA, had a much different take on the “rights” issue.

“Health care is a right, but a right in the sense that free speech or education is a right. … There are far too many dangerous consequences to universal coverage, including government mandating specific treatments.” He noted that tech companies already have launched programs that reduce costs and operate outside the insurance system, citing smartphone/video medical provider Teledoc. “The government must not infringe on a citizen’s right to choose.” (While universal care might, like the ACA, let insured Americans keep their insurance, it is less likely the government would consider something like Teledoc a valid alternative.)

Affirmative Logan Carlile asked how a citizen with no money can fulfill his or her right to health care.

“It is not the government’s responsibility, but for those in need, there are safety nets in place,” Murnane replied.

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Editor’s note: Opening speakers in the affirmative for the Allegany County, Maryland, Day of Civility April 8 debate resolution, “Should government provide health care for all citizens?” are Logan Carlile, Delanie Blubauth and Lauren Nordquist, of Frostburg State University. 

Here are some of their talking points for the affirmatives’ opening arguments in the debate…

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), better known as “Obamacare,” survived former President Donald Trump’s promise to completely dismantle and replace it with a new, Republican plan, although with the key provision of the individual mandate having been made ineffective. While President Joseph Biden has promised as part of his agenda to restore such kneecapped provisions, more-progressive congressional Democrats are anxious to take health care reform to the ultimate level: A federal government-backed single-payer plan. 

Affirmatives debating in favor of the resolution, “Should government provide healthcare for all citizens?” in the Braver Angels/Bridge USA/ACTA debate Thursday night have set such a plan as the goal. Here are a few arguments we can expect from affirmatives in the debate …

•Providing universal health care will ultimately cost less than the current “free-market” system. The uninsured in the U.S. cost taxpayers more in the end and giving them government-backed insurance up front leverages taxpayer money, compared with forced emergency services when the illness or injury becomes more severe. 

•Single-payer healthcare is not a forced-government plan. That is, those who have their own health insurance, or employer-provided insurance will not have to give it up, as often claimed by opponents of such a system.

•Universal healthcare in the U.S. will set an example on the world stage that the U.S. is committed to its promises of equality for all and to ensuring a high quality of life through the instatement of resources to support basic right to life.

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By Todd Lassa

The Allegany County Day of Civility presents a Zoom debate by Braver Angels/Bridge USA and the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) Thursday, April 8, beginning 7 pm Eastern time on the resolution; “Should government provide health care for all citizens?” The debate is organized by the Allegany College of Maryland and Frostburg State University, and is sponsored by Allegany County Choose Civility, the Allegany College of Maryland’s Peace Club, its Democracy Commitment Committee, the Frostburg State University Debate Team, FSU Communication Leadership Lab and The Hustings. You may register for the debate (free) at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/braver-angels-debate-should-government-provide-healthcare-for-all-citizens-tickets-146961278139 up to 6 pm Eastern time Thursday, and you are encouraged to participate. 

This post is a preview of the debate, with affirmative talking points in the left column and negative talking points in the right column. Come back to this site Friday for a review post of the debate, and again on the weekend for a compilation of your comments. Instructions on how to comment are at the end of this column.

Theodore Roosevelt was the first president to seriously propose universal health care, toward the end, and again after his second term as president. Most Americans paid their doctors directly back then, although some union workers received health care benefits.  The notion of government help or involvement did not make a serious political appearance until the Social Security Act of 1965 sought to cover the older and the poor with Medicare and Medicaid. 

Universal health care advocates had to wait another 45 years — until 2010 – for any significant new legislation, when the Obama administration pushed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) through a Democratic-majority Congress just months before Republicans won 63 House seats in the 2010 mid-terms. Though President Obama claimed the ACA was modeled on former Republican Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s health care reform program for his state, universal health care coverage had shifted from a fair degree of bi-partisan support to become a very polarizing issue.

“Obamacare” immediately was met with resistance by Republican governors, who declined the expansion in their states of Medicaid benefits to a wider spectrum of individuals, one of the key provisions the Obama administration designed to reduce the number of uninsured Americans, widely estimated at 40 million at that time.

Free-market opponents concentrated on the ACA’s “individual mandate.” If an individual did not have health insurance through an employer or provided by a union or other group, the individual was required to purchase insurance or face a federal penalty. Health care exchanges were to provide such insurance at reasonable prices for working class and middle-class Americans, but they depended on a large membership pool in order to control costs. 

