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Vanity-Is it a tax or is it a "penalty".
Self | 7/1/2012 | Sefl

Posted on 07/01/2012 10:30:29 AM PDT by Signalman

Obama underlings have been on TV ever since the ruling stating that the mandate is a penalty, not a tax. But SC Justice Roberts said it was a tax. I think the reason the Obama crowd is saying it's a penalty is because they know that if the mandate is officially a tax, it can be repealed by the Congress with a simple majority of 51 Senators (and President Romney signs it into law).

So, is the mandate officially and legally a tax, or can it possibly be argued with success by the Dems that it's a penalty, so it can't be repealed?


TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: mandate; penalty; tax
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1 posted on 07/01/2012 10:30:32 AM PDT by Signalman
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To: Signalman
Rogers opinion does not matter a damn. The bill does not read a tax so as the bill stands it is not a tax. Rogers vote does matter since he in effect using false assumptions pass this damn legislation. The bill currently is law. All efforts now is to repeal.
2 posted on 07/01/2012 10:35:48 AM PDT by Logical me
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To: Signalman

OMG this is what those dam liberals will get us into. But how so true that chart is. Like that post there should be only 3 people involved in Health Care: Doctor, Pharmacy, & ME!!! This Kenyan crap is getting us into a HellHole.

http://lockerz.com/s/221367985


3 posted on 07/01/2012 10:38:19 AM PDT by Patriot Babe
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To: Signalman

Is there really a difference when you get right down to it? A dollar is a dollar is a dollar.


4 posted on 07/01/2012 10:38:28 AM PDT by Free Vulcan (Election 2012 - America stands or falls. No more excuses. Get involved.)
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To: Signalman

yes

and unconstitutional


5 posted on 07/01/2012 10:39:30 AM PDT by smokingfrog ( sleep with one eye open (<o> ---)
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To: Signalman

They can call it whatever they want, but the SCOTUS called it a tax. Now we just need a speaker with a pair that isn’t crying to lead the way.


6 posted on 07/01/2012 10:40:57 AM PDT by digital-olive
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To: Signalman

The controversy seems to be like hemorrhoids to the left and I feel like passing them some creme full of salt.

As long as the left is so worried its a tax in the penalty phase then thats is what it is.

Its ure as heck isn’t a bonus points reward plan.


7 posted on 07/01/2012 10:41:09 AM PDT by Eye of Unk (Is your state Obamacare free yet?)
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To: Free Vulcan
Yes, it matters a great deal.

Because Congress has broad authority to raise taxes. But it cannot fine or penalize you for doing something over which it has no Constitutional authority.

8 posted on 07/01/2012 10:43:29 AM PDT by FredZarguna (When you find yourself arguing against Scalia and Thomas, you AREN'T a conservative.)
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To: Signalman

If the IRS is going to collect it, if it’s going to take 15K new IRS agents to do the job, and if it’s due on April 15, it’s a tax.

Good of the court to call Obama on it.

Also good of the court to give Congress an easy way out by designating it a budgetary item and allowing for easy repeal, if we do the job in November.


9 posted on 07/01/2012 10:45:04 AM PDT by Jedidah
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To: Signalman
If it's a penalty it can't be repealed like a tax can? I don't know about that. A law is a law and can be repealed by Congress.

Whether it's a tax law or not, my understanding is that it can be filibustered and a 3/5 majority can be necessary for repeal, but somebody else will know better.

They say it's not a tax because no politician wants to admit in an election year to have raised taxes. So they call tax increases "user fees." They can't call this a user fee, so they call it a penalty.

It is a penalty, but as such it wouldn't be constitutional, so the court calls it a tax. It's confusing, I know, but politicians and lawyers like it that way.

10 posted on 07/01/2012 10:46:54 AM PDT by x
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To: Signalman
I am going to say this one more time:

We NEVER needed 60 votes to overturn 0bamacare. NEVER.

Because the Bill was passed as a budget reconciliation measure which bypassed the rules of the Senate, it can be repealed the same way: with 51 votes. Doesn't matter if it was a tax, a penalty, or an exercise of the commerce power.

There is NO silver lining in this idiotic and dangerous ruling.

11 posted on 07/01/2012 10:46:54 AM PDT by FredZarguna (When you find yourself arguing against Scalia and Thomas, you AREN'T a conservative.)
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To: Signalman
It's 'tribute' to Emperor Obama I of the Amerikan Socialist Empire. Didn't you get the staff memo?

"As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their hearts desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron."

--H.L. Mencken, The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920


12 posted on 07/01/2012 10:47:17 AM PDT by Viking2002 ("If you're gonna hang out in places like this, wear a badge on your didey.")
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To: Signalman
I am going to say this one more time:

We NEVER needed 60 votes to overturn 0bamacare. NEVER.

Because the Bill was passed as a budget reconciliation measure which bypassed the rules of the Senate, it can be repealed the same way: with 51 votes. Doesn't matter if it was a tax, a penalty, or an exercise of the commerce power.

There is NO silver lining in this idiotic and dangerous ruling.

