Thanks for the link. I hope his crystal ball is right.
He’s been “right on” so far. You should read the article just previous which made me think pretty hard about the SCOTUS decision and what it means.
To be clear, I think what SCOTUS did, taking the clear meaning of the law regarding subsidies and twisting it the way they did is horrible and wrong. They have basically made the rule of law the rule of anything goes ... whatever the powers that be want it to be. That being said .....
IF they had ruled the subsidies were illegal, the pressure would be on the Republicans to fix it. Burwell said multiple times the administration had no fix, no plans if the SCOTUS ruling went against them. They wanted maximum “hurt” on the American people and thus, maximum leverage.
The stupid Republicans would have tried to tinker with Obamacare & win concessions from Obama (like repealing the medical device tax) in exchange for continuing subsidies.
Obama would have called their bluff and REFUSED to sign anything but a fix making state/federal subsidies one and the same. If the Republicans caved, fine ... he would have them legalize what he had done illegally and they would have added their fingerprints to Obamacare, which up until then had not a single Repub vote.
If the Repubs didn’t cave (ha!), then Obama would have had this as an issue for the rest of his term and the Dems would have had it for the election .... the cruel, hard hearted Republicans, keeping poor, hardworking people who need insurance from getting it & even worse, those who had it, would be losing it because they are too poor to pay for it. This would have been a never-ending disaster for Republicans ... who could have put the blame squarely on Democrats who wrote/voted for this monstrosity in the first place, BUT Republicans seem incapable of standing up for themselves and communicating issues like this clearly.
Since SCOTUS ruled the way they did, there still is not one Republican fingerprint/vote on Obamacare. The Dems cannot use it for campaign purposes. The bill will continue to be unpopular and will eventually fail under its own weight. As its popularity declines and the ill effects on the economy and peoples’ lives continue to add up, it will be easier politically to do something about it ... assuming we get a Repub president for starters & can get rid of the likes of Boehner, McConnell, etc. & have more David Brats (lot could be said here, but I’m cutting it short)
All this being said, while Obama is gloating and doing his little SCOTUS victory tour regarding Obamacare, I would hazard a guess that behind closed doors, he’s not as happy about the ruling as one would think. He lost out on a “crisis” that he could have used greatly to his/Dems advantage. In his narcissistic view, one reinforced by past experience, I’m sure he was absolutely confident that he could get the Republicans to cave yet again and vote the subsidies as legal. Just my 2 cents - YMMV.