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Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

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Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#61
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no individual "right to own guns" in the Constitution. When the second amendment talks about the right of "the people" it means as a collective. It's talking about curtailing the Federal government from restricting states from raising state militias. But we don't have a state militia anymore, it's been replaced by the National Guard. There was no serious jurisprudence to interpret the second amendment as an…

The first amendment also refers to “the right of the people to peaceably assemble.” By your logic, is there no individual right to protest? The fourth amendment refers to “the right of the people to be secure in their persons.” Does that mean that you don’t have an individual right against unreasonable search and seizure? You’re correct to identify “the people” as the key phrase, and you’re correct that the second am…

> By your logic, is there no individual right to protest?

I'm not sure to what extent there is one to be honest. We don't really have concerns around enforcing public nuisance statutes when someone is being a public nuisance. I think some cities still have (largely unenforced) laws on the books about fining you for swearing. We only really extend such actions protection if it's being done as part of a larger demonstration and, even then, people can get wrangled into "free speech zones" or ordered to disperse when the public safety situation gets out of hand. In practice it's difficult to imagine how protest would even work without some amount of individual right to political expression, but that's an operational need to actually have the collective right in place. Similar standards for the press and search and seizure or cruel and unusual punishment. I view the right to privacy in the same way, where it's hard to imagine how you can meaningfully have a free press or protection from search and seizure or even due process without some acknowledged guard-rails around making sure government actions have a compelling public interest. I just don't see something analogous with firearms.

With firearms it actually is easier to imagine much less scope for an individual right because of the "well-regulated militia" clause.

> I’m willing to entertain the view that our whole incorporation doctrine is non-sensical, but that cuts more broadly than I think most gun control advocates would like to go. Moreover, the notion that the 14th amendment was meant to apply the second amendment to states is far better supported than the incorporation of the first amendment.

It is a awkward kludge to be sure. But at the time the second amendment was more-or-less an after-thought because of how the structure of the military evolved and the way the Civil War put a lot of constitutional "questions" to rest about how far the states' rights go. I really just don't think they imagined people in the future would extend the argument beyond all reason to assert that any person should have access to any level of firepower at their whim without any public interest in curtailing it. That's plainly absurd and the only reason we even accept it today is because big swathes of the country are in the grip of some crime-wave paranoia mingled with Red Dawn fantasies being stoked by the media.

And like I mentioned with the right to protest, we still do put up some guardrails around it in the name of public safety despite the general understanding of the right, which is why I'm generally against complete bans of firearms. But I think our understanding of what that 2nd amendment right actually means needs to be anchored to some idea of what these things are for. What is their purpose and what value do they provide to civil society or for enabling people to freely pursue life, liberty, and happiness? From that standpoint I can see wanting to permit access to tools for reasonable self-defense or sport/hunting uses. But you don't really need most of the tacticool gear that people worry about for that. I'm not even sure most people even really need a handgun for that. Right now, it seems like what the most vocal 2nd amendment advocacy organizations think they're for is to menace government officials and engage in acts of terrorism and insurrection. I do not believe this is a view compatible with having a civilized country or a functioning government.

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#62
post #2

Encouraging generic drugs eases the problem a little bit. Right to health care should be in the constitution instead of right to own guns.

There is no individual "right to own guns" in the Constitution. When the second amendment talks about the right of "the people" it means as a collective. It's talking about curtailing the Federal government from restricting states from raising state militias. But we don't have a state militia anymore, it's been replaced by the National Guard. There was no serious jurisprudence to interpret the second amendment as an…

You are stating legal misinformation. There is an individual right to own guns in the US Constitution. This was settled in District of Columbia v. Heller.

https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/supreme-cour...

Technically many of us are considered members of the Federal militia, although in practice that statute is effectively moot.

https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?path=/prelim@title10/sub...

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#63
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because generally the argument of "it doesn't need to be a right" is coupled with arguing why universal healthcare is bad. Your comment is a great example for how people try to muddy the waters and distract from the issues at stake.

Fwiw, I am strongly pro universal health care, but agree with pfannkuchen’s framing of what a right is. I see it as clarifying position, not a muddying one. Healthcare requires resources, it doesn’t happen just because everyone agrees upon it. We must structure our society to provide those resources, so all its members can be provided healthcare.

Well if it’s not a right but everyone must get it, what’s that called? A right is pretty close.

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have the right to roads. Similarly education is mostly implemented at the state level, there's nothing legally preventing a state from saying that public school is now K-8 only. Laws requiring people to go to school are kind of a mixed bag, and compulsory education laws usually only apply to children (and in some cases only to pre-teens). AFAIK there's no legal forms of adult forced labor, except prisoners…

And yet despite being at the state level, all americans do have a right to K-12. Is that also forced labor?

There's a difference to having the right to something and being forced to do something. For example all states give the right to a K-12 education, up to a point (usually there's age limits, and some states also have pre-k).

However just because children have the right to go to school doesn't mean they're forced to actually go and sit down (eg Wisconsin v Yoder). The courts do recognize that parents have the rights to force their kids to do certain things. Eg you can ground your child and it isn't "forced confinement", you can make them go to school and it isn't slavery, etc. Those exemptions pretty much go away once someone turns 18

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#65
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a distinctly 20th century individualistic take. From the Magna Carta to the Constitution, "rights" are primarily collective rights. They structure the relationship between the government and "the people." The First Amendment is not there so individuals can "express themselves." It's to maintain the communication and transparency necessary for democracy to work.

Be that as it may. Who or what has the rights described? Do corporations have a right to assembly what does that even mean? Or do it's individuals have rights which under some circumstances make it seem like a corporation has rights? Employees have a right to freedom of speech, so companies can make statements protected by the right to free speech.

This is important because undocumented immigrants are starting to assert their Second Amendment rights.
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