Posted on 06/28/2012 9:09:26 PM PDT by little jeremiah
....But while Roberts may have saved Obama's signature domestic legislation — and perhaps his reelection campaign — by siding with the court's liberal wing, he actually did it in spite of Obama, not because of him.
Roberts' opened his opinion today by declaring, unequivocally, that the individual mandate — which requires people to buy insurance or pay a penalty — is not constitutional under the Commerce Clause or the Necessary and Proper Clause. It's a direct shot at the Obama administration's defense of the law's constitutionality, which largely relied on those two clauses, which give Congress the power to regulate commerce and to enact provisions that are necessary to carry out its laws, respectively.
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(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
Liberals absolutely love John Roberts. He’s the new media lib plaything like John McCain.
Lipstick meets pig. Here, we may have a case of more lipstick than pig.
” The fate of Obama Care is now firmly in the hands of the electorate”
Considering the fact that this is the same electorate that put obama in office in the first place, that isn’t a comforting thought.
Curious why you didn't mention Kennedy, the author of the dissent.
That aside, Roberts and his liberal co-horts wrote new law into the ACA by calling a fine a tax.
Failed logic, there are 2 parts,
1. The individual mandate requires people to buy insurance
2. The penalty is to pay a tax
It was better when it was still a mere “penalty.”
Not since Roe v Wade has the SCOTUS screwed up so bad that countless lives have and will be destroyed.
Roberts is the devil.
There’s no fixing this on fine points, like whether a tax must go into effect to be challenged.
The libs won and they will quickly move on — to a new Constitutional Convention.
Mark my words.
Because the majority has declared it a tax bill, it now becomes immune to a filibuster. All that is required for repeal is a simple majority in both houses and the President's signature. The problem here will be whether Republicans will actually vote to repeal once they take control of the Senate in January.
Whatever. His actions killed us.
Try explaining this to all of the businesses that are going to have to close, all of the resulting unemployed and all of the bankrupted families who can't afford the "largest tax increase in the history of mankind".
F* him, he's killed us...
” Can’t he (Roberts) just come up with a straight, non-nuanced decision based upon the principles of the US Constitution? “
NO !!!! everything inside the boundry of DC is beyond corrupt
I’m sorry, LJ, but Roberts did not injure Obama at all today.
Today’s decision gave Obama ObamaCare. It also gave it to America.
Worse, the legislation was specifically written as a mandate, and in order to save it, Roberts said that it was written as a tax.
He created a fix out of clean air. That’s the worst that happened today. The Court is now on record with a precedent that if you can change a word or two in any legislation, then go ahead and do it. They should have changed the wording of the stolen valor act, too. They should have changed words in the Arizona law. But they didn’t.
They only changed words in the healthcare law.
Now WE are funding abortion.
“I will remember that it’s my job to call balls and strikes and not to pitch or bat.”
— John Roberts, 2005.
“I REFUSE TO PLAY ALONG”
all taxes are voluntary, Sheehan refuses to pay her taxes as an objector and hasn’t filed or paid since 2005 and is still out and walking around.
CJ Roberts applied two levels of criteria to decide whether or not the SCOTUS could review Obamacare as a “tax.” Limits imposed by Congress in laws, like the Anti-Injunction Act (AJA), are applied literally. Congress called it a “penalty,” but the AJA specifically applied only to a “tax.” Since it wasn't called a “tax,” the Anti-Injunction Act can't apply.
Constitutional limits, on the other hand, require a much higher level of analysis that cannot be restrained by simple legislative acts or terminology. If the constitution permits taxes on income, for example, anything that's effectively an income tax has to be treated (constitutionally) as such even if Congress calls it something else. I'm not saying CJ Roberts is right, it just appears he believes the constitution cuts to the heart of an issue, while law is taken at face value.
He makes the point it doesn't matter if Congress calls something a penalty if it more accurately fits the description of a tax. Alternately, something isn't a penalty if doesn't met the criteria of a penalty from previous rulings (regardless of what Congress calls it).
The four liberal justices didn't surprise. They ruled the Commerce Clause pretty much lets the federal government do anything. The four conservative justices also didn't surprise. They took Obamacare at face value. If Congress called the mandate a penalty, for example, the four justices treated it as such.
CJ Roberts seems driven by something that doesn't fall into either conservative or liberal definitions (trying to find the right words to describe him). He tried to determine whether the law's effect was constitutional and did not take it at face value like the other justices. That could work for us or against us depending on the case.
I think the mandate could be challenged again on the grounds that it's effectively an income tax (for constitutionality purposes), but it didn't originate in the House. I don't believe that particular issue was addressed. The dissenters treated it as a penalty, and the libs thought it was regulating commerce. Only CJ Roberts seemed keen on making it a tax, and he can't ignore the strict constitutional standards he's applied here if he's consistent.
BTW, Congress could have simply raised taxes and given a rebate for having private health insurance. Wouldn't that be constitutional? I think so. They haven't traditionally assigned tax increases for not doing something, but CJ Roberts is probably right Congress can do nearly anything it wants with income. As we know, The 16th Amendment is pretty broad.
Does anybody think ANY Democrat Senator, Congressman, or Obama will even want to be anywhere near the campaign trail this fall with this Tax Monster draped around their neck?
If the Pubbies don’t manage to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory yet again...we’re talking 70 senators!!!
Personally, I wouldn't have went through all the legal wranglings Robert did to try and determine constitutionality. I would have taken Congress at its word. In other words, they said the mandate was a penalty and treated it as such. However, I see Roberts’ point that previous SCOTUS rulings have defined certain elements that are required for something to be, in fact, a penalty, and that criteria doesn't fit the mandate.
Can Congress encourage certain behaviors by giving income tax breaks? Apparently it can. It certainly does. Could it do the opposite, assign a higher tax rate to someone for not doing something it wants? I'm trying to think of an instance like that, but I'm drawing a blank. Nevertheless, there's a very small distinction in my opinion between giving out tax breaks based on behavior and assigning tax increases for same.
That blasted 16th Amendment was written so poorly it pretty much allows the federal government to do whatever it wants with our incomes. I think we need some constitutional amendments to reign in the madness.
I decided today to revoke my pledge to never vote for Romney. I will hold my nose (and other parts) and vote for the wimp party, one more time. Obama and his (Obamacare) legacy MUST BE STOPPED!!!
Which would I prefer Obama nominated Supreme Court Justices or Romney nominated Supreme Court Justices?
Bush may have given us Roberts, but he also gave us Alito.
Would Obama give us an Alito?
Another such victory and we will be finished.
But that's no reason to celebrate, because the rest of the ruling says that they don't matter anyway, and that Congress has essentially unlimited power to compel anyone to do anything, as long as the noncompliance penalty is a "tax".
Congress can stop the decades-long "commerce clause" tap dance now and simply ram whatever they want through by making the penalties "taxes/fines" rather than jail time. But if you accumulate enough taxes that you can't pay them, what happens in the end anyway?
Who needs an "assault weapons ban"? We'll just levy a $10,000 annual tax on "assault weapons"! The ones who can afford to pay that are the ones we'd generally exempt anyway! You didn't separate your recyclables out of your trash? That's a $1,000 tax per offense. Every house is required to have solar panels, or pay $2,500 a year in extra tax.
And so on, and so on...
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