The Supreme Court announces that they upheld Obamacare/ more correctly known as the Affordable Health Care Act! Hooray!
In the context that it is a gift to see ourselves as others see us, I'm going to turn to the Guardian in the UK for our 'Obamacare' news. They have an excellent continuing update here that refreshes every 60 seconds, and they also provide excellent analysis -- which it is sad to say, is often better than their American counterparts,:
you can follow that coverage with additional updates, analyses and other coverage HERE.
Supreme court ruling on healthcare law – live coverage
The US supreme court rules today on the fate of President Obama's healthcare reforms – follow live coverage here
10.21am: In the detail: the supreme court appears to have also redefined the commerce clause and tightened its use. The clause's power has been trimmed by the court in recent decision, but this is another attempt to box it in further.
10.20am: Here's the key quote to maintain the individual mandate as constitutional, from Roberts's opinion:
10.17am: Once again, this is a long, complex and multi-layered decision by the supreme court, and the voting may have differed on different points – so take nothing for granted.
But it appears that John Roberts joined the liberal wing in upholding the healthcare law and individual mandate. This is significant in itself and news that will sink the US conservative movement into deep gloom.
10.16am: Wow: it appears that the so-called swing vote on the court, Anthony Kennedy, actually joined Scalia, Alito and Thomas in voting against the law – and that Chief Justice Roberts voted to uphold.
Now there's a turn-up for the books.
10.15am: Opinion seems to be that the Affordable Care Act has been upheld – but there's a lot of detail in there, so more as it comes.
10.12am: So the individual mandate appears to have survived as constitutional, not under the commerce clause but as a tax, and that Chief Justice Roberts has joined the "liberal" wing of the court on the issue.
More important news: the Medicaid expansion is slighty limited but not invalidated by the decision. The devil is in the details but if that's broadly the case that's another big win for the administration.
No news on votes or dissents yet.
10.10am: As suggested earlier – this is a complex decision, so it's worth waiting to see what the whole decision reads.
It appears that the individual mandate may survive as a tax – but that may need further Congressional action.
More as we get it.
10.08am: Hold on – while Roberts appears to have invalidated the individual mandate under the commerce clause, ScotusBlog is saying the mandate has survived as a tax. Let's wait and see how this plays out.
10.07am: Here we go: Chief Justice John Roberts is reading the decision on healthcare law now – so that means he wrote the decision – and the mandate fails under the commerce clause.
More as we get it.
10.02am: The court has published its first decision, but it's about something else involving the first amendment. Oh it's the Stolen Valor act – which bans people falsely claiming they have won military honours (surprisingly common in the US, for some reason).
Anyway, it's unconstitutional but Congress can redraft it. Apparently it's not illegal to lie. Thomas, Scalia and Alito all dissent.
10am: While we are waiting, here's a nice photo of the supreme court justices.
The justices of the US Supreme Court, front row (L-R): Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, chief justice John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Back row (L-R): Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito and Elena Kagan. Photograph: Tim Sloan/AFP/Getty Images
They all have a great health insurance deal.
9.55am: Five minutes to go. There's a tiny but non-negligible chance that the court will punt on the whole issue, thanks to the Anti-Injunction Act that holds that taxes cannot be challenged in court until they are first levied. Which hasn't happened yet. But it's not likely.
But if the court did, that would be really bad for everyone's health.
9.49am: Fifteen minutes to go – and when the healthcare rulings come, it's likely to be a complex one with many layers and possibly multiple dissents – as the Arizona immigration ruling on Monday showed – so beware of over-caffinated responses declaring victory for one side or the other.
The fate of the individual mandate is only one aspect, although it's obviously the biggest one. Another, perhaps more far reaching in constitutional terms, is how the court redefines the commerce clause that the government is using to justify the mandate.
And then there's the so-called Medicare expansion issue, offering healthcare coverage to an additional 16 million people but from which some states are asking the court to allow them to opt out. That alone could be even more significant than a decision on the individual mandate.
9.40am: In all the political excitement over today's ruling, let's not forget what's at stake: the nearly 50 million Americans without health insurance.
