# Legally can the federal government now force you to buy a Chevrolet? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 31, 2012, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959 "2012-07-31T15:49:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![babygoat666](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/2acd7d/32.png) [@babygoat666](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/babygoat666)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/81 "2012-07-31T20:59:17Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Sure we give a shit. And Obamacare is like charging gasoline taxes on people who don’t own cars, because they aren’t paying their fair share towards keeping up the roads. > > All that would be needed was to swear up and down that it was not a gasoline tax, until after it passes and turns out it was a gasoline tax all along. > > Regards, > Shodan Are you telling me that the people being **forced** to buy health insurance for some reason do not and will not ever need health care? This is the worst analogy I have ever seen. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/82 "2012-07-31T21:00:01Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Let’s try an analogy, because those ALWAYS work: > > Bob walked around naked in his hometown, because his interpreted the anti-indecency laws in his town to apply only to lascivious conduct, and he was just wanted to be free, man. > > He got arrested. > > His lawyer suggested he try a first-amendment defense. “Bullshit,” Bob said, “that’s only supposed to protect political and religious speech, not walking around naked.” So at his bench trial, he told the judge about his interpretation of the anti-indecency laws. “Also,” he said, “my lawyer tells me other people have gotten away with nekkid strolling through a first-amendment defense. I think that’s nonsense, but here are the relevant cases.” > > The judge rejects Bob’s reading of the anti-indecency laws, but accepts the first-amendment defense. > > Has Bob lied at any point? I don’t think so. Not based on what you’ve presented. But I’ve already opined that I don’t think Obama was necessarily lying. Did you intend for your analogy to have any use othe than to illuminate the possibility that Obama didn’t lie? ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/83 "2012-07-31T21:00:06Z")
> [@YogSosoth](#): > > You’re [wrong](http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2012/07/who_invented_the_internet_the_outrageous_conservative_claim_that_every_tech_innovation_came_from_private_enterprise_.html). The government was part of every step in the development of the internet. And where private persons were instrumental in creating parts of the internet, they were government funded. In fact, private corporations like AT&T tried to inhibit the internet. Why would they support something that would supplant their existing phone lines and monopolies? Even if you don’t know anything about the internet, answer that question. And how many years did it take for online commerce to be profitable? Decades? No company would bet their bottom line on a gigantic project whose profitability was iffy and unpredictable. The government had to invent the internet, no one else could I’m sorry, but nothing in that article contradicts what I said. I never said that private industry invented the internet. That was definitely a collaborative effort between private industry (contractors) and the Government (including research institutes and colleges, if you want to count them as ‘the Government’). But the internet AS YOU USE IT TODAY is almost entirely from private industry, taking the basic design and technologies and expanding them to provide a service that wasn’t originally envisioned by the Government. Now, if you want to say that the research types at various universities are ‘the Government’, then I suppose you have a case that ‘the Government’ was along for every step of the process from then until now, but having been there I can tell you that, from my perspective at least it was private industry that took the lead after the early to mid-80’s. The best thing The Government™ did was to allow it to be opened up and to generally get out of the way and allow private industry to expand in new directions. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/84 "2012-07-31T21:07:54Z")
It’s like how the federal government can force you to move to another country if they want to. Don’t laugh, it happened to my uncle. They drafted him into the army first but then they made him go to South Korea and live there. And it was legal and everything. So the precedent’s clear. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/85 "2012-07-31T21:09:35Z")
> [@babygoat666](#): > > Are you telling me that the people being **forced** to buy health insurance for some reason do not and will not ever need health care? I believe the idea is that when they need health care, they’ll just pay for it. You know, like when they’re in a horrible car accident with an uninsured driver and run up a $500,000 medical bill. Instead of relying on insurance, they ask Jeeves to bring them their checkbook… or go completely bankrupt, I forget which. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/86 "2012-07-31T21:09:41Z")
> [@YogSosoth](#): > > You’re [wrong](http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2012/07/who_invented_the_internet_the_outrageous_conservative_claim_that_every_tech_innovation_came_from_private_enterprise_.html). The government was part of every step in the development of the internet. And where private persons were instrumental in creating parts of the internet, they were government funded. In fact, private corporations like AT&T tried to inhibit the internet. Why would they support something that would supplant their existing phone lines and monopolies? Even if you don’t know anything about the internet, answer that question. And how many years did it take for online commerce to be profitable? Decades? No company would bet their bottom line on a gigantic project whose profitability was iffy and unpredictable. The government had to invent the internet, no one else could Yes, the government played a role: > [@](#): > > The origins of the Internet reach back to research of the 1960s, commissioned by the United States government in collaboration with private commercial interests to build robust, fault-tolerant, and distributed computer networks. The funding of a new U.S. backbone by the National Science Foundation in the 1980s, as well as private funding for other commercial backbones, led to worldwide participation in the development of new networking technologies, and the merger of many networks. The commercialization of what was by the 1990s an international network resulted in its popularization and incorporation into virtually every aspect of modern human life. As of 2011, more than 2.2 billion people – nearly a third of Earth’s population — use the services of the Internet.