A key committee in the Michigan legislature has voted down a proposal to create one of ObamaCare’s health insurance “exchanges.” The Speaker of the Michigan House pronounced a state-run Exchange dead:

It was my hope the committee would find that a state-run exchange afforded us more control over the unacceptable over-reach by the federal government regarding the health care of Michigan citizens. After due diligence, however, it is clear that there were too many unanswered questions for the committee to feel comfortable with a state-run exchange and we will not have one in Michigan…

The committee apparently was not able to get the answers to key questions or receive assurances about major concerns regarding costs for Michigan taxpayers, the ability to adopt a model the federal government wouldn’t ultimately control or the ability to protect religious freedom for Michigan citizens. Because the committee could not be assured that a state exchange was the best way to protect Michigan’s citizens, it is understandable why they did not approve the bill.

Under the terms of ObamaCare, Michigan’s refusal to create an Exchange exempts all Michigan employers from the law’s employer mandate, which imposes penalties of up to $2,000 per worker per year.

It exempts, by my count, 429,000 Michigan residents from the law’s individual mandate — a tax of $2,085 on families of four earning as little as $24,000.

And it gives the state, those employers, and those individual residents standing to file lawsuits to stop the IRS from ignoring the clear language of the law and imposing those taxes on them anyway.