Follow the SCOTUS Ruling Live

[saveliberty]

David Burge ‏@iowahawkblog

Huge victory for President: court rules his widely-despised heath care plan a huge tax increase #winning

[Valin]

[Valin]

Jim Treacher ‏@jtLOL

If you're happy about today's decision, either you're not one of the people who'll pay for it, or you haven't yet realized that you are.

 

There are a lot of really ignorant people out there.

[Pepper]

@Valin @pollyannaish

 

The idea that individual mandate is a tax is lunacy. People will be taxed on something they do not buy. Those tax revenues will subsidize those who do not buy . Because there is no limit on the power to tax, in effect this tax on non-participation amounts to coercion because it becomes so onerous. Because how else will you cover 30 million uninsured and unhealthy people?

[Saltbag]

Unbelievable. But remember, it's not a tax.

 

Well, I'm charged up for November.

[Pepper]

I hear you, @Saltbag. I'm more charged up now than if it had been all tossed out window,

[Valin]

@Valin @pollyannaish

 

The idea that individual mandate is a tax is lunacy. People will be taxed on something they do not buy. Those tax revenues will subsidize those who do not buy . Because there is no limit on the power to tax, in effect this tax on non-participation amounts to coercion because it becomes so onerous. Because how else will you cover 30 million uninsured and unhealthy people?

 

I get the impression you doubt the good intentions of the Federal Government! You radical you.

What could possibly go wrong?

[Valin]

The Left keeping it classy!

[NCTexan]

My Rasmussen email this morning prior to the announcement:

 

A week after President Obama’s health care law was passed, 54% of voters nationwide wanted to see the law repealed. Now, as the Supreme Court is set to issue a ruling on the law’s constitutionality, the numbers are unchanged: 54% want to see the law repealed.

 

In polls conducted weekly or biweekly for over two years since the law's passage in March 2010, the numbers have barely moved. In fact, for more than a year before the law was passed, a similar majority opposed its passage.

 

The dynamics have remained the same throughout as well. Most Democrats oppose repeal, while most Republicans and unaffiliated voters support it. Older voters, those who use the health care system more than anyone else, favor repeal more than younger voters. The number who Strongly Favor repeal has remained over 40%, while the number Strongly Opposing has remained in the 20-something percent range.

[SrWoodchuck]

H/T:TheLookingSpoon & TheFeralIrishman

[Valin]

This just one reason why I say it will fail, even if it is not repealed...

 

What Should Americans Do After the Supreme Court ObamaCare Ruling?

Paul Hsieh, MD

6/28/12

 

(Snip)

CNN recently reported that 17% of doctors in private practice might close shop within the next year due to a combination of factors, including “business expenses and administrative hassles, shrinking insurance reimbursements and costly malpractice insurance.” Under ObamaCare many will likely join large “Accountable Care Organizations” or become hospital employees, accelerating the government-driven collectivization of American medicine. Under new medical practice incentives, doctors will become increasingly beholden to their paymasters, rather than their patients.

(Snip)

[righteousmomma]

Now that I have had time to consider all this-----this may be the best outcome we could hope for. Lies and frauds and hoodwinking exposed, the dire ramifications to our personal freedom and choices and the total idiocy of the left and their communist dictating... Edited to add the assault on the Constitution should be at the top of the list.

VOTE THE GUY OUT!! VOTE THE DEMS OUT!! Send Pelosi and Reid on a slow fact checking cruise across the seas and lets take our Country back.

 

And PRAY that Romney stays steadfast and firm.

[saveliberty]

Ann Althouse has a very readable analysis of Chief Justice Roberts' opinion:

 

Chief Justice Roberts writes an opinion limiting the commerce power and the spending power.

 

This is an important opinion about federalism and the scope of Congress's enumerated powers. Even as the individual mandate was upheld under taxing power — and Roberts wrote about the expansiveness of that power — we have an opinion that limiting those other 2 powers. I want to begin to talk about the Chief Justice's contribution to constitutional law as he writes about these 2 powers.

 

*********

 

Note that as Roberts explains why these people can't be regulated, he's also explaining why the health insurance companies are doomed. (But, you may think, isn't the mandate upheld under the taxing power? Again, what's upheld is the tax imposed for not buying insurance, and that's less expensive than buying insurance, and the money goes to the federal government, not to the insurance companies).

