After hearing ad nauseum that the ACA bill has 2000+ pages, I decided to count the words and pages, and evaluate really how long and hard it is to read. I'm not a lawyer, so I assume that the language shouldn't be difficult for a "esteemed" lawyer and judge like Scalia. To my surprise, I could follow it (well, some of the sentences needed a bit of diagramming). Hmm, if I could follow it, I figure Judge Scalia can.
I converted the PDF file of the ACA as passed to Word to use Word's counting features. (I assume that the arguments at this point would be on the bill as passed, not the one under consideration). The PDF measured in at 904 pages, and the words measured in at 384,200 (rounding to the hundreds). Still hefty - that's about equal to the Lord of the Rings Trilogy (not counting the appendices).
Still, I wanted to do more evaluation. The bill has a large number of parts, so the Table of Contents (or list of contents) would be rather long. That's 12 pages gone. The header on every page was counted as well, so that's 2700 words gone (Word counted the header as 3 words, and they appeared on all pages). We're down to 894 pages and 381500 words. The Table of Contents comes in at 5100 words, so we're down to 376400 words of the actual bill (not headers, not Table of Contents). That comes to 422 words per page on average.
How long is 422 words? To this point you've plowed through 265 words. Hard, wasn't it?
On the other hand, it is a lot of pages. Too bad there isn't a way of listing what the sections are, and what's in each section. Oh yes, that's the Table of Contents. The TOC in the bill provides a brief description of the section number. Here's a sample:
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TITLE I—QUALITY, AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE FOR ALL AMERICANS
Subtitle A—Immediate Improvements in Health Care Coverage for All Americans
Sec. 1001. Amendments to the Public Health Service Act.
‘‘PART A—INDIVIDUAL AND GROUP MARKET REFORMS
‘‘SUBPART II—IMPROVING COVERAGE
‘‘Sec. 2711. No lifetime or annual limits.
‘‘Sec. 2712. Prohibition on rescissions.
‘Sec. 2713. Coverage of preventive health services.
‘Sec. 2714. Extension of dependent coverage.
‘Sec. 2715. Development and utilization of uniform explanation of coverage
documents and standardized definitions.
‘‘Sec. 2716. Prohibition of discrimination based on salary.
‘‘Sec. 2717. Ensuring the quality of care. ‘
‘Sec. 2718. Bringing down the cost of health care coverage.
‘‘Sec. 2719. Appeals process.
Sec. 1002. Health insurance consumer information.
Sec. 1003. Ensuring that consumers get value for their dollars.
Sec. 1004. Effective dates.
Subtitle B—Immediate Actions to Preserve and Expand Coverage
Sec. 1101. Immediate access to insurance for uninsured individuals with a preexisting condition.
Sec. 1102. Reinsurance for early retirees. Sec.
1103. Immediate information that allows consumers to identify affordable coverage options.
Sec. 1104. Administrative simplification.
Sec. 1105. Effective date.
Subtitle C—Quality Health Insurance Coverage for All Americans
PART I—HEALTH INSURANCE MARKET REFORMS Sec. 1201. Amendment to the Public Health Service Act.
‘‘SUBPART I—GENERAL REFORM
‘‘Sec. 2704. Prohibition of preexisting condition exclusions or other discrimination based on health status.
‘Sec. 2701. Fair health insurance premiums.
‘Sec. 2702. Guaranteed availability of coverage.
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It isn't hard for me to follow at all, but apparently Judge Scalia has a hard time with a document organization like this. A legal clerk should be able to read this if I can. Or maybe he has more important things to do on the bench, like watch Fox News.
Oh yes, total number of words in this diary: 611