9.35am: In the event of the supreme court upholding the Affordable Care Act, how will the Republicans react? After the apoplexy has faded, here's what Speaker of the House John Boehner said yesterday:
In the context that it is a gift to see ourselves as others see us, I'm going to turn to the Guardian in the UK for our 'Obamacare' news. They have an excellent continuing update here that refreshes every 60 seconds, and they also provide excellent analysis -- which it is sad to say, is often better than their American counterparts,:
you can follow that coverage with additional updates, analyses and other coverage HERE.
Supreme court ruling on healthcare law – live coverage
The US supreme court rules today on the fate of President Obama's healthcare reforms – follow live coverage here
10.21am: In the detail: the supreme court appears to have also redefined the commerce clause and tightened its use. The clause's power has been trimmed by the court in recent decision, but this is another attempt to box it in further.
10.20am: Here's the key quote to maintain the individual mandate as constitutional, from Roberts's opinion:
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.That's clear, right? Me neither.
10.17am: Once again, this is a long, complex and multi-layered decision by the supreme court, and the voting may have differed on different points – so take nothing for granted.
But it appears that John Roberts joined the liberal wing in upholding the healthcare law and individual mandate. This is significant in itself and news that will sink the US conservative movement into deep gloom.
10.16am: Wow: it appears that the so-called swing vote on the court, Anthony Kennedy, actually joined Scalia, Alito and Thomas in voting against the law – and that Chief Justice Roberts voted to uphold.
Now there's a turn-up for the books.
10.15am: Opinion seems to be that the Affordable Care Act has been upheld – but there's a lot of detail in there, so more as it comes.
10.12am: So the individual mandate appears to have survived as constitutional, not under the commerce clause but as a tax, and that Chief Justice Roberts has joined the "liberal" wing of the court on the issue.
More important news: the Medicaid expansion is slighty limited but not invalidated by the decision. The devil is in the details but if that's broadly the case that's another big win for the administration.
No news on votes or dissents yet.
10.10am: As suggested earlier – this is a complex decision, so it's worth waiting to see what the whole decision reads.
It appears that the individual mandate may survive as a tax – but that may need further Congressional action.
More as we get it.
10.08am: Hold on – while Roberts appears to have invalidated the individual mandate under the commerce clause, ScotusBlog is saying the mandate has survived as a tax. Let's wait and see how this plays out.
10.07am: Here we go: Chief Justice John Roberts is reading the decision on healthcare law now – so that means he wrote the decision – and the mandate fails under the commerce clause.
More as we get it.
10.02am: The court has published its first decision, but it's about something else involving the first amendment. Oh it's the Stolen Valor act – which bans people falsely claiming they have won military honours (surprisingly common in the US, for some reason).
Anyway, it's unconstitutional but Congress can redraft it. Apparently it's not illegal to lie. Thomas, Scalia and Alito all dissent.
10am: While we are waiting, here's a nice photo of the supreme court justices.
The justices of the US Supreme Court, front row (L-R): Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, chief justice John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Back row (L-R): Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito and Elena Kagan. Photograph: Tim Sloan/AFP/Getty Images
They all have a great health insurance deal.
9.55am: Five minutes to go. There's a tiny but non-negligible chance that the court will punt on the whole issue, thanks to the Anti-Injunction Act that holds that taxes cannot be challenged in court until they are first levied. Which hasn't happened yet. But it's not likely.
But if the court did, that would be really bad for everyone's health.
9.49am: Fifteen minutes to go – and when the healthcare rulings come, it's likely to be a complex one with many layers and possibly multiple dissents – as the Arizona immigration ruling on Monday showed – so beware of over-caffinated responses declaring victory for one side or the other.
The fate of the individual mandate is only one aspect, although it's obviously the biggest one. Another, perhaps more far reaching in constitutional terms, is how the court redefines the commerce clause that the government is using to justify the mandate.
And then there's the so-called Medicare expansion issue, offering healthcare coverage to an additional 16 million people but from which some states are asking the court to allow them to opt out. That alone could be even more significant than a decision on the individual mandate.
9.40am: In all the political excitement over today's ruling, let's not forget what's at stake: the nearly 50 million Americans without health insurance.
9.35am: In the event of the supreme court upholding the Affordable Care Act, how will the Republicans react? After the apoplexy has faded, here's what Speaker of the House John Boehner said yesterday:
If the court does not strike down the entire law, the House will move to repeal what's left of it.
All I have to say to Speaker Boehner is, "Go ahead and try to repeal it. That's what you SAID you were going to do following the 2010 election, why haven't you done so to this point?"
