[SoFloFreeper]

I wish they’d just whacked it, but I do respect Clarence Thomas...if he thinks this is the way to go, then I will defer.

I am encouraged this was not a ruling on the law as written—and I do believe we must continue to work to repeal this pile of Obamacare. The law is dung, and must be treated as dung—thrown out.

[Alberta's Child]

Good perspective. One of the most fundamental principles of civil law is that you have no standing to pursue a legal challenge unless you can demonstrate that you were harmed in some way. You can’t file a lawsuit to challenge a hunting or fishing regulation, for example, if you don’t hunt or fish.

[semimojo]

...I do respect Clarence Thomas...if he thinks this is the way to go, then I will defer.

JUSTICE THOMAS, concurring.

There is much to commend JUSTICE ALITO’s account of “our epic Affordable Care Act trilogy.” Post, at 1 (dissenting opinion). This Court has gone to great lengths to rescue the Act from its own text. Post, at 1–2. So have the Act’s defenders, who argued in first instance that the individual coverage mandate is the Act’s linchpin, yet now, in an about-face, contend that it is just a throwaway sentence.

But, whatever the Act’s dubious history in this Court, we must assess the current suit on its own terms. And, here, there is a fundamental problem with the arguments advanced by the plaintiffs in attacking the Act—they have not identified any unlawful action that has injured them. Ante, at 5, 11, 14–16. Today’s result is thus not the consequence of the Court once again rescuing the Act, but rather of us adjudicating the particular claims the plaintiffs chose to bring.

“

Kind of says it all.

[AnotherUnixGeek]

I wish they’d just whacked it, but I do respect Clarence Thomas...if he thinks this is the way to go, then I will defer.

I am disappointed by this latest cave-in, but I also respect Thomas and I know he knows a lot more about the law than I do. If he voted this way, there must have been a good reason.