[1] Let’s not forget this individual that made it what it is today: > [@](#): > > Sir Timothy John “Tim” Berners-Lee, OM, KBE, FRS, FREng, FRSA (born 8 June 1955[1]), also known as “TimBL”, is a British computer scientist, MIT professor and the **inventor of the World Wide Web**. He made a proposal for an information management system in March 1989[2] and on 25 December 1990, with the help of Robert Cailliau and a young student at CERN, he implemented the first successful communication between a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) client and server via the Internet.[3] ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/87 "2012-07-31T21:11:23Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > It’s like how the federal government can force you to move to another country if they want to. > > Don’t laugh, it happened to my uncle. They drafted him into the army first but then they made him go to South Korea and live there. And it was legal and everything. So the precedent’s clear. Which, under Obama, means they could send a drone to kill him without trial! (Joking, but that really is the huge overstep of government power that conservatives [and liberals] _should_ be up in arms about!) ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/88 "2012-07-31T21:17:06Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > . . . And frankly, I don’t buy the “everyone tries to get their money’s worth” line. I’m not going to run to the doctor every other day to “get my money’s worth”. I don’t do it now and I pay a shit load for my insurance. Well, the contrapositive is, alas, true: I don’t have insurance, and so I simply sit and take it when I have minor medical maladies. If I had insurance, I’d go to the doc and have 'em looked at. So, yeah, to be fair, if there were magically, overnight, a national health care system here, costs would go up a little, as people like me went in to have our little problems treated. (In my opinion, this is a Good Thing, not a bad thing…) ---
**Author:** ![aux203](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/77aa72/32.png) [@aux203](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aux203)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/89 "2012-07-31T21:41:44Z")
> [@dataguy](#): > > You actually know people who do this? Call an ambulance to avoid having to search for a parking space, etc? I do. I’ve met plenty of people who called an ambulance because they wanted one or more of the following: a) to be seen without having to wait in the waiting room b) pain medication c) a free meal d) somewhere to spend the night e) wanted to get out of jail for a while f) some attention Not like there’s an epidemic of these people, but they tend to generate a lot of visits. In general they have no ability or interest in paying their bills and everyone knows it. Most ER’s have a few and can list the most common ones of the top of their heads. From my interactions with foreign MDs, this isn’t a problem limited to the United States, though I’d be curious if anyone has studies the relatively frequency of this sort of thing. I’m not aware of it if they have. Not that this has anything to do with Obamacare. No health care system can eliminate assholes. If anything, it would be a lot cheaper if they were torturing their PCP instead of using the emergency care system. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/90 "2012-07-31T21:51:43Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > I don’t have insurance, and so I simply sit and take it when I have minor medical maladies. If I had insurance, I’d go to the doc and have 'em looked at. Even if there was a deductable? How much would you be willing to pay to have 'em looked at? ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/91 "2012-07-31T21:57:27Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Your ire appears to be that Congress, at Obama’s behest, passed a tax, and Obama refuses to admit it’s a tax. That’s a political problem, not a legal one. I think we thrashed this out in the Bush-Iraq threads. It is not against the law to lie to Congress, or the public. Obama was not under oath. But yes, you are correct that passing legislation under false pretenses is a political problem. > [@](#): > > No. But the federal government can tax you if you fail to buy that product. That’s a distinction without a difference. It’s not against the law to speed; you just have to pay a tax if you do it. > [@](#): > > I’m sorry to say this, **Shodan** , but in this complaint, you sound like a liberal to me. There’s no need to get insulting. 🙂 Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/92 "2012-07-31T22:05:27Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Ask any paramedic. It happens. most often to a shitty medic. Transport by ambulance needs to be justified (at least here in CA) and even medical/medicaid etc will reject payment claims that cannot be medically justified. Ambulance companies are often private companies that have no desire to not get paid. an ambulance crew can refuse to transport you if they do not feel in their judgement that it would be detrimental for you to do so. ---
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/93 "2012-07-31T22:13:29Z")
> [@Iggy](#): > > Any 9-1-1 center or ambulance office knows several of these people. There is a somewhat pejorative nickname, frequent flyers. > > There are patients who literally will jump out of the ambulance once it reaches the hospital and walk away. I have personally dealt with a patient who left the ER waiting room, walked a couple blocks, and called an ambulance thinking it would move him to the head of the line. What we called frequent fliers were just the ones like alcoholic non compliant diabetics, major asthmatics, guys with seizure disorders and a meth habit. They have legitimate medical needs, sometime exacerbated by their own behaviors, but still real emergencies. IF someone is bailing out of an ambulance and wandering off I question how they justified transporting him. We saw a lot of folks who had justifiable concerns about their condition but whom later could be driven by a family member or visit the doc/clinic of your choice in the next couple days. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/94 "2012-07-31T22:40:33Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > That’s a distinction without a difference. It’s not against the law to speed; you just have to pay a tax if you do it. No, for a couple of reasons. The fine from speeding is assessed by the courts, after a finding of guilt. The speed limit is enforced by police. These are not characteristics of taxes. The ACA’s tax is collected by the IRS. Need I say more? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/95 "2012-07-31T22:45:36Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > But I’ve already opined that I don’t think Obama was necessarily lying. Did you intend for your analogy to have any use othe than to illuminate the possibility that Obama didn’t lie? Nope. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/96 "2012-07-31T23:23:17Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > The ACA’s tax is collected by the IRS. Need I say more? They sure did in the dissent. I thought it was a pretty compelling argument as to why this is not a tax but a penalty. Did you find fault with it? ---