ReplyDeleteThe obvious answer is the same one as the one for why President Obama couldn't get the kind of health care reform we need, and instead passed the Romney individual mandate plan from Massachusetts, specifically, because we are a two party system, represneting the interests and veiws of ALL of us, not just the right-wing extremist tea-baggers.
Incidentally the plan just upheald is the same plan many Republicans stomped and yelled SHOULD be what was done, right up until Obama embraced it. They didn't complain about it being unconstitutional then, and Roberts only complaint about it's constitutionality (and Kennedy's) was that the FEDERAL government can't force someone to buy a certain product under the Interstate Commerce Clause, not that NO government could do so, in short, states can, Massachusetts did, so claiming it was tyranny is poppycock, it simply was something the Republicans hated because it was done by Obama and the Democrats. If it had been passed by Bush they'd have defended it to the death.
That said, I don't like this bill and never have, it's a band-aid on a geyser.
That said, all you Republicans who PROFESSED to know whether this was constitutional were W-R-O-N-G with a capital W-R-O-N and G. Perhaps you should wait for the decision before pretending to know the law. Perhaps also you should recognize that it is far better to work from a civil plank and stance, than to preach division and contempt. Perhaps, but I'll not hold my breath waiting for you to do so.
Hello Dog Gone,
ReplyDeleteWell I had to boot up as soon as I got home from work and stop to say, “Hooray for the Working Middle Class Today!” We have not won many here of late but we won this one TODAY!!
You are correct because what was passed was what the Republican’s proposed when they were railing against “Hillary Clinton Health Care in the 1990’s!!
Now Lets Head Toward The November Election With This One Under Our Belt and Take This Country Back From Corporate Stooge Romney and the Rest of the BOUGHT AND SOLD Republicans!!
Engineer of Knowledge has nailed the BIG issue this November ...
DeleteHouse Republicans already have voted 30 times to eliminate, defund or scale back parts or all of the health-care law, most recently passing a measure to repeal a 2.3 percent tax on medical devices set to take effect in January using fear-mongering claims of job losses (after the vote industry monitors acknowledge claims were unjustified and now that the ruling has now been called by Wall Street a long-term boom for the industry.
What businesses want is certainty ... what families want is certainty ... the law has been ruled constitutional by the Supreme Court (although that is not good enough for Rand Paul who said : “Just because a couple people on the Supreme Court declare something to be ‘constitutional’ does not make it so. The whole thing remains unconstitutional,” the freshman lawmaker said in a statement. “While the court may have erroneously come to the conclusion that the law is allowable, it certainly does nothing to make this mandate or government takeover of our health care right.”)
So, voters need to go to the polls and vote to implement the law or vote to delay it ... and as long as we are discussing delays, remember that wannabe President Romney wants to delay taxpayers from participating in Medicare coverage until the age of 67.
Just read your commentary on Life Imitating Stephen Cobert which made me wonder how many Tweets went out announcing the ruling only to be wrong ... oh, wait a second, IMO the Most Powerful Woman in the House did tweet : “#UNCONSTITUTIONAL: #SCOTUS overturns #Obamacare's individual insurance #mandate.” and then had to delete the tweet once she realized that it was actually ruled Constitutional.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the the key quote to maintain the individual mandate as constitutional, from Roberts's opinion:
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.
That's clear, right? Me neither.
Actually, the SC did what the MN-Supreme Court did with Pawlenty's "cigarette fee is not a tax" argument ... yes it is
Likewise a requirement that you pay a penalty if you do not have health insurance is not a requirement that you purchase health insurance, it is a requirement that you pay a fee (or tax) - and actually, it will be cheaper for older citizens that do not want to pay for a policy, to pay the tax - but then again they do not get any of the benefits afforded by the Act.
But the best reaction came from Michele Bachmann ... I heard Representative Bachmann on WCCO's Chad Hartmann program essentially complaining of Judicial Activism ... which is surprising since the People's Legislature enacted the law that was properly approved by the Executive and now confirmed by the third branch ... how is that Judicial Activism ?
BTW ... I see that Raymond Cravaack recognized that this is just another reason to encourage people to donate money to him ... of course, that should be a good reason to encourage people to participate in this election ... under a Romney Presidency, new Supreme Court justices (as well as lower courts) would now be held to a new litmus test (as well as the previous concerning Roe-v-Wade).