However, they can "tax" the hell out of you if you drive a combustion engine car instead of an Obama Motors Voltswagen.
I like it.
Dumbass Roberts could have killed the monster today saying the mandate was unconstitutional because it was not passed by Congress as a tax. He would have made the exact same points as he is “credited” with making today *and* killed ObamaCare at the same time.
I dont’ get it.
The whole reason why obamacare existed in the first place was because the CBO could prove obamacare was a deficit reduction program. Right?
so now that we redefine it as a tax and we take away the fed’s ability to force states to comply...it can’t possibly STILL be a deficit reducing program can it? Is it now nullified if it is deficit expanding? Or what?
bump
I trust Scalia’s judgement on this. Roberts isn’t worthy to shine Scalia’s shoes.
“This is critical. His ruling means Congress can’t compel American citizens to purchase anything. Ever.”
Wait.... What?
I guess I’m pretty dense - I thought we lost?
Thanks for the link.
As somebody who’s been trying to sort through “what was Roberts thinking?” all day, and who has always had respect for him, even if I didn’t agree with every ruling...this is the kind of outcome I’d love to see.
While I’m still shell shocked and not sure what his exact intention was, all that really matters is the result and its impact on the ability to get rid of both Obamacare and Obama.
Wow! It will be interesting what the states that fought to stay out of the mandate do now. That just may have been a genius move for Roberts. If all the states that fought it stay out of it the bill may be dead any way.
Oh BFD!! Who CARES? - Roberts could have ruled that as any part of his ruling, and STILL ruled that the mandate was unconstitutional!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yes, that discretion is virtually unlimited!
too much wishful thinking.. He took the cowards way out and it will go down in history as one of the worst decisions in the history of the court.
This could have been ended but he punted and in effect, legislated from the bench making law out of thin air to make it work.
Quit drinking this statist Flavor-aid. Roberts could have chosen to side with Alito, Thomas, Kennedy, and Scalia to destroy the power grab, but chose Ginsburg, Kagan, Sotomayer, and Breyer side in rearranging the “penalty” plus keeping all the regulations intact. The "Mediscare" provision was a given but Roberts expanded Congress' power by calling the fine/penalty a tax and foolishly running with it.
I can't believe people on this website are buying the spoiled milk Roberts is trying to sell. In the words of Scalia in regards to the tax explanation from Solicitor General Verrilli, "Extraordinary".
If we were not dealing with Chicago mafia I might bite. But the silly argument that the state can opt out of the medicare provisions is plain nuts. The Won will simply issue an EO telling the dept of transportation to suspend all federal hwy dollars to that state. As to the argument that Roberts gutted the Commerce Clause “go to” route of congress, why in the world did it have to be done in this round robin way? There was a direct plain and simple way that was clearly not taken.
I’ve been saying this all day. The Roberts decision is probably a blessing in disguise, because now it forces Obozo to run for re-election defending a HUGELY unpopular tax increase for all.
It may end up being more of a gift to the GOP and Romney than an outright tossing out would have. Now all we have to hope is Romney and the party don’t manage to screw it up.
Why do they even need the commerce clause to screw us over when they can just screw us over this way? It’s just a legal fiction. Bottom line is they get to screw us over with Obamacare.
Listen to Mark Levin’s take on the ruling.
http://marklevinshow.com/Article.asp?id=2484259&spid=32364
Best analysis I have heard or read all day.
If one actually reads the decision, one will see Roberts twisting himself into pretzels trying to rationalize his rewriting of PPACA from a penalty into a tax. The bill says at least eight times the mandate is a penalty as opposed to a tax.
He obviously decided he wasn’t game for the heat he would take for a 5-4 decision and stretched for some way to uphold the statue. The tax pretzel was what he came up with.
There are no dots to connect. The supreme court abdicated its judicial review role in this case. Starts at that dot and ends there too.
All this “deep strategy” stuff reminds me of when conservatives interpreted every dumb thing Karl Rove did as some deep game that would, but did not, turn out for the good. It’s too clever by far. All it does is rationalize a big defeat delivered by a friend.
Interesting take.But the 4 Constitutionalists agreed that the whole shebang was unconstitutional on it’s face.
Hmmm