John Roberts Compromise of 2012

The Washington Post ^ | June 29, 2012 | Charles Lane

[centurion316]

The Supreme Court’s health-care ruling is welcome because it is a compromise. The justices overcame their differences, defusing political conflict and channeling it into the election where it belongs.

But the ruling is historic because it is a Compromise — a crisis-averting pact across lines of ideology, party and region, the likes of which we have not seen since pre-Civil War days.

Four of the court’s five Republican-appointed conservatives wanted to strike down the Democratic Party’s most cherished legislative achievement since the Great Society, dealing an election-year political blow to President Obama.

Their legal arguments were hardly specious, but they were novel enough to be plausibly branded partisan and opportunistic — possibly in a dissenting opinion by four liberal Democratic appointees on the court that would have become a de facto Obama campaign manifesto.

For Chief Justice John Roberts, the temptation to join the other four GOP appointees, consequences be damned, must have been strong. Surely this lifelong conservative has little use for “Obamacare.”

Yet he is also a student of history, especially pre-Civil War America; his intellectual biography of Daniel Webster won Harvard’s undergraduate writing prize in 1976. ...

Roberts grasped two realities. First: In a great national debate, no side has a monopoly on wisdom. Second: Conservatism has no future if the country slides into division and dysfunction.

And so, instead of standing on the legal principles articulated by his conservative brethren, Roberts sacrificed some of those precepts and persuaded some court liberals to reciprocate.

This was no capitulation. Roberts dealt from strength, holding four aces named Anthony Kennedy, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.

What emerged was less a legal opinion than a plan for national cohesion, on terms remarkably favorable to conservatives.

[philman_36]

And once again I go to the decision...
@National Federation of Independent Business v. SebeliusThe Affordable Care Act’s requirement that certain individuals pay a financial penalty for not obtaining health insurance may reasonably be characterized as a tax. Because the Constitution permits such a tax, it is not our role to forbid it, or to pass upon its wisdom or fairness.

According to this decision the penalty itself is a tax as well.
Disagree all you want, it's right there in black and white.

[NoLibZone]

Thanks you got it.

I’ll read it.

[philman_36]

This is a real "Damned if you do and damned if you don't" moment.

It's now a "Taxed if you do and taxed if you don't" moment.

[Monorprise]

“”But the ruling is historic because it is a Compromise — a crisis-averting pact across lines of ideology, party and region, the likes of which we have not seen since pre-Civil War days. “
So, the powers that be are betting on the fact that they have another 40 years to milk the American public...”

Ironically it is the same policy that ultimately lead to the first “Civil War” in the first place. Managing the divide with corrupt compromises only prolongs the hate and prevents resolution, while we get all the more pressed at one anthers throats.

Socialist demand the enslavement of men to other men where as Patriots demand their freedom. Obviously both demands are incompatible except when separated geographically and by separate governments. Under the same Government we cannot live in peace.

[Monorprise]

Your quite right, Conservationism in this “federation” has no future in compromise with lawless leftist. Much-less without a Constitutional(limited) government.

[Monorprise]

It was their power grabs over the current healthcare system is the cause of the present problems. Everything from forcing hospitals to give out free care(1986 COBRA), to subsiding health-insurance(disconnecting the health consequences with health choices)

[Freedom_Is_Not_Free]

John Roberts Betrayal of 2012

[Freedom_Is_Not_Free]

The bias in the Washington Compost is scathing.

Four of the court’s five Republican-appointed conservatives wanted to strike down the Democratic Party’s most cherished legislative achievement since the Great Society, dealing an election-year political blow to President Obama

Nope, you will never read in the Compost, "The courts four Democrat appointed liberals wanted to save the Democratic Party’s most cherished legislative achievement since the Great Society."

Or pointing out the partisan and opportunistic judicial activism of Ginberg and Breyer since they joined the court. But hey, Roberts got his attaboys and isn't that what this is about anyway?

The Washington Compost can suck my... thumb.

[Tallguy]

Yeah, and how did those pre-Civil War compromises work out in the long run? Uh huh! Kicking the proverbial can down the road just guarantees the loss of ever more blood & treasure when the conflict actually does begin.

[BuckeyeTexan]

FReepmail me to subscribe to or unsubscribe from the SCOTUS ping list.