13 posted on 07/01/2012 10:47:17 AM PDT by FredZarguna (When you find yourself arguing against Scalia and Thomas, you AREN'T a conservative.)
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To: Signalman
the Affordable Care Act has 300+ pages detailing how the US goverment will control and regulate the industry as well as force participation of the citizens in the federal governments regulation of what is a wide range of PUBLIC entities.

The governement regulation and control of public entities IN THIS MANNER is not authorized under the general welfare clause or the interstate commerce clause and certainly does not fit the enumerated powers.

I blame the five "justices" who did not do their job of interpreting constitutionality, but instead twisted a morsel of fabricated fact (that it is a tax contrary to what the content of the bill details) in order to justify their personal paradigm of socialism.

Even if it is in fact a tax is not their business, taxation is certainly at the discretion of congress. the issue in question was this ; does congress have the authority to regulate public entities and force the people to fund their imposition ?

it is exactly the same as if they passed "the Affordable Car Act", forcing a tax in order to make you buy a car, with 300 pages detailing how they will control each car company and how they will decide what car you will have , the fact that it is funded by a tax does NOT address the constitutionality of the act but is merly a deflection and dereliction of the duties of a cheif justice

14 posted on 07/01/2012 10:52:33 AM PDT by KTM rider
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To: Logical me

Who is Rogers?


15 posted on 07/01/2012 10:53:20 AM PDT by ari-freedom
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To: Signalman

In as much as the SCOTUS is the final arbiter of the interpretation of the laws of the United States, as well as the Constitution, it is a tax.

It is a peculiar tax, esp. considering it was levied at the behest of leftist who have a visceral horror of regressive taxes and an irrational belief that progressive taxes are “fair”: a regressive income tax which is waived on persons covered by health insurance policies that meet desiderata specified at the whim of the Secretary of HHS, persons deemed to be in ‘hardship’ by the HHS, and members of certain religious groups.

It is regressive both at the bottom end — there is a minimum tax — and at the upper end — there is a maximum tax. Otherwise it is levied as a percentage of gross adjusted income.


16 posted on 07/01/2012 10:56:22 AM PDT by The_Reader_David (And when they behead your own people in the wars which are to come, then you will know. . .)
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To: Signalman
It's a penalty tax because Justice Roberts likes Certs

It's like two mints in one!

17 posted on 07/01/2012 10:57:24 AM PDT by frithguild (You can call me Snippy the Anti-Freeper)
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To: Signalman
Neither, IMHO it was more like a bill of attainder, but I am sure Freeper Legal Eagles will punch holes in that theory...
18 posted on 07/01/2012 11:02:30 AM PDT by taildragger (( Palin / Mulally 2012 ))
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To: Signalman

Its a penalty for NON participation of the socialist health care unions.

You buy a car, you then for economic reasons decide to ride a bicycle instead but the state fines you for suspending the auto insurance on it even though it will not be driven.

And if you fail to pay the tax they will take the car, your paycheck and all you own.

Its a tax to die fighting against it because its a tax waiting to kill.


19 posted on 07/01/2012 11:08:35 AM PDT by Eye of Unk (Is your state Obamacare free yet?)
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To: Signalman
Core paragraph from the Roberts opinion:
"Suppose Congress enacted a statute providing that every taxpayer who owns a house without energy efficient windows must pay $50 to the IRS. The amount due is adjusted based on factors such as taxable income and joint filing status, and is paid along with the taxpayer's income tax return. Those whose income is below the filing threshold need not pay. The required payment is not called a 'tax,' a 'penalty,' or anything else. No one would doubt that this law imposed a tax, and was within Congress’s power to tax. That conclusion should not change simply because Congress used the word 'penalty' to describe the payment. Interpreting such a law to be a tax would hardly '[i]mpos[e] a tax through judicial legislation.' Post, at 25. Rather, it would give practical effect to the Legislature’s enactment."

Now that I've studied the opinion, my interpretation is this:

Roberts argues two points (note: Not using these words--I'm extrapolating on my own):

  1. The exact same effect as the "penalty" (fine) could have been achieved by using some combination of an income tax credit, increased income tax rates, reductions in the size of deductions, and even new filing statuses for "those without health insurance" (in addition to 'single,' 'married,' 'head of household,' etc) with different standard deductions and tax rates.
  2. For Constitutional purposes, what something actually is is a function of what it actually does, not what it's called. So if it walks like a tax, talks like a tax, quacks like a tax, and acts like a tax, then it's a tax--or at least, based on past precedents, that's how it must be interpreted for the purpose of deciding Constitutionality if that's the only way to uphold a challenged law. And past precedents require that the Court must exercise every due diligence in order to find a way to interpret the law (but not the Constitution) so that the law may be found to be Constitutional.

So the argument is that since Congress could have achieved the same result--with precisely the same effects on everyone--by changing the income tax law, and since the assertion that X is a penalty is not the assertion that X cannot also be a tax (any tax may be intended as a penalty,) then interpreting the penalty as a tax is the interpretation of the law required by the Court's past precedents regarding how laws must be interpreted.

I will have more to say on this later.

20 posted on 07/01/2012 11:09:52 AM PDT by sourcery (If true=false, then there would be no constraints on what is possible. Hence, the world exists.)
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