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Saturday, November 07, 2009

Justice and the Affordable Health Care for America Act

Two things came together for me tonight - I watched the 5th episode of the Harvard philosophy class on Justice, and I saw that the the Affordable Health Care for America Act (with the Stupak amendment added) passed the House (with only 1 republican voting for it).

Here's a bit of a post on the health care bill from ThinkProgress ....

House Passes Historic, Bipartisan Health Reform Legislation

Moments ago, the House of Representatives passed the Affordable Health Care for America Act by a vote of 220-215, with one Republican — Rep. Joseph Cao (R-LA) — voting for the measure. Once the bill reached the needed threshold of 218 votes, the chamber erupted in applause ..... The House also approved, by a vote of 240-194, an amendment introduced by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI), which imposed tighter restrictions on abortion coverage ......

I'm glad the bill passed - I'm all for universal health care - but I wish the Stupak amendment had not been added on.

As for the video/class on Justice, you can watch it below. The last installment and this installment both reference British philosopher John Locke - this week the professor touched on the question of when, how, and if we can consent to give up our rights to life, liberty, and property, and dealt with particular examples of military conscription in the first half and with the selling of procreation, surrogate motherhood, in the second half ......



You might wonder what connection the video/class on Justice and the passing of a health care reform bill might have - it made me think about Locke, a guy somewhere between libertarianism and socialism .....

I think Locke would agree with me that it's good that we pay taxes for universal health care, for the sake of the common good .... and I wonder if Locke might also agree with me on not adding the Stupak amendment to the health care bill, which will make things difficult for women in general and poor women especially. Would Locke be pro-choice? He did believe the body was private property, but on the other hand also believed that there's more to morality than respecting people's rights, so I must admit it's debatable.


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