Posted on 06/28/2012 1:11:02 PM PDT by DYngbld
I just got back from the Supreme Court. It was an interesting experience sitting in the Courtroom as the opinion in the Obamacare case was read. And, by now, if you’re like me, you’ve gotten37 million pre-written press releases from every elected official in Virginia and most nationally either celebrating the individual mandate’s survival, or decrying this as the darkest day in the union’s history.
The truth lies, as it usually does with Supreme Court decisions, somewhere in the middle. In my opinion, however, the bulk of the victory lays with those of us on the right.
While we may have lost the battle on the individual mandate itself, we won two arguably bigger, more long-term critical fights – the fight about the breadth of the federal government’s regulatory power under the commerce clause, and the fight about the use of the federal spending power to coerce states into doing the federal government’s bidding. Those are both huge issues for small government conservatives and we won both – even getting a large majority, 7-2, on the spending power issue.
(Excerpt) Read more at bearingdrift.com ...
Wake up, and smell the Obama Dictatorship.
Their votes for this need to become an albatross to them in re-election bids.
limiting the Commerce Clause is a big deal.
We should never rely on a court to make laws or un-make bad ones, that’s the job of the legislature. In this case Justice Roberts did his job to evaluate the constitutionality, rather than acting as an activist. We hate that, right?
The law was entirely unconstitutional and Roberts allowed it. There is nothing more to say. No amount of spin or BS forgives Roberts and the other 4 for not doing their jobs.
The court, including Roberts, have really nothing to do with the American people. The Supreme Court, like Congress and certainly like Obama sees the people they are supposed to be working for as their own property. Slaves.
They ruled right on some but not on the others? If it’s wrong, it’s wrong.
I agree limiting the commerce clause is a big deal. It is tougher to expand government if it takes a massive tax increase to fund it.
Still, overall, this was a terrible decision that further threatens the economic viability of this country. The country would have been far better off with Roberts making the correct ruling instead of this twisted “clever” ruling.
The good news is we are now closer to the second revolution.
End this bullsh!t once and for all.
Since when do rats run from tax-and-spend positions? They LOVE pandering to the non-taxpaying voters, promising them all kinds of “gimmees” in exchange for votes. They’ve just been talking about making the “rich” pay “their fair share”, I don’t see where they think taxes are a losing propostion
The law was not written or passed as a tax, therefore calling it one is an example of judicial activism. If the law had been written as a tax, it would have been defeated. Trying to paint a smiley face on this monstrous bill and the court’s upholding it is preposterous, even if you were “in the courtroom”.
I don’t see how the Supreme Court changing the language of a bill to make it “constitutional” is a “good thing”. But okay.
He was in fact the poster boy for judicial activism here. He wrote that Congress should have defined it as a tax, so therefore it is a tax, so therefore it is the law of the land. Judicial activism right out of the Democratic playbook.
Don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining.
From Chief Justice Roberts decisio:.....
“Those decisions are entrusted to our Nation’s elected leaders, who can be thrown out of office if the people disagree with them. It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.”
.....Just ike our forefathers in the American Rovolution taxation has/will motive us again to replace the governmment. This time we can vote them out.
Get er done. Donate, work the phones, work locally to get “representation” of our own ideas: We need SIXTY Senators, the Presidency AND the House.
This did more than any decision in decades to expand the commerce clause. Roberts essentially said ‘just use taxation and the federal government can rightfully coerce anyone to do anything.’
“it was a reaffirmation of the conservative principle that the federal government and our federal system has limits.”
Wow. It will take a long time to bring the American
republic back to life. A legal precedent to control
every individual through the taxing authority will
ripple through the system for years, decades or even
generations, if at all. Do justices reverse precedent?
Not anymore.
I see the blog article is hate speech./s In order to
discourage this hatred, I’m imposing a sin tax of an
additional 45% of your income./s
Brian, you ignorant slut.
There is no way to polish the turd that Roberts delivered.
He will NEVER recover from this vote in terms of how i look at him and GWB.
No, that was being done long before this ruling.
Roberts called them out by rightly labelling it a tax.
I hope you mean a real one and not one lead by Romney and the Republicans.
It is not judicial activism - the Administration argued before the court this was a tax and that is what the court ruled on.