**Author:** ![Iggy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iggy/32/3364_2.png) [@Iggy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Iggy)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/97 "2012-07-31T23:37:30Z")
> [@drachillix](#): > > What we called frequent fliers were just the ones like alcoholic non compliant diabetics, major asthmatics, guys with seizure disorders and a meth habit. They have legitimate medical needs, sometime exacerbated by their own behaviors, but still real emergencies. > > IF someone is bailing out of an ambulance and wandering off I question how they justified transporting him. We saw a lot of folks who had justifiable concerns about their condition but whom later could be driven by a family member or visit the doc/clinic of your choice in the next couple days. Well practiced frequent flyers report symptoms but may lack matching signs. Patient complains of chest pain, but medics find no abnormality on EKG, no elevated BP, no elevated pulse rate, etc… Paramedic has to transport. We have one patient who complains of sudden onset, 10 out of 10, abdominal pain and will wait standing on the side of the road holding her little suitcase. Various efforts have been tried in some communities (not ours). Providing taxi vouchers to travel for routine medical appointments. Some cities have proposed a modest charge ($20 or so, more than bus or taxi fare) that is ineligible for reimbursement by insurance. Ft Worth has implemented some efforts to proactively visit and provide more in home care. I forsee the PPACA boosting the frequent flyer problem dramatically. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/98 "2012-07-31T23:41:12Z")
Criminal charges and a bill should clear up those symptoms. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/99 "2012-07-31T23:55:36Z")
> [@XT](#): > > I’m sorry, but nothing in that article contradicts what I said. I never said that private industry invented the internet. You are trying to answer a question that was not asked, which is that who is responsible for the internet as it is today. Post #72 makes it clear, when you repeatedly claimed that: > [@](#): > > They DEVELOPED the initial concept (for reasons that have zero to do with how it’s used today), but they had virtually nothing to do with the internet as you know it today. It was private industry that gave you pretty much all you are using right now. This answer was to a statement on how the government BUILT the internet. So why does your answer have nothing about who built it and focuses completely on how it is NOW? Of course right NOW the internet is pretty much the way it is due to private companies. Those companies have had decades to build up their networks and infrastructure and business plans! Nobody has claimed here that the government is responsible for Google, or Facebook. You are claiming that in direct response to the question of who built the internet originally, and it is the government. If that’s not an attempt to distract people from the real issues, then I don’t know what is Can you simply answer the question of is the government responsible for inventing the internet at its very beginnings? That’s the only issue we’re concerned about. > [@magellan01](#): > > Let’s not forget this individual that made it what it is today: > > > [@](#): > > > > Sir Timothy John “Tim” Berners-Lee, OM, KBE, FRS, FREng, FRSA (born 8 June 1955[1]), also known as “TimBL”, is a British computer scientist, MIT professor and the inventor of the World Wide Web. He made a proposal for an information management system in March 1989[2] and on 25 December 1990, with the help of Robert Cailliau and a young student at CERN, he implemented the first successful communication between a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) client and server via the Internet.[3] From the article: > [@](#): > > Some of Crovitz’s errors seem to stem from technological ignorance; in arguing that Xerox’s graphical machines were in some way responsible for the design of the Internet, **Crovitz seems to conflate the Internet and the World Wide Web.** The Web is the system of linked, usually graphical documents you see in a Web browser—i.e., sites like Slate. The Internet is the network over which the Web and other communications systems—e-mail, instant messaging, file-sharing—travel. **The Internet predated the Web.** We are talking about who invented the internet, not who invented the World Wide Web. And you made the exact mistake that the article writer on [Slate.com](http://Slate.com) said that people like you often do when they claim that the government didn’t invent the internet. They did, and it was only the government that could have done so Hang your head in shame ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2012, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959/100 "2012-08-01T00:46:21Z")
> [@YogSosoth](#): > > We are talking about who invented the internet, not who invented the World Wide Web. And you made the exact mistake that the article writer on [Slate.com](http://Slate.com) said that people like you often do when they claim that the government didn’t invent the internet. They did, and it was only the government that could have done so Hmmm. Ponder, if you will, why I _first_ provided a link to the beginnings of the internet—stating that the government _did_ play a role—and _then_ chose these words to point to TBL’s contribution: (emphasis added for those with poor reading skills) [QUOTE=magellan01] Let’s not forget this individual that made it _what it is today_: [/QUOTE] I’ll leave you to it… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legally-can-the-federal-government-now-force-you-to-buy-a-chevrolet/629959.md?page=6)