Thanks for the overview of the issues. I will be very interested to see how this turns out, as questions about AG authority could have national significance. In Alabama, there has been a conflict between the governor and the AG which stemmed from the AG's decision to file suit for recovery of damages from BP relating to the oil spill. The governor argues that this damages the state's ability to work with BP outside of the court system. I'm not sure if there is the same issue of the AG's authority here, but it does again illustrate the conflicts that can arise when the governor and AG are separately elected offices.

Also, don't you mean that the King County Council (instead of Seattle City Council) voted 5-4 for a resolution in favor of Obamacare? There's yet another layer of government getting involved.

I hope Mr. McKenna questions the constitutionality of the government imposing laws differently on citizens based on their race. The Affordable Health Care Act requires citizens to either purchase health insurance or pay a fine. Except for members of indian tribes.

When will somebody ask Wishik why the City of Seattle "picks and chooses" which laws will be obeyed and enforced and which ones will not. Hempfest has 100,000 people over three days in a public park violating the smoking ban. They chose to ignore them, yet if you try to open one cigar bar at El Goucho and you toast

Would Crosscut consider not using the term "Obamacare" in headlines and in news stories like this piece about McKenna? As I'm sure the Crosscut editors know, it's become a pejorative term used by critics of the health reform law. The term isn't even accurate, since it was drafted by House and Senate Democratic leaders -- with plenty of compromises to win over at least Democratic conservatives -- as much as it was written by the Obama administration. By using this term, Crosscut is tying itself to Fox News and the right-wing media and blogosphere and encouraging uninformed and misinformed contempt for the law. Obviously, it's different for opinion commentators who choose to use the term as part of their critique of the health reform law. But I personally don't think it should be used in straight news coverage or in news headlines. Just my thoughts.

Why would they do that Harris? They let people like Peter Jackson, Knute Berger use terms like Tea bagger all the time.
March 10, 2010
"Reasonable people will disagree about McKenna's judgment. A Profile in Courage a la Nebraska's George Norris, or an ill-considered suck-up to the ubiquitous Tea Baggers?"

I am sure you can search the website for your own examples of one group or another might consider "pejorative" by critics of all stripes.

Notice that I distinguished between the use of the pejorative term in headlines and straight news pieces, where I don't think it's good journalism practice, versus opinion commentaries, where I see no problem with it.

They all appear in Crosscut, there is no straight news reporting, it's all opinion and commentary.

I myself have written straight news pieces for Crosscut, and I would call Chasan's piece pretty much a straight news piece.

Bluelight, Indian tribes are provided federally-funded care through the Indian Health Care Act and have been since 1976. Considering we took their land and threw them onto reservations, I think that's only fair.

The double reference to "a divided Executive" is important to understanding an important, and unsettled, issue in our state constitution.

A central concept in both national and state systems is the separation of powers in Executive/Legislative/Judicial fashion. With respect to the Legislative and Judicial, "division" is taken for granted; the Legislative is politically divided, and the Judicial (while giving nods in the direction of Common Law precedent, 'stare decisis', and statutory direction) is if not politially, then philosophically, divided. On the Executive side, we can assume unity--but to the extent that elected Executives other than the Governor can form and pursue policy agendas (which has clearly been the case with the Insurance and Lands Commissioners, and now crucially arises in the context of legal services), there is an erosion and distribution of Executive powers beyond what was probably contemplated by our own state "framers."

In such an environment of disseminated power, the Governor is not truly the sole and unified Executive, but shares that distinction and that power with "elected others," whose conduct in office is but little understood by the electorate.

This is a conundrum of political science, and deserves deep thought--not just by the Justices who are in receipt of these prayers and amicus briefs, but also by the public at large, since the implications are profound.

Mr. McKenna's personal situation represents, of course, a particularly interesting "subtext" to the great questions associated with the course of actions he pursues: He is clearly the leading Republican candidate for Governor in 2012. Should the office he now occupies next be occupied by a Democrat with an analogous policy agenda to pursue, it will be interesting in the extreme to watch how he approaches the matter of a "divided Executive."

very interesting piece, and how refreshing to have intelligent and thoughtful reader comments and debate, both on the underlying issue and the media stuff.

Harris, I think a big part of the problem is that Crosscut pretty much leaves it up to the reader to distinguish which pieces are "News", "Analysis", and "Opinion". When you couple that with the perception that any piece which doesn't conform to one's world view is "biased" it's understandable that readers simply don't bother to make a distinction.

What I find absurd about the phrase "Obamacare" and the media's acceptance of it is that it connotes a government run health care system. This was of course the intention of whoever coined the term, but much to the chagrin of liberals it couldn't be further from the truth. The recent health care law maintains the current private health care industry for everyone under 65.

The government may not be the insurer, Mr. Fox, but it is definitely running the system.

I would hardly describe setting minimum standards and requiring full participation as "running the show". So dbreneman please elaborate.

What's in that phone-book-sized health care bill that Congress just passed, Mr. Fox? There's a whole heck of a lot more there than just "setting minimum standards and requiring full participation." I'd say that you and I simply have different definitions of how much intrusion into a market constitutes "running" it. To me, when you require a person to purchase a product offered by another, that's coercion. That's "running the show." When you regulate something as heavily as the government is now regulating healthcare, you have a situation where the regulators are in charge, and the providers of the service are heavily constrained in the actions they can take. The providers of the service are not in charge. The regulators are.

It's sort of like how the Government deals with Illegal Immigration. The Government sets minimum standards and requires full participation, but in the end they run away from any responsiblity or enforcement and they blame everyone but themselves.

Health care is not a free-market, consumer-choice issue like buying a TV set. You don't absolutely need a TV set, or any particular brand, or any particular size. At some point in your life, you'll need health care, and at that point if you don't have reliable, affordable access to it, you will likely die. America already has a number of government-run programs: VA health care, Medicare, Indian Health, and Medicaid. No one is militating about getting rid of those programs, and because of regulation--yes, federal reguation--they work quite well. If you're going to complain about "intrusion into a market", you should logically be against those programs. Are you? If not, it will seem as though your complaint is really about President Obama and you're using health care as a straw man argument.

Sounds reasonable Sarah, but we are all going to die, with or without reliable, affordable access to healthcare. If what you are suggesting is that if we eliminate the programs individually focused on special sub-groups within our society and allow them to be serviced by the existing free market medical providers, that suggestion would make us anti-veteran, anti-elderly, anti-native american. And if we are not for closing those facilities, any complaint about healthcare reform are simply a "strawman" arguement and you are probably a racist, ranting about the President. That is quite the cornor you have painted yourself into sarah, for maintaining the status quo and supporting the President. Everyone else is a racist bigot except people who believe like you do.