THIS JUST IN!!! MUST CREDIT AMERICABLOG!!! THE HOUSE WELFARE REFORM LEGISLATION INCLUDES LEGAL WORDS AND LEGISLATIVE LANGUAGE!!!!
Jonathan Allen at the Politico (often referred to as the Republico) wrote a story today revealing for the first time that the House health care reform legislation includes legal phrases that non-lawyers might find difficult to understand.
Seriously:
And for those who cry “read the bill,” beware. There are plenty of paragraphs like this one:I'd certainly hope there are plenty of paragraphs like that one, as that's how one writes legislation, you moron.
“(a) Outpatient Hospitals – (1) In General – Section 1833(t)(3)(C)(iv) of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1395(t)(3)(C)(iv)) is amended – (A) in the first sentence – (i) by inserting “(which is subject to the productivity adjustment described in subclause (II) of such section)” after “1886(b)(3)(B)(iii); and (ii) by inserting “(but not below 0)” after “reduced”; and (B) in the second sentence, by inserting “and which is subject, beginning with 2010 to the productivity adjustment described in section 1886(b)(3)(B)(iii)(II)”.
The section deals with “incorporating productivity improvements into market basket updates that do not already incorporate such improvements,” if that helps.
With all due respect, you'd have to be an idiot to quote a paragraph like that as proof that there's a problem with the health care bill. I got my law degree from Georgetown, and I worked in the Senate for five years, during which time I helped write legislation. Legislation is per se extremely legalistic. It has to be (duh). Or else you get it wrong and the entire country is screwed. That paragraph reads like any paragraph in any bill. It's not easy stuff. It never has been. There's a reason a law degree takes seven years of university after high school. It's actually hard stuff. And for a reporter to point out that paragraph as evidence of a problem with the bill - well, it only evidences a problem with the reporter. And it's frankly embarrassing, and rather FOX News-y to boot.
It is incredibly disingenuous to write something like this. It's intended to convince Politico's readers that the Democrats did something wrong with the legislation.