Conservative Republicans also tackled the ACA during the second Obama administration from a “culture wars” perspective. They scored a victory in Burwell vs. Hobby Lobby Stores Inc. (2014), as the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby, 6-3, that a business owned by individuals with “sincere Christian beliefs” could not be compelled to include contraceptive services among its employees’ health insurance benefits (cited by the Legal Information Institute of the Cornell Law School).

Small businesses often do not include health insurance among their employees’ benefits; an organization of small businesses challenged the individual mandate in 2012 in National Federation of Independent Businesses vs. Sibelius. The Supreme Court upheld the mandate in a 5-4 vote (fact-checking source: Wikipedia). But Republican opponents were tenacious. 

Even before he took office in January 2017, Donald J. Trump vowed to dismantle Obamacare and replace it with a “better” plan of his own (which failed to materialize during his four years as president). Meanwhile, the Republican-led Congress in its budget bill for fiscal year 2017 cut the penalty for failing to fulfill the requirement to have health insurance coverage to $0. 

Two popular planks in the ACA that remain are the rule preventing health insurance companies from denying new customers because of “pre-existing conditions,” and the rule that requires employer-provided insurance to continue to protect the children of families covered up to age 26. Democrats used Trump’s promise to dismantle the entire ACA, and thus remove those provisions, as a cudgel in opposing his re-election last year.

While Republican plans to fully dismantle the ACA have faded since Trump’s loss last November, progressive forces on Capitol Hill led by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-VT, (who caucuses with Democrats) continue to push for universal health care for the entire country. They argue that the richest country on Earth should offer free, single-payer health care for anyone in the U.S. and relegate private health insurance as a so-called “Cadillac plan” option for well-off Americans for elective surgeries and procedures and  unlimited choice of providers. As a splintered GOP concentrates on more immediate matters, the moderate wing of the Democratic party, led by President Biden, promises to repair and update the ACA rather than completely starting anew as Sanders and his progressive colleagues would prefer.

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Email your comments and opinions on the resolution, “Should government provide healthcare for all citizens?” to editors@thehustings.news … We will post all comments that meet our standards (click on “About”) in the left and right columns over the weekend. Comments must meet the Braver Angels’ and The Hustings’ standards for civil discourse, and may be edited for length and clarity.

Editor’s note: Opening speakers in the negative for the Allegany County, Maryland, Day of Civility April 8 debate resolution, “Should government provide health care for all citizens?” are Luke Phillips of Braver Angels, Isadore Johnson of Students for Liberty at the University of Connecticut, and Grega Wagley and Connor Murnane, of ACTA.

Here are some talking points for the negatives’ opening arguments in the debate…

Conservatives opposed to government-guaranteed health care are in at a sort of crossroads after the Trump administration. As noted in the center column, President Trump famously tried to dismantle the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act – “Obamacare” – for pretty much the entirety in his four years in office, as he reversed other Obama administration programs mostly by executive order. 

The question now for advocates of the free-market system of health care in the U.S. is whether conservatives on Capitol Hill should continue to work to reverse what they can of Obamacare, or whether their effort should concentrate on preventing the Biden administration from restoring, for example, the federal penalty for the working uninsured who do not comply with the ACA’s “individual mandate.” The mandate was made ineffective when the Republican-controlled Congress reduced the federal penalty to $0 in 2017. 

The negative position on this resolution centers on a constant fight against government-provided universal health care – a “single-payer” plan that would be closer to the systems found in Canada and Great Britain, but considering the close party counts in the House of Representatives and the tie-breaker-thin margin in the Senate, such progressive programs are unlikely until the 2022 midterm elections, if then.

Given the popularity of the pre-existing condition provision, and the ability of parents to keep adult children on their health insurance to age 26, a further rollback of the ACA seems unlikely. Opposition to Obamacare, after all, does not mean conservatives aren’t interested in reforming health care. The conservative approach to health care reform centers on these policy issues …

•Cap damage awards against healthcare providers ordered by “activist” judges

•Promote health insurance vs. pharmaceutical company competition.

•Reform the Medicare payment system.

•Establish clear standards of care.

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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news