McCabe+Genre2

= rial: Individual mandate vs. 'do not treat' = === === What a difference a week makes. Before Monday morning, Supreme Court experts seemed confident the justices will uphold the health reform law and its controversial requirement that uninsured Americans buy medical coverage or pay a penalty. A panel put together by the [|American Bar Association] predicted, 85%-15%, that the court will approve the health law and forecast a 6-3 split in favor of the so-called individual mandate. > Supporters of health care reform rally in front of the Supreme Court on Wednesday. > By Charles Dharapak, AP  Supporters of health care reform rally in front of the Supreme Court on Wednesday. [|Ads by Google] __ [|Plans for Small Business] __Find out why so many small businesses choose UnitedHealthcare® __[|UHC.com/SmallBusiness] __ __ [|Pennsylvania Health Plans] __View Current Plans in Pennsylvania. Get Customized Quotes Online! __[|www.GoHealthInsurance.com] __ __ [|AARP 50+ Life Insurance] __From New York Life. No Exam, just Health info. See Affordable Rates! __[|NYLAARP.com/Life-Insurance] __ You have to wonder what the panel thinks now. Several justices' comments and questions during this week's oral arguments pushed expert opinion hard the other way. Now it appears at least as likely that the court will throw out the mandate, and perhaps even the entire law, when it issues its decisions, likely in late June. Opponents would celebrate such an outcome, but none of the problems the law was designed to address will disappear just because the law does. The prospect requires some preliminary thinking about other options. The mandate, vilified as a violation of personal freedom, is designed to deal with uninsured people who can't cover their costs when they get seriously ill or injured. Medical ethics and federal law require that those people be treated, so hospitals, doctors and insurers make up the loss by raising prices for everyone else. The cost adds an estimated $1,000 a year to the average family health premium.
 * [[image:http://i.usatoday.net/news/_photos/2012/03/29/Editorial-Health-mandate-vs-do-not-treat-3J17LTL5-x.jpg width="245" height="184" caption="Supporters of health care reform rally in front of the Supreme Court on Wednesday." link="http://i.usatoday.net/news/_photos/2012/03/29/Editorial-Health-mandate-vs-do-not-treat-3J17LTL5-x-large.jpg"]] By Charles Dharapak, AP

