Individual Mandate Is Upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court; Obama's Affordable Healthcare Act Is Constitutional

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John Roberts, amirite?

Rotten666 on June 28, 2012 at 7:15 AM

Sounds like way less of a clusterfuck than expected.

Please, Jay Inslee, take this gift, run with it, don't fuck it up.

capicola on June 28, 2012 at 7:16 AM

What the wow the hey wow! That liveblog thingy's most recent line is "Chief Justice Roberts' vote saved the ACA". Whodathunkit?

gloomy gus on June 28, 2012 at 7:17 AM

I'll gladly and openly admit to being wrong on this. Take it, Tea Baggers! I just turned on Glenn Beck and he's going nuts. So - much - fun!

John Roberts?! Really? I knew there was a better chance of him than Kennedy, but still.

Can't wait for Limbaugh.

floater on June 28, 2012 at 7:21 AM

Beck and Limbaugh to commit suicide later today...we can hope can't we?

Cato the Younger Younger on June 28, 2012 at 7:23 AM

WOOT!!!

bobbelieu on June 28, 2012 at 7:25 AM

Thank you!!! What a victory!

Scalia must be going crazy.

Patricia Kayden on June 28, 2012 at 7:26 AM

Fuck this noise if a baby step like this Republican idea can barely squeak through like this. Grover nor quits has truly won. Let's work on this law until it is the equivalent of Medicare for everybody.

bozbozeman on June 28, 2012 at 7:27 AM

Amy Howe's recent post quoted the money paragraph:

Our precedent demonstrates that Congress had the power to impose the exaction in Section 5000A under the taxing power, and that Section 5000A need not be read to do more than impose a tax. This is sufficient to sustain it.

This has to be a joyous moment for Don Verrilli, the solicitor general who briefed and argued this and who caught such a HUGE RAFT OF SHIT for getting flustered when Kennedy was such a prick.

gloomy gus on June 28, 2012 at 7:28 AM

I'm shocked it took this much effort to find that "the Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes." I mean, it's only explicitly stated in Article I of the Constitution and a major reason for even creating the Constitution.

Goes to show the problem with being sneaky. Obama and Congress should have called the tax what it was, rather than hiding behind the weasel word "mandate." Although, I suspect it wouldn't have passed if they called it a tax. A very near miss indeed.

Medina on June 28, 2012 at 7:32 AM

Very unexpected good news. And I'm with Cato on this one today.

Matt from Denver on June 28, 2012 at 7:34 AM

Holy fuck. I'm actually flabbergasted.

mubhappy on June 28, 2012 at 7:35 AM

@11, I'd rather you weren't

Cato the Younger Younger on June 28, 2012 at 7:38 AM

I was unsure which would win out among the supremes, would their hatred of the big black menace or the chance to get all that new money into the hands of their insurance company friends win. Guess we should always bet on the money thing.

Jersey on June 28, 2012 at 7:38 AM

And who predicted this decision from the beginning?

JIM MC DERMOTT, that's who. So all you whiny little brats and you smarmy little prats who think Jim is just old and in the way can all go suck on something big.

on June 28, 2012 at 7:40 AM

And now my take on Family Feud:

"Romney says..."

floater on June 28, 2012 at 7:41 AM

@4: this establishes Roberts as solidly in the pocket of big business, so not SUCH a great surprise. Perhaps more so that he may not be in thrall of the foaming-at-the-mouth teabagger wing of the party.

emma's bee on June 28, 2012 at 7:43 AM

@ 13, tough shit, baby. Let's hug.

Matt from Denver on June 28, 2012 at 7:44 AM

Alright, the word I'm seeing elsewhere is that Roberts is doing this out of a desire to have his Court NOT be viewed as a partisan, 5-4 conservative majority Court. Thoughts? This theory is new to me, but apparently there's been some speculation about this.

Matt from Denver on June 28, 2012 at 7:48 AM

Great News for the Jay Inslee campaign - not only did Rob McKenna show his partisan colors and overstep this authority as AG in joining the lawsuit in the first place, he ended up being wrong in his legal arguments.

Gregoire's legacy as AG was a tobacco lawsuit settlement that benefited our entire state; McKenna's legacy as AG is as someone who played politics with his office and was on the losing side of the biggest court case of our generation.

SuperSteve on June 28, 2012 at 7:51 AM

Mitt Romney must be relieved. It would have been awkward for his campaign to have his greatest accomplishment as Governor of Massachusetts declared unconstitutional.

shabadoo on June 28, 2012 at 7:51 AM

Rob McKenna must apologize to the people of Washington State for his irresponsible behavior!!!

Pope Peabrain on June 28, 2012 at 7:56 AM

@19 I know this sounds silly and naïve, but maybe the guy who has spent all of his life getting ready to be a SCOTUS justice made a decision based on his understanding of the law?
He's been known to push for unanimous decisions, but to tip the scale is a whole different thing.

Sir Vic on June 28, 2012 at 7:58 AM

@20 Haha, Jay who? This makes no difference in the coming election. The people who are voting for McKenna don't give a shit about his role in bringing this to SCOTUS.

Rotten666 on June 28, 2012 at 7:58 AM

@19: That's a pretty sketchy reason to do this on such a huge bill. I think if that were the case he would have been much more likely to do it on the Arizona immigration debacle.

NateMan on June 28, 2012 at 7:59 AM

@19 Maybe. They are set for life and Scalia and Thomas don't give a damn what people think. But on the other hand, they're not having their names attached to an era of the Court. John Roberts might not want to end up being remembered as the Supreme Court's George W. Bush. Public opinion about his court is already pretty low as it is.

