[Servant of the Cross]

Donning the flame suit.

[newfreep]

Than just repeal this “tax”....

[C. Edmund Wright]

I hated this article - queasy thesis, wrong conclusion. He connected some dots correctly, but whiffed on a bunch.

[Kozak]

If in fact it’s a tax, and the bill originated in the Senate, then it’s unconstitutional.

[Dr. Sivana]

Even if it IS a tax, you can’t be taxed for breathing. No “vindication” for a bad decision.

[demshateGod]

Gene Schwimmer and John Roberts are both Rat Dhimmis. The legislation was not a tax and is not a tax.

[Liz]

Clearly---Gruber was handed the Marxist dream plan FIRST. Then Obama bribed money-hungry Gruber w/ $400,000 hefty tax dollars to invent a healthcare model so that he, and lock-stepping Dems, could sell it to gullible Americans.

==============================================

THE GOVT CONSPIRACY UP-CLOSE:

<><> At a July 23, 2009 town hall, Obama described the healthcare conspiracy thusly----he explained that the "Cadillac tax" (invented by Gruber) was intended to target health plans that spend unnecessarily and excessively, thus driving up health care costs (such as the $25,000 healthcare union benefit).... "that's a lot more expensive and a lot fancier than the one that even members of Congress get, " Marxist Obama griped.....rushing to the defense of Big Govt.

<><> By 2018, the colluders had decided to switch gears----lock-stepper Gruber was saying just the opposite. That those who object to the Cadillac tax (those dratted Republicans) will be obligated to figure out how to come up with the trillion dollars that repealing the tax will take from the U.S. Treasury, or risk significantly adding to the national debt....exactly what Obama told voters in 2009 he had "taken off the table."....

================================================

REALITY CHECK: The Cadillac tax was part of the Obama/Gruber/Big Govt conspiracy designed: (1) to destroy insurance companies......targets of Progressive unending hatred, and, (2) to deny end-of-life care to the elderly......deplored by Progressive Marxists.

===========================================

Progressive Democrat Gruber achieved every single one of the odious Marxist dicta. The preening, duplicitous Gruber---the embodiment of cockamamie far-left thinking---believed it was his moral duty to lie, deceive and collude w/ the US govt......so that these revolting ideas could be imposed on "sub-mental defectives' taking up valuable space in their Utopian America.

Loyal foot-soldier Gruber, in obeisance to the Marxist dream, invented mechanisms to serve Obama's Marxist obsession w/ wealth transfer---as candidate Obama told Joe the Plumber---his plan was to redistribute the wealth:

(1) throwing Americans off affordable health plans
while assuring them they could "keep their plans,"

(2) nationalizing 1/6 of the US economy,

3) installing IPAB's (healthcare rationing),

(4) decimating intergenerational transfers of wealth a longtime Progressive bugaboo;
via Obamacare, grandma/pa's holdings go to the govt---not to you,

(5) pulling $750 billion out of Medicare (another Progressive irritant---giving the elderly healthcare),

(6) drug-rationing---death panels,

(8) outright abandoning seniors and the chronically ill,

(9) transferring wealth from healthy young Americans to subsidize healthcare for others.

Obama organized Democrats into a high-stepping cheerleading squad to force the Progressive Poison down the throats of recalcitrant Americans.

=============================================

Vladimir Lenin / 1945 pamphlet

“Socialized Medicine is the Keystone to the Arch of the Socialist State.”

[Servant of the Cross]

< intellect on; emotion off>

If SCOTUS had declared 0bamcare Unconstitutional in June 2012, hell would have been unleashed by the media and democRATS 24/7. The Left's base would have been energized beyond belief, literally frothing at the mouth. It would have been Citizens United on steroids ... (visual aid below)

And we would not have had the following events occur ....

* a TRAINWRECK of a website launch
* a vindication of religious freedom and the First Amendment in Hobby Lobby
* the REALITY of this piece of legislative garbage was neither Affordable nor Caring (DEATH PANELS)
* a running parody of the "if you like your health plan, you can keep your health plan ...."
etc. etc.

THIS WAY, the completely unConstitutional and unAmerican piece of garbage collapsed of its own making. The people saw it for the lies that it was and its proponents as the liars they are.