 

************

 

Read the whole thing.

[Valin]

Well That Was Quick...

[clearvision]

Bummer.

[Valin]

Bummer.

 

?

[clearvision]

That it was not overturned. Just catching up during break. By the time anything can be done about it, there were be so many issues, businesses dropping insurance, insurance plans gone (we will lose the ability to have our high deductible plan), etc.

[Valin]

@clearvision

 

Ah. Thanks.

[saveliberty]

Did Roberts just give Obama the bird? – UPDATED

 

June 28, 2012 By Elizabeth Scalia 7 Comments

Just a thought that occurred to me after I’d done some reading around the internets, particularly this, this and this.

Is it possible that Roberts, concerned by threats from the left that they would de-legitimize the court if it struck down Obamacare, reasoned as he did to both give the GOP a workable means of repealing the thing through legislation while also utterly defanging those threats? After all, if you look at the people screaming about the court yesterday, they’re all purring like kittens on twitter, and calling SCOTUS “humble” and “judicious.” There’s no more talk of “partisan, activist judges” today.

 

Are the Dems and the press going to wake up in the middle of the night, think about that and cringe?

Hey, anything is possible at this point.

 

*********

Read the whole thing.

[saveliberty]

The more I think about the penalty for non purchase of the insurance as a tax, the more appreciation I have for Roberts' decision. The feds cannot make you buy health insurance. There cannot be one part of the Constitution that says this is unconstitutional but that the same thing is constitutional due to this other section. That was what bothered me most.

 

But in fact, he upheld that the mandate was unconstitutional but that the Feds can tax us to pieces if we don't buy insurance. Not great policy but that's not what legal decisions are about. It also says that voting matters.

Edited June 28, 2012 by saveliberty

[Valin]

The more I think about the penalty for non purchase of the insurance as a tax, the more appreciation I have for Roberts' decision. The feds cannot make you buy health insurance.

 

No they can just fine you is you don't. Someone explain to me how this is not forcing me to buy something? Use small words.

[Valin]

[saveliberty]

The more I think about the penalty for non purchase of the insurance as a tax, the more appreciation I have for Roberts' decision. The feds cannot make you buy health insurance.

 

No they can just fine you is you don't. Someone explain to me how this is not forcing me to buy something? Use small words.

 

Because it is cheaper to pay the fine than to buy insurance.

 

Manyfold.

[saveliberty]

Roger’s Rules

 

 

SCOTUS & ObamaCare: The Search for a Silver Lining

 

June 28, 2012 - 9:17 am - by Roger Kimball

 

Would it have been better had Chief Justice Roberts voted the other way, giving us a 5-4 decision against ObamaCare? (Note by the way that some initial reports had the decision 6-3 in support.) My reflexive instinct says, “Yes, it would have been better to put paid to this fiscal and political monstrosity.”

But maybe I am being hasty. There are some subsidiary concerns, like the reputation of the Supreme Court in the culture at large. As Glenn Reynolds asked, “So, liberals, does this mean the Supreme Court is legitimate again?” The hysteria about what the Supreme Court might do, evident in the president’s minatory language as well as from other fruity precincts on the Left, was not a healthy thing. The decision certainly took the air out of that meme.

 

There is also the issue of whether overturning legislation judicially (as distinct from repealing it legislatively) is a habit to be encouraged. Right and Left complain about “judicial activism” whenever the court’s activity goes against legislation they like. “Activism” is not the issue so much as the proper role of the courts in our tripartite system. There is something to be said for limiting the use of the courts as a legislative tool.

[saveliberty]

Conservatives’ Misguided Criticism of Roberts

 

Richard Garnett

June 28, 2012 5:02 P.M.s

 

Michael Walsh’s post on the Corner echoes some things I’ve been reading in the right-leaning sectors of the blogosphere, and that I hope do not catch on. The suggestion is that Chief Justice Roberts is somehow a disappointment — that his decision today tells us something bad about “the Bush Legacy” — because he upheld, as a “tax,” the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate.

 

First things first: Professor Barry Cushman has debunked devastatingly the notion that there was a “switch in time that saved nine,” prompted by President Roosevelt’s Court-packing threats and so the comparison between the Chief Justice and Justice Owen Roberts seems unfair to both of them.