USATODAY OPINION
**About Editorials/Debate** Opinions expressed in USA TODAY's editorials are decided by its [|Editorial Board], a demographically and ideologically diverse group that is separate from USA TODAY's news staff. Most editorials are accompanied by an opposing view — a unique USA TODAY feature that allows readers to reach conclusions based on both sides of an argument rather than just the Editorial Board's point of view. If these people can't be made to buy insurance, even with subsidies, what else might make them act responsibly? The cold-blooded answer would be to let them die. Hypothetically, they could sign waivers alerting medics that they have agreed not to be treated. Maybe they could wear black " do not treat " wristbands. That would be an act of responsibility to match the freedom exercised in rejecting insurance. But this is, of course, not a nation that would tolerate leaving people to die in hospital parking lots. So what other options are open? Taxes to subsidize insurers are an alternative to making people pay insurers directly. But politically, that's a fantasy. Putting everyone on Medicare is an option, but Republicans hate that idea even more than the mandate. They blocked a "public option" for the current plan that would have let Americans define the health care future with their own choices, not Washington's. So the mandate's demise stands to be a gift to the free riders and a burden for everyone else. Those who demonize "ObamaCare" should be careful what they wish for. **States show what works, and what doesn't** Even some of ObamaCare's ardent foes like many of its provisions. Polls have shown that while people overwhelmingly disapprove of the individual mandate, they support requirements such as the one that prevents insurance companies from excluding people who have pre-existing medical conditions. Or the rule that bars insurers from canceling your coverage when you get sick, or terminating your policy when you hit a lifetime spending cap. Another popular new rule lets you keep your children on family policies until they're 26. In fact, critics of health reform like these provisions so much that they'd like to keep them, even if the individual mandate were struck down. Sounds great. Doesn't work. In the early- and mid-1990s, nine states passed "guaranteed issue" laws that required insurance companies to write policies on demand. Without a mandate that required all citizens to buy policies, though, premiums and deductibles soared, enrollment fell and many companies dropped coverage in those states. Vermont went from 33 insurance companies to two. In the first three years [|New Hampshire] 's law was in effect, the number of insurers writing individual policies in the state dropped from 12 to five, and they offered only high-deductible, catastrophic coverage. Premiums in New Jersey rose as much as 155% over four years. Six states repealed their guaranteed-issue laws in whole or in part. [|New York], which retained its law, had the nation's highest individual market premiums in 2009. States are often looked on as the laboratories of democracy, where new ideas can be tried out to see whether they'd work nationwide. In this case, the laboratories have shown that forcing insurance companies to take all comers and drop noxious practices doesn't work unless that comes with a requirement that just about everyone get a policy, the way Massachusetts does. That state's health insurance reform — signed in 2006 by then-Gov. [|Mitt Romney], the current Republican presidential front-runner — has ensured that about 98% of state residents have health coverage. In health care, as in life, you can't have the dessert without the spinach. **What ObamaCare and RyanCare share** If the Supreme Court strikes down the health care law, prospects for replacement anytime soon are grim. After all, it took 15 years from the implosion of [|President Clinton] 's health overhaul in 1994 for Congress to take another crack. And Congress is even more bitterly divided now than it was then. Despite the partisan differences, however, there are some striking similarities between ObamaCare and the health care parts of the budget written by Rep. [|Paul Ryan], R-Wis. The Ryan budget, passed Thursday by the Republican-controlled House, includes a change to Medicare that would give seniors subsidies to buy private plans on an exchange and penalize them if they didn't participate. Insurers wouldn't be able to exclude people because of pre-existing conditions. If that sounds familiar, it's because that's exactly what ObamaCare would do for those under 65. To be sure, there are significant differences between RyanCare and ObamaCare. RyanCare focuses mainly on controlling the unsustainable growth in the cost of Medicare and Medicaid. ObamaCare focuses mainly on extending coverage to about 30 million of the 50 million in the [|United States] who are uninsured, while promoting experiments aimed at restraining costs. Ultimately, repairing the [|U.S.] health care system will require addressing both cost and coverage. The overlap in the policy frameworks between the Democrats' plan (which was borrowed largely from old Republican ideas) and the Republicans' plan (which applies the new Democratic ideas to seniors) suggests that, for all their political scheming, the two parties might find at least a patch of common ground someday if old people and young ones are treated as a single group, not as two.

For more information about [|reprints & permissions], visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor **Brent Jones**. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to [|corrections.usatoday.com]. Posted 2d 15h ago | Updated 2d 15h ago

= Editorial: Tax preparation industry needs policing = === === To practice law, you need to pass a bar exam. To be a contractor or a hairdresser, you need a license. But being a professional tax preparer requires nothing. >
 * [[image:http://i.usatoday.net/news/_photos/2012/03/29/Editorial-Police-tax-preparation-industry-4A17H4K8-x.jpg width="245" height="184" link="http://i.usatoday.net/news/_photos/2012/03/29/Editorial-Police-tax-preparation-industry-4A17H4K8-x-large.jpg"]] By Eileen Blass, USA TODAY

This is an odd state of affairs given that the U.S. tax code would stump most brain surgeons and that taxpayers and the federal government have a lot riding on the preparer getting things right, particularly as the April 15 tax deadline nears. Not unreasonably, the [|IRS] wants to reduce the number of inaccurate or fraudulent returns filed by paid preparers. In 2010, it instituted a registration process. By next year, preparers who are not lawyers, certified public accountants or highly skilled tax experts, known as enrolled agents, will be required to take an exam and undergo 15 hours of continuing education annually. At some point in the future, the IRS will begin background checks to weed out preparers with criminal backgrounds. These moves were not seen as particularly controversial. In fact, at different times during the past several years, both the House and the Senate passed legislation that would have required the IRS to police the tax prep business. But this month, a libertarian public interest law firm called the Institute for Justice filed suit on behalf of three small services. Since then, the issue has become something of a cause célèbre for conservatives determined to portray the Obama administration as overly regulatory (never mind that the IRS commissioner who launched the program, [|Doug Shulman], is a Bush appointee). The need for change was shown in a pair of studies conducted by the Government Accountability Office in 2006 and the [|Treasury Department] in 2008. Both sent testers into the field and asked preparers to figure out their taxes.
 * === OPPOSING VIEW: [|Overturn IRS power grab] ===