If it had been declared dead by SCOTUS in 2012, the liberal left would have made it a rallying cry and a cause for which they would die for. It would have been like the Roe v Wade decision, a never ending battle.

By allowing it to survive a very temporary Constitutional challenge in 2012, the Dread Pirate John Roberts truly put a stake in its heart forever.

[Old Sarge]

How does this “vindicate” Roberts?

The fact is, Roberts declared an unconstitutional tax (the Jizyah) as law of the land - because the Chicago Way priomised his kids would be deported if he didn’t.

[9YearLurker]

If it was, for Constitutional purposes a tax, then the bill needed to have originated in the House in order to be Constitutional.

My recollection is that it wasn’t.

[Iron Munro]

In the first Obamacare decision, Roberts folded up for Obama like a $2.00 yard sale lawn chair.

The smart money says he will do it again.

After all - Obama and Holder still have the blackmail evidence and aren’t afraid to use it.

[Travis McGee]

[pgyanke]

To be a tax or not to be a tax is not the biggest issue. John Roberts agreed that the Federal Government has the authority to compel free citizens to enter into private contracts. That is the bigger picture everyone ignores.

[dfwgator]

So? He still voted for it. The rest is irrelevant.

[fruser1]

“The IRS will hold back the amount of the fee from any future tax refunds. There are no liens, levies, or criminal penalties for failing to pay the fee.”

Is anyone sure this is entirely correct? The organization that withholds refunds is the Financial Management Service. This office can withhold refunds from any federal payment to a recipient.

So if you don’t have a refund to snatch up, they can also withhold it from future social security payments.

So if you try to get away with things by not doing insurance and structuring your taxes so you don’t get a refund (have to send a check every year), are you just racking up fines and interest that will ultimately taken from SS?

[VRWC For Truth]

Juan Roberts should be impeached.

[Political Junkie Too]

No vindication here.

Even if it is a tax, there cannot be a precedent set where Congress gets around the politics of passing a tax increase by lying that it's not a tax, only to have the courts later -- after it's passed -- rule to be, in fact, a tax.

The point is moot. The dirty deed is already done. The law is passed that otherwise might not have.

-PJ

[randita]

“This bill was written in a tortured way to make sure CBO did not score the mandate as taxes.”

Because it wouldn't have passed. Nelson, Landrieu and one or two others as well as some Blue Dogs in the House would not have signed on to a bill that openly raised taxes. It was worded to give those members cover when they voted for it.

[rollo tomasi]

What kind of "tax" is this, direct, income, or excise? Remember, "No capitation, or other direct, tax shall be laid, unless in proportion to the census or enumeration herein before directed to be taken."

Amendment XVI does not apply since this "tax"/penalty does not originate from income, just a refusal to purchase a good or service. "The 16th Amendment must be construed in connection with the taxing clauses of the original Constitution and the effect attributed to them before the Amendment was adopted." Eisner v. Macomber (1920)

Direct = goes against Article I S. 9. (Roberts avoided this issue especially tackling the enumerated "apportioned"/proportion aspect) Excise = some type of action that needs to occur, doing nothing and being "taxed" expands Article I S. 8 to perverted levels.

Roberts, if he claims this is a tax, has just given Congress the power to tax an individual for just existing along with the power to force the individual to purchase goods or services at the government's command. Read the Constitution/case law, I don't see anything that gives Congress the right to tax an individual based on "conscious continuity" or forces them to buy "anything".

The Founders would have probably tarred and feathered someone attempting to introduce a Negative Tax just for the pleasure of existing after coming off a Revolution for control of their colonies partly over taxation policies. Pro tip, head/poll taxes were instituted so that you could vote, which means an action "charged" for back in the day.

If this ACA penalty is not dead in the water, I figure someone who his forced to pay this "tax" will have a lot of merit for an appeal.

[Savage Beast]

Nonsense.

It merely proves that Roberts is one of the stupid Americans Gruber was talking about.

[TBP]

Roberts had to twist and rewrite the law to make it “constitutional”, even though he knew better.

If you’re fined for an offense, such as speeding or hiring an illegal alien, is that a tax or a penalty? Well, the Obamacare penalty is the same thing as that.