And did somebody on the left send out a memo regarding the spiking of the football? 'Cause if he or she did, I think it might have gotten lost in the pep rally.

floater on June 28, 2012 at 8:02 AM

Hey! I did forget about Rob McKenna! Now he has to face up to potential voters on the campaign trail as an awkward loser.

floater on June 28, 2012 at 8:06 AM

Yeah I think end of the day Roberts doesn't want to be remembered as a partisan hack.

Seattle14 on June 28, 2012 at 8:07 AM

I'm guessing Roberts has a conscience and the fact of depriving millions of Americans health care was too much to bear, regardless of his political views. I don't think he wanted to be the person people blamed when families went bankrupt or family members died without access to health care.

delirian on June 28, 2012 at 8:07 AM

@21

Great comment!

Patricia Kayden on June 28, 2012 at 8:22 AM

The court's still batshit.
Not finding it legal under the Commerce Clause? Really?
This is not a win; it's just a loss that has been delayed.

dirge on June 28, 2012 at 8:34 AM

Waiting for Seattleblues to post something angry and incoherent before seeing his shadow and retiring from SLOG for another six weeks.

venomlash on June 28, 2012 at 8:40 AM

The first step toward a single-payer healthcare system. I'm all for it.

Knat on June 28, 2012 at 8:46 AM

wow

Roberts is pretty damn clever.

this leaves ObamaCare as a HUGE issue to fire up the right.

but branding it a TAX is just fucking brilliant.....

on June 28, 2012 at 8:51 AM

As I skim the opinions, though, I don't see Roberts arguing that the TAX is okay, but the Commerce Clause reasoning is wrong -- he just says that, BECAUSE the tax is okay, the rest of it is moot. IANAL, etc, but really, it's just regular ol' English, mostly.

Catherwood on June 28, 2012 at 9:01 AM

Labeling a coercive penalty a tax is a stretch, if you ask me, but the important thing is that Obamacare survived and will extend the world's most expensive underinsurance to half of our >50 million uninsured at an additional cost of only >2% of GDP (~$300 billion) a year. Only 22,500 a year will die due to lack of health insurance instead of 45,000 a year. Only 465,000 a year will file for bankruptcy because of medical bills instead of 500,000 a year. Meanwhile, We'll be spending over 20% of GDP to provide the First World's least protective, least reliable health insurance to 91% of the population whilst the more expensive of our peer countries spend around 12% to provide first-class, prenatal-to-grave coverage to virtually 100% of their populations, with virtually no deaths from lack of insurance and virtually no medical bankruptcies. Hooray.

PCM on June 28, 2012 at 9:21 AM

@36, how do ya like them broccolis?

gloomy gus on June 28, 2012 at 9:24 AM

@37: http://i2.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/orig… http://thefunnycat.net/wp-content/upload… http://www.timyoung.net/contrast/images/…

venomlash on June 28, 2012 at 9:30 AM

The butthurt is so strong amongst the GOP trolls here that it did not even take five minutes before they started proclaiming this a victory.

The conservative parallel universe sure must be weird to live in.

Theodore Gorath on June 28, 2012 at 10:41 AM

@38:

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/1…

Theodore Gorath on June 28, 2012 at 10:45 AM

Usually when I get up and turn on the news and immediately start crying, it's because something horrible has happened.............

I have to admit, I was surprised that the ACA was upheld this morning. Surprised, and so, so proud. This is a historic day.

And... now I'm off to search the interwebs for nuggets of wisdom tossed by Republicans.. in response to FDR's country-destroying implentation of the Social Security network... That's right! What the Repugs say today has ALL BEEN SAID BEFORE - 80-some years ago!

Oh those silly Repugs... At least they're consistent!

merry on June 28, 2012 at 11:01 AM

@37, 40, those ruin me so!

gloomy gus on June 28, 2012 at 12:25 PM

Congratulations, the state can now mandate that you pay private for-profit companies for an intangible commodity and they are calling it a tax to do so. You did it.

Spindles on June 28, 2012 at 12:33 PM

@ 43 - You mean like WA state did a long time ago, requiring drivers to buy individual auto insurance from private companies?

merry on June 28, 2012 at 1:07 PM

@43 Harvard Law professor, Einer Elhauge, wrote:
[In] 1790, the first Congress, which was packed with framers, required all ship owners to provide medical insurance for seamen; in 1798, Congress also required seamen to buy hospital insurance for themselves. In 1792, Congress enacted a law mandating that all able-bodied citizens obtain a firearm. This history negates any claim that forcing the purchase of insurance or other products is unprecedented or contrary to any possible intention of the framers.

on June 28, 2012 at 2:24 PM

Jesus Christ and J.P. Patches on a unicycle, Eli's out to sea on this one.

John Roberts is a 100% corporate, Chamber of Commerce-approved, mafia choirboy Chief Justice. There was no way the ACA was getting repealed - insurance corporations paid good money for that legislation.

Q: Have any of the cheerleaders on this thread observed Romneycare firsthand? It was/is shyte insurance for top dollar, forced down the throats of those who can least afford it. This is the insurance industry's wet dream gone nationwide. Cancel all that noise about "working on" and "improving" Obamacare. Now the insurance industry will shift to defense, stifling any/all complaints; bend over and get out your checkbooks, America.

Stay tuned for folks a-goin' postal over insurance extortion.

Che Guava on June 28, 2012 at 3:23 PM

Individual Mandate Is Upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court; Obama's Affordable Healthcare Act Is Constitutional

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