Posted on 06/25/2015 7:22:53 PM PDT by rhema
Good news from the Supreme Court today: If you like your health care subsidies, you can keep them. If you like limited government and the separation of powers, you are out of luck.
Now that Chief Justice Roberts and five of his colleagues found that the phrase “Exchange established by the State” means “Exchange established by the State or the Federal Government,” we should henceforth follow Justice Scalia’s suggestion that this act of Congress, which had to be passed before the People knew what was in it and then had to be rescued not once, but twice, by a complicit Supreme Court, be renamed “SCOTUScare.”
If there was any remaining doubt that the present Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) was in the business of writing the law when it thinks Congress requires its better judgment rather than interpreting the law, then that doubt can be set aside. Congress, this President and even the IRS have a most clever partner in re-writing the laws of our land after the fact: SCOTUS.
The Affordable Care Act, previously known as Obamacare, is no longer the law that the Pelosi Reid clique rammed through Congress. It was first rewritten by the Court to meet whatever is left of Constitutional limits on Congress by refashioning the individual mandate from a penalty into a tax administered by the ever-competent and trustworthy IRS.
Now the Court, determined to save the country from the plain intent and meaning of the Act, has agreed with the IRS and Obama Administration that Congress intended that premium subsidies be doled out via both state exchanges and the federal exchange. This is despite the fact that Congress clearly and plainly limited the subsidies to an “Exchange established by the State.” Jonathan Gruber and other Obama consultants, who hold such high opinions on the intelligence of the American electorate, designed a carrot and stick regime to get all or most of the states to build an exchange, dangling premium subsidies, loans to build the exchanges and federal funds to expand Medicaid, all underlined by the threat of a personal penalty if people did not buy insurance.
Obamacare proponents underestimated the intensity of the opposition to the federal takeover of health care and were surprised by the wide scale rejection of the law by many states and the American people. When it became clear that more than half the states were not going to build a state exchange, the IRS had to get the carrot out to the citizens of those states by offering the subsidy via the federal exchange.
In order to save SCOTUScare, the Court outdid itself on behalf of its signature legislation. As Justice Scalia noted in his dissent, “normal rules of interpretation seem always to yield to the overriding principle of the present Court: The Affordable Care Act must be saved.”
President Obama, who was initially offended by the label “Obamacare” (it was after all, intended as an insult) but who proudly embraced it on the campaign trail in 2012, may object to Scalia’s suggestion that we rename the law after its best benefactor. But given that the Court has insured we will be re-working this law long after the president leaves office, it seems fitting that the Court get the credit.
On a more serious note: I recommend that you only skim the majority opinion in King v. Burwell and cut right to Scalia’s dissent (joined by Justices Thomas and Alito). Scalia’s dissent shreds the majority’s reasoning, as only Scalia can do, and reminds us of the proper role for SCOTUS and the all the courts. It is worth reading, if only for its historical value.
The King v. Burwell full opinion can be read here.
Chief Justus Johnny Bob and his pal Barack Hussein Obama can both kiss my @$$.
“Good news from the Supreme Court today: If you like your health care subsidies, you can keep them. If you like limited government and the separation of powers, you are out of luck. “
The supreme court should always be referred to as the “LAWLESS COURT” from this day forward.
Might as well write everything.
Apparently the ones we voted for can’t do shit.
Essentially the Court blessed the Executive usurped power to rewrite laws and by extrapolation, to write new laws by simply keeping a law’s title and replacing all of the content. This at the same time that Congress is eagerly giving up its powers to the Executive. The Revolution has, in fact, happened. It is now left but to get rid of Kerensky and the “moderates.” Then the Reforming of society can shift into high gear.
Well, we are here. One Branch of Government.
Don’t think for a moment that Husseins 100 Czars have not been hard at work.
“Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become more corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters. ”
God will not save us from our government. He will save us from our life.
Obama, Franken, Roberts.
Without the IRS, Obamacare would not be possible.
I am at least glad that I never chose to look to the IRS for employment, even when I was out of almost all other options. I felt it was anti Constitutional and anti American, even when I was 21. Even though there was no Internet and I had no education in government or law, it did not take me much time to sit down and figure that out.
Now I think it might be time for someone in a position to make a change to help with a paradigm shift— a new Thomas Paine.
The rule of law is broken. All options are on the table now.
In preparation for that time, let the unfortunate boating accidents commence.
Right part of the anatomy. However, they prefer a different bathhouse act.
We have two branches of government writing laws, while the branch constitutionally responsible for writing laws asleep.
We’re so screwed. Pray that America wakes up. But I doubt it will happen before the collapse.
“Might as well write everything.
Apparently the ones we voted for can’t do shit.”
There is of course good reason for Congress to be tided into doing nothing most of the time. An active congress is after all a dangerous congress.
Obamadontcare and Scotusdontcare...about the Constitution.
I think it should be renamed ROBERTScare.
See how he likes HIS name on it.
Scalia (unknowingly?) identifies the real goal of the scheme in part II of the dissent: single payer gubmint health care. Between him and Thomas, two of the best minds on the current SCOTUS.
OOPS, part III of the dissent.
"Perhaps the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Actwill attain the enduring status of the Social Security Act or the Taft-Hartley Act; perhaps not. But this Court’s two decisions on the Act will surely be remembered through the years. The somersaults of statutory interpretation they have performed (“penalty” means tax, “further [Medicaid] payments to the State” means only incremental Medicaid payments to the State, “established by the State”means not established by the State) will be cited by litigants endlessly, to the confusion of honest jurisprudence.And the cases will publish forever the discouraging truth that the Supreme Court of the United States favors some laws over others, and is prepared to do whatever it takesto uphold and assist its favorites. I dissent."
I wish we could clone him.
Welcome to the New Socialist Caliphate of the Western Hemisphere.
Who the heck is ever going to want to go to trial in this country when judges can interpret statutes anyway they want ?
Seems like everyone writes our laws except for the people we elect to write the laws.
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