The court just declared Obama and the Democrat controlled (at the time) Congress to all be liars.
I don’t mince words.
In my opinion, however, the bulk of the victory lays with those of us on the right.
Don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining.
This was probably the worst ruling to come down since Roe vs Wade, and look how long we have been fighting to overturn it?
Roberts has just wiped out our constitutional right to freedom. Under the guise of a tax, we can now be forced to do what ever the federal government demands.
In essence, we have just become slaves to the state! Karl Marx and every communist/fascist/nazi/totalitarian who has ever hated America and capitalism is dancing in the streets today. Even the ones who have died and went to hell are dancing the jig with Satan over this ruling!
Even if we get a super majority of republicans in the house senate and Romney in, we will have to wait to change the court to fix this. On the average, it takes an average of 40 to 50 years to overturn a bad a SC decision.
Tell your children you are sorry for them now, because it will be a cold day in Hell before this ever gets fixed.
I’m sorry, but exchanging a limitation on the commerce clause for full-blown socialism is not a win.
If Roberts wanted to challenge the commerce clause, it would have been wiser to do so on a case that doesn’t involve 1/6 of the economy of the United States. He’s taking a very big risk, if that was indeed his intent.
They took a baby step in the direction of correcting a wrong done by SCOTUS in Wickard v. filburn. It still wasn't enough.
But, but, what about the commerce clause lip service?
A label. Yeah, that'll show 'em who's boss. I bet they are quaking in their slippers.
I would like to wait till the smoke settles a bit.
I honestly don't see how Obamacare got this far in the first place. The branches of government have been withering into one mess for the last several years.
We are going to continue down this dead end road, until we actually get enough people pissed off enough to do something about it. This ruling may have been the required catalyst, it may not. Watch the spin over the next few days with caution.
This is like arguing that the French Young Guard Division reported 96 percent casualties at the Battle of Waterloo, but this is mostly good news because 4% survived.
Seriously? Who cares where anyone was when it was read, this was horrible decision, and there is absolutely nothing good about this. Nothing good at all, unless, of course, one is rooting for America’s demise.
I am sick about this..
We are going to continue down this dead end road, until we actually get enough people pissed off enough to do something about it. This ruling may have been the required catalyst, it may not.
You nailed it. The political cost of the law being labeled a tax during the legislative process may have prevented it from passing. Roberts plays this word game, and this author pretends like the political liability of it now being declared a tax will play it’s original legitimate role after the fact. It can’t. Even then I don’t see any limiting principle even if you call it a tax. The government can compel you do anything as long as it has some negative label attached to it such as “tax” because that is politically limiting? Close the court. They no longer have any purpose if the only check on the legislative branch is the voting booth.
If he was a leader, he would have already adopted the correct nomenclature of Obama Tax Hikes on the middle class.
Well, yeah it did.
They lied for years and said it wasn't a tax. And Roberts just smacked them down.
The bonus is that campaign ads can now be unleashed showing Obama promising over and over and over again that he wouldn't tax the middle class.
That's pretty good fodder for Nov. '12.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought that the Court was supposed to act upon what Congress actually passed. If you can show me where in that 2,700 monstrosity it was referred to as a tax, then I will agree with you. Otherwise, Roberts was ruling on what the ACA’a lawyers argued, not what was in the bill. And that, my friend, is judicial activism.
No, Roberts rubber-stamped what was improper if it was a tax—as it originated in the Senate. He allowed them to go ahead with it by relabeling it as a tax even though they had positioned it otherwise.
The net effect of his ruling is that Congress can micromanage everything just like an expanded commerce clause—as long as they do it technically by the coercion of taxes rather than the fig leaf of the commerce clause.
This is a hugely bad deal for the country.
It is beyond question that the Administration case was, when it was convenient, that it WAS a tax, and when it was convenient, that it was NOT a tax.
May I suggest these observations from the vaunted "oral argument" phase of the case:
U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli used the phrase “tax penalty” multiple times to describe the individual mandate’s backstop. He portrayed the fee as a penalty by design, but one that functions as a tax because it’s collected through the tax code.
