neat stuff in the supreme court.

the bush administration is, of course, on the wrong side of both of these cases. in 2000, bush talked up the texas healthcare liability act, which filled a gaping hole in ERISA: HMO's could be sued for denying necessary care. now the administration has disavowed the law, siding with aetna and cigna in saying something that *i think* amounts to "congress thought about it carefully, and didn't put it in the federal law, which means the states shouldn't be allowed to put it in either."

having researched it quite a bit this morning, i wonder whether the administration would try to strike down state laws that duplicate or expand upon, for example, federal anti-discrimination statutes. (probably, the bastards.)

scalia also said something tremendously, characteristically stupid: the hmo's aren't actually denying access to necessary drugs; they're just refusing to pay for them. right! a total updownblackwhitewarpeace on the entire concept of insurance, but...right!

with regard to the second case currently before the court, a choice article quote: "Separately on Tuesday, the court ruled unanimously in a Clean Water Act case from the Florida Everglades that a pumping station that conveys pollution from one body of water to another remains subject to the law's requirement for a permit, even if the pump is not itself the source of the pollution.

But the court sidestepped the most provocative assertion in the case, put forward by the Bush administration: that no permit is required in that circumstance because all the country's navigable waters are "unitary." Since the law requires a permit for the "addition" of pollution to the water, pollution that is simply moved within the "unitary" water system cannot be said to be added, the administration argued."

HOLY SHIT.