Thread: How Will Supreme Court Rule on Obamacare Mandate Provision

Originally Posted by astralis

the wonders of personal leave...although why i spend it online, perhaps i'll never know.

ah...

either way, it IS relatively toothless. people who don't have tax refunds can blithely ignore the law. i'd imagine the number of people who DO get tax refunds but DON'T have insurance and also DON'T WANT insurance is a rather small pool.

Eric, come on. You know how it is inside the Beltway. First you build a Trojan horse. Then you take over. Right now they are estimating that only 4 million people will opt to pay the tax penalty from their refunds rather than carry insurance (a bargain at $690 in the 1st year). All the other violators who don't get refunds will receive an IRS assessment, which as yet cannot be enforced. But you know how it goes. Sooner or later Congress will get tough on people who ignore those assessments and give the IRS the tools to collect them. So until then we're still going to have a lot of freeloaders. Wasn't the ACHA supposed to end that?

JAD,

Eric, come on. You know how it is inside the Beltway. First you build a Trojan horse. Then you take over. Right now they are estimating that only 4 million people will opt to pay the tax penalty from their refunds rather than carry insurance (a bargain at $690 in the 1st year). All the other violators who don't get refunds will receive an IRS assessment, which as yet cannot be enforced. But you know how it goes. Sooner or later Congress will get tough on people who ignore those assessments and give the IRS the tools to collect them. So until then we're still going to have a lot of freeloaders. Wasn't the ACHA supposed to end that?

so what are you more worried about: the fact that freeloaders are getting away or the potential that they will be punished later?

frankly, my assessment still stands: as written, it's toothless. preferably i'd like to see the law evolve so that people who can afford insurance but go without get hit with a penalty that doesn't just involve a refund deduction. no, i don't believe people should go to jail for not having insurance; on the other hand, they had better be prepared to pay a greater tax, which you can either call incentive to get insurance, or less kindly, something that will at least help cover part of their almost inevitable medical expenses later.

tax evasion, of course, is a different matter.

i fully agree with you that the way it's written now was meant to make initial passage easier, but that's also DC for you. i don't mind dinging obama for it, because he said he'd change this-- heck, i think he should be dinged for not being straight-up with the american people and just call it a tax to begin with.

but i also don't think this is going to be the "gateway drug" into, gasp, single-payer.

Here is a conservative reaction that might interest folks. Don't really know the guy, but I agree with some of his takes. A lot of his fellow conservative commentators are taking a harder line. Fox is running half-half. Limbaugh has already ruptured several arteries over Roberts.

I’m Not Down on John Roberts

Erick Erickson (editor of Redstate blog)
Thursday, June 28th at 11:35AM EDT

Having gone through the opinion, I am not going to beat up on John Roberts. I am disappointed, but I want to make a few points.

First, I get the strong sense from a few anecdotal stories about Roberts over the past few months and the way he has written this opinion that he very, very much was concerned about keeping the Supreme Court above the partisan fray and damaging the reputation of the Court long term. It seems to me the left was smart to make a full frontal assault on the Court as it persuaded Roberts.

Second, in writing his case, Roberts forces everyone to deal with the issue as a political, not a legal issue. In the past twenty years, Republicans have punted a number of issues to the Supreme Court asking the Court to save us from ourselves. They can’t do that with Roberts. They tried with McCain-Feingold, which was originally upheld. This case is a timely reminder to the GOP that five votes are not a sure thing.

Third, while Roberts has expanded the taxation power, which I don’t really think is a massive expansion from what it was, Roberts has curtailed the commerce clause as an avenue for Congressional overreach. In so doing, he has affirmed the Democrats are massive taxers. In fact, I would argue that this may prevent future mandates in that no one is going to go around campaigning on new massive tax increases. On the upside, I guess we can tax the hell out of abortion now. Likewise, in a 7 to 2 decision, the Court shows a strong majority still recognize the concept of federalism and the restrains of Congress in forcing states to adhere to the whims of the federal government.

Fourth, in forcing us to deal with this politically, the Democrats are going to have a hard time running to November claiming the American people need to vote for them to preserve Obamacare. It remains deeply, deeply unpopular with the American people. If they want to make a vote for them a vote for keeping a massive tax increase, let them try.

Fifth, the decision totally removes a growing left-wing talking point that suddenly they must vote for Obama because of judges. The Supreme Court as a November issue is gone.

Finally, while I am not down on John Roberts like many of you are today, i will be very down on Congressional Republicans if they do not now try to shut down the individual mandate. Force the Democrats on the record about the mandate. Defund Obamacare. This now, by necessity, is a political fight and the GOP sure as hell should fight.

60% of Americans agree with them on the issue. And guess what? The Democrats have been saying for a while that individual pieces of Obamacare are quite popular. With John Roberts’ opinion, the repeal fight takes place on GOP turf, not Democrat turf. The all or nothing repeal has always been better ground for the GOP and now John Roberts has forced everyone onto that ground. Oh, and as I mentioned earlier, because John Roberts concluded it was a tax, the Democrats cannot filibuster its repeal because of the same reconciliation procedure the Democrats used to pass it.

It seems very, very clear to me in reviewing John Roberts’ decision that he is playing a much longer game than us and can afford to with a life tenure. And he probably just handed Mitt Romney the White House.

Originally Posted by astralis

JAD,



so what are you more worried about: the fact that freeloaders are getting away or the potential that they will be punished later?

Let say the AHCA sticks, then I'd be worried about freeloaders.

frankly, my assessment still stands: as written, it's toothless. preferably i'd like to see the law evolve so that people who can afford insurance but go without get hit with a penalty that doesn't just involve a refund deduction. no, i don't believe people should go to jail for not having insurance; on the other hand, they had better be prepared to pay a greater tax, which you can either call incentive to get insurance, or less kindly, something that will at least help cover part of their almost inevitable medical expenses later.

tax evasion, of course, is a different matter.

Your next statement answers my question and more.

i fully agree with you that the way it's written now was meant to make initial passage easier, but that's also DC for you. i don't mind dinging obama for it, because he said he'd change this-- heck, i think he should be dinged for not being straight-up with the american people and just call it a tax to begin with.

but i also don't think this is going to be the "gateway drug" into, gasp, single-payer.

Originally Posted by astralis

the wonders of personal leave...although why i spend it online, perhaps i'll never know.



yes, that's why it's called a mandate.

either way, it IS relatively toothless. people who don't have tax refunds can blithely ignore the law. i'd imagine the number of people who DO get tax refunds but DON'T have insurance and also DON'T WANT insurance is a rather small pool.

Smells to me like someone wants to be "just a little" pregnant for a few months.

-dale