As usual, it all rests on Kennedy. If he votes to shoot it down, that frees the Dems to vote as they think best. But they will certainly vote in Obamacare’s favor, especially on the severability issue, if Kennedy does.
The fact that they are all asking questions may be serious, or it may just be political cover. They wouldn’t want to destroy the country unless they appeared to examine all the issues very carefully.
All this depends upon the mercurical thinking of Justice Kennedy. We still don’t know how he might rule, he himself may not know, or even have his thoughts sufficiently organized to make up his mind.
In any instance, we shall not know until perhaps June, when the final opinion is handed down.
There is always the tactic of resorting to silent boycott and intransigent responses to any application of the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act” should the provisions be held, if not Constitutional in the original sense of the term, at not not entirely incompatible with some loose interpretations under the interstate commerce clause.
But wait a minute here - a possible opportunity just passed. The belief is, that the penalties imposed under the provisions of the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act” are a tax, and therefore cannot be contested until they actually apply. But there is the other interpretation, that these penalties are NOT a tax, but rather like payment of a fine, as for a traffic ticket. Nobody, even in the wildest of interpretations, would term such a fine as a “tax”.
So why does the analogy not apply here?
Massive resistance by NOT paying the imposed penalties. Let them try to collect. Is it still a “tax” then?