USATODAY OPINION
**About Editorials/Debate** Opinions expressed in USA TODAY's editorials are decided by its [|Editorial Board], a demographically and ideologically diverse group that is separate from USA TODAY's news staff. Most editorials are accompanied by an opposing view — a unique USA TODAY feature that allows readers to reach conclusions based on both sides of an argument rather than just the Editorial Board's point of view. The results were ugly. The studies uncovered numerous errors and found preparers who counseled people to ignore outside income, failed to ask necessary questions, and refused (in about a quarter of the cases) to sign the returns as required by law. The Treasury Department study concluded that six out of 28 returns included misstatements or omissions deemed to be willful or reckless. Of particular concern to the IRS is the Earned Income Tax Credit, a program that supplements the income of the working poor through refundable tax credits. The IRS estimates that 23% to 28% of the EITC checks it writes are in error, generally in the filer's favor. It also strongly suspects that an industry of preparers willing to file fraudulent returns for a fee has emerged. But with no way of matching numerous questionable returns with a single preparer, its ability to police this industry is limited. Both the government and millions of conscientious tax filers have a stake in cleaning up this mess. But so do the taxpayers who use shoddy services, because they can be exposed to financial penalties and additional headaches. Opponents of the new requirements say they will limit competition by causing some small tax preparation services to get out of the business. That is no doubt true. Some of the 350,000 or so people required to take the test are part-timers who make a little extra money in the spring by doing taxes. Some of them will decide the hassles are not worth the time. But the same could be said of lawyers. People would have more choices in preparing a will or managing an uncontested divorce if states weren't so picky about those bar exams. Somehow, there hasn't been a call for deregulating that business. The obvious and the best possible solution to this problem would be a radically simplified federal tax code. Then, more than half of taxpayers wouldn't have to hire other people to do their returns. But until that blessed day arrives, it makes sense to try to ensure that preparers know what they're doing.

For more information about [|reprints & permissions], visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor **Brent Jones**. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to [|corrections.usatoday.com]. Posted 3d 16h ago | Updated 3d 16h ago

EDITORIAL
= An Incomplete DNA Deal =


A __ [|major expansion of New York State’s DNA database] __ signed into law last week by Gov. Andrew Cuomo will enhance the ability of law enforcement to convict the guilty and, in some cases, exonerate the innocent. But, disappointingly, the measure still leaves New York State without certain protections to avoid wrongful convictions. ===Related News === ===Related in Opinion ===
 * ====== [|New York State Set to Add All Convict DNA to Its Database] (March 14, 2012) ======

More on [|New York Politics »]
The new measure requires people convicted of any crime, including misdemeanors, to submit a DNA sample. It exempts those without a criminal record convicted of possessing small amounts of marijuana. Violent criminals often commit multiple offenses before getting caught, including minor ones, warranting the broadened collection of DNA samples that can be searched for possible matches with crime-scene samples. Assembly Democrats deserve credit for insisting on provisions, included in the final measure, to make it easier for defendants and convicted persons with claims of actual innocence to obtain testing for DNA evidence on the order of a judge. Those provisions draw on recommendations by a task force on wrongful convictions created by the state’s chief judge, Jonathan Lippman. Regrettably, other important reforms sought by the Assembly did not make it into the final bill, leaving unaddressed two of the biggest causes of wrongful convictions: witness misidentification and false confessions. The proposed changes would have mandated the videotaping of police interrogations and “double blind” police lineups so neither the witness nor person administrating the lineup knows the identity of the suspect. Mr. Cuomo says he supports both reforms but had to omit them to reach a compromise on the DNA database expansion. Had he pushed for the videotaping and lineup changes early in the process instead of getting behind the database-only bill favored by Senate Republicans he might have been able to achieve more. Mr. Cuomo has said he intends to revisit the overlooked issues. He should do so soon.

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A version of this editorial appeared in print on March 27, 2012, on page A26 of the New York edition with the headline: An Incomplete DNA Deal. ====== Criteria: Intro Body Conclusion Need to pick a side <span class="ob_org_header" style="font-size: 16px;">have opposing views represtented <span class="ob_org_header" style="font-size: 16px;">strong conclusion

<span class="ob_org_header" style="font-size: 16px;">Characteristics: <span class="ob_org_header" style="font-size: 16px;">Strong point of view <span class="ob_org_header" style="font-size: 16px;">Current news angle <span class="ob_org_header" style="font-size: 16px;">strong opposing views