Once upon a time an old man was trying to nap in the town square in Hammama, while some children exuberantly kicked a ball. Eventually their youthful play became too boisterous for the old man to ignore. He sat up and said, "Why are you children kicking a ball in the square in Hammama on such a hot day? Don't you know that over in the square in the next village they're handing out oranges?"
Upon hearing this, the children ran off, leaving the old man to drowse in peace. But within just a few minutes, he sat up, scratched his head, and thought, "Why am I napping in the square in Hammama on such a hot day, when they are handing out oranges in the next village?"
Conservatives, sadly, seem to have a capacity at least as large as the Arabs to delude themselves, as this article (and many others like it) prove.
Here's just one example of how tortured the author's "thinking" is in the instant case: He claims that people with the same income are paying two different tax rates if one buys an electric car, while the other fails to, because there is a tax incentive to buy electric cars. So far, so good... He then assures us that this is the same thing as paying a higher tax rate if one doesn't insure for health care.
"Consequently" he reasons (and I use both words very guardedly with respect to this author) Congress already has the power to do what Roberts' claims in his ruling.
But he is apparently unaware of the nature of the argument against the mandate. Whatever the tax consequences, neither of the taxpayers' in his example is forced to buy an electric car. Both make a voluntary decision. Neither would pay any penalty for refusing to buy a car. The author's argument that the differential tax rate is the same thing as a mandate to buy health insurance is as silly as the argument that I did not buy my daughter a car this year, but my neighbor did, and that therefore I have "saved" $30,000.
This idiocy has to stop.
The people trying to make an argument that Roberts has handed the left a stinging defeat are jackasses, and they need to be anathematized from conservative, libertarian, and Constitutionalists' company.
We lost. The decision is a shattering betrayal of the concept of limited government. It is the Dred Scott decision of our time.
Don't actually meet the new national guidelines for the HHS' new health regimen?
Well, I'm afraid that'll be something else you'll have to tabulate on your 1040...
‘The decision is a shattering betrayal of the concept of limited government.’
+1
“It is the Dred Scott decision of our time.”
I completely agree with everything you said.
Dred Scott said “if you are a slave there is no escaping it”, this decision says “you are all wards of the state”.
Think of what it took to undo the Dred Scott decision!
I hope we can cure this abomination merely by electing a Republican President and congress. Because I know that ultimately we will cure it, the only question is how high will the cost be?