“General Verrilli, today you are arguing that the penalty is not a tax. Tomorrow you are going to be back and you will be arguing that the penalty is a tax,” said Justice Samuel Alito, in one of the few laugh lines throughout the 90 minutes of argument Monday.
And, as proof enough to me (now) that "oral arguments" are just a bunch of pretty words for us yokels:
The justices, particularly the four Democratic-appointees, and Justice Antonin Scalia, appeared skeptical that the fine constitutes a tax.
http://www.therightscoop.com/day-1-listen-to-the-supreme-courts-oral-arguments-on-obamacare/
http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html#A1Sec7
Section 7 - Revenue Bills, Legislative Process, Presidential Veto
All bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives...
You need to take a break from Rush Limbaugh’s happy-talk once in a while.
I don't listen to Rush.
They have already micro-managing everything via tax for years.
Nothing new.
If only. To our everlasting shame and national injury, that ship sailed some time ago. When the Senate can declare that 2700 pages of legislation of healthcare is an “amendment” to a bill that gives first-time-homeowners a tax break, because it’s revenue-neutral and therefore a matter of “budget reconcilation”, then the Constitution has no more value in this country.
Huge really, especially because of this from the opinion:
Justice Ginsburg questions the necessity of rejecting the Government's commerce power argument, given that §5000A can be upheld under the taxing power. Post, at 37. But the statute reads more naturally as a command to buy insurance than as a tax, and I would uphold it as a command if the Constitution allowed it. It is only because the Commerce Clause does not authorize such a command that it is necessary to reach the taxing power question. And it is only because we have a duty to construe a stat-ute to save it, if fairly possible, that §5000A can be interpreted as a tax. Without deciding the Commerce Clause question, I would find no basis to adopt such a saving construction. The Federal Government does not have the power to order people to buy health insurance. Section 5000A would therefore be unconstitutional if read as a command. The Federal Government does have the power to impose a tax on those without health insurance. Section 5000A is therefore constitutional, because it can reasonably be read as a tax.
If one recalls, the government ran with the Commerce Clause argument as their primary authority with the power to levy taxes as their backup. Sadly Justice Ginsburg didn't appreciate CJ Roberts having to slam the door, making it clear that not engaging in commerce is not the same as engaging in commerce; thus making precedent in doing so.
We should never rely on a court to make laws or un-make bad ones, that’s the job of the legislature. In this case Justice Roberts did his job to evaluate the constitutionality, rather than acting as an activist. We hate that, right?
If one were true to their convictions about what powers are given to each branch... yes. Here on FR today... another matter for some. Roberts even provided a pointed statement to that end here:
Our permissive reading of these powers is explained in part by a general reticence to invalidate the acts of the Nation's elected leaders. "Proper respect for a co-ordinate branch of the government" requires that we strike down an Act of Congress only if "the lack of constitutional authority to pass [the] act in question is clearly demonstrated." United States v. Harris, 106 U. S. 629, 635 (1883). Members of this Court are vested with the authority to interpret the law; we possess neither the expertise nor the prerogative to make policy judgments. Those decisions are entrusted to our Nation's elected leaders, who can be thrown out of office if the people disagree with them. It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.
Emphasis on this last sentence "It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices."
Alas, there will be some who have decried judicial activism in the past with respect to liberal leaning rulings, who will beclown themselves now because C.J. Roberts did not do so.
Another moron.
Congress has not been coercing people to buy things for years; this angle is new.
Thanks for the ping!
We lost the fight over federal coercion through taxation to force the individual to conform to government-mandated behaviors. Once that fight is lost, it's game over. The rest is just noise.
This whole monstrous scheme will collapse under its own weight all by itself.
Just like communism in Korea, Vietnam.
We don’t have to lift a finger or fire a shot. Everything liberals do violates the laws of human nature. That’s why it always fails.
Right, Vike!
Americans - the true spiritual heirs of liberty, not the grifter class - are horrified and sickened because they were just forced to watch their mother be gang raped.
And to make it even worse, “grief counselors” are trying to explain that it wasn’t so bad... maybe even a good thing... because it means that her husband and brothers and children will love and care for her all the more.
Remember a particular cartoon with Obama and a disheveled Statue of Liberty? After raping her he says he’ll be back - with friends. Looks like one of ‘em is named John Roberts.
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