Law Federal judge in Texas strikes down ObamaCare

[Quipling]

So why can a lower court rule against it again?

That's a big part of why the decision is getting flak. The judge is setting himself up to get slapped in the dick.

 

[Lead]

That's a big part of why the decision is getting flak. The judge is setting himself up to get slapped in the dick.

What normally would happen in that case? Like if the Supreme Court eventually didn't choose to hear it, wouldn't it still revert to their past ruling compared to his ruling? Isn't this just him trying to bring it back up for double jeopardy and hope it's ruled different now that the justices changed?

 

[Quipling]

What normally would happen in that case? Like if the Supreme Court eventually didn't choose to hear it, wouldn't it still revert to their past ruling compared to his ruling? Isn't this just him trying to bring it back up for double jeopardy and hope it's ruled different now that the justices changed?

What normally would happen in that case? Like if the Supreme Court eventually didn't choose to hear it, wouldn't it still revert to their past ruling compared to his ruling? Isn't this just him trying to bring it back up for double jeopardy and hope it's ruled different now that the justices changed?

So, he's trying to distinguish it. Ultimately, though, it is a ruling and it stands until overruled.

The Fifth Circuit can do that just fine.

If it were to go to SCOTUS, a likely outcome would be that they reverse without argument. They don't hear every case that they think is wrong. Sometimes they issue summary rulings upholding or vacating without hearing another argument on the same issue.

 

[Lead]

So, he's trying to distinguish it. Ultimately, though, it is a ruling and it stands until overruled.

The Fifth Circuit can do that just fine.

If it were to go to SCOTUS, a likely outcome would be that they reverse without argument. They don't hear every case that they think is wrong. Sometimes they issue summary rulings upholding or vacating without hearing another argument on the same issue.

Got it. Yea, it would make sense for the very next court to just say nah.

 

[EGarrett]

You're conflating the issue. Neither side in the ACA debate argue against the plenary congressional power to tax. Congress can pass pretty much any tax they want, so long as it isn't a penalty for unlawful conduct. THAT is the issue, whether the individual mandate was a tax or a penalty for unlawful conduct. Scalia in his dissent didn't even try to argue that Congress doesn't have the power to tax, because they do, so Scalia's dissent was based on the argument that Congress didn't pass the IM as a tax and the SCOTUS doesn't have the constitutional authority to enact taxes by judicially rewriting legislation -- which is what Roberts effectively did when he decided that it was a tax and not a penalty. That's not Roberts' decision to make because tax power was given to the House specifically because the House is the body most accountable to the people.

Scalia's dissent tells you everything you need to know about the tax issue. Some excerpts that can shed some light on the tax/penalty issue far greater than I ever could:

And this is the final overhand right that destroys Roberts' majority opinion:
https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/567/519/#tab-opinion-1970524

It seems like you might have been reading my first section and thinking that I was somehow proposing that as an argument instead of describing how despots (wannabe tyrants in government) try to argue to use taxation to control people. Because what you said afterward is the same thing I'm saying.

I didn't say congress didn't have the power to impose taxes, I said congress doesn't have the power to impose taxes as a penalty for certain types of behavior they disapprove of (and thus as a way to bypass Constitutional rights and the criminal justice system). Which is the same thing you said in your third sentence and the same thing Scalia was acknowledging in the first quote you used from him.

 

[kpt018]

This is it!!!!

 

[EGarrett]

If they can tax for medicare and tax for social security then they can tax to subsidize the ACA.

But, even with that tortured wording (which Gruber admitted was tortured) their taxation wasn't what was necessary to subsidize the ACA, it was to punish people for not buying health insurance. They outright admitted this, which is what got them in trouble.

 

[Cubo de Sangre]

But, even with that tortured wording (which Gruber admitted was tortured) their taxation wasn't what was necessary to subsidize the ACA, it was to punish people for not buying health insurance. They outright admitted this, which is what got them in trouble.

I didn't read it. What was necessary to subsidize the ACA, if not taxes?

 

[Prutfis]

Murcan healthcare, lol

 

[EGarrett]

I didn't read it. What was necessary to subsidize the ACA, if not taxes?

The purpose of the money they charged for not having health insurance was to penalize the person. They said this themselves.

You can go through the books and determine what would actually be needed to run a constitutionally-valid program and thus would be justified and whether the amount they try to charge reflects that (and whether they have the right to arbitrarily impose that cost on a select group of citizens), but you don't even need to. They stated outright that they did it to penalize people.

 

[Cubo de Sangre]

The purpose of the money they charged for not having health insurance was to penalize the person.

Like alcohol and tobacco taxes?

 

[palerider500]

That's a big part of why the decision is getting flak. The judge is setting himself up to get slapped in the dick.

Simple, because it is unconstitutional. Simple as that.

 

[Philo-Publius]

It should have never been allowed to stand in the first place. ALL laws that include a tax MUST start in the U.S. House of Representatives according to the U.S. Constitution.

Pro Tip: The Obamacare law started in the U.S. Senate. The Supreme Court ruled it was a tax. How they let it stand is mind boggling.

Because John Roberts was a closeted liberal, and a series of rulings (including this one) exposed him. Libs like to legislate from the bench because they hate the fucking constitution.

 

[Lord Coke]

That's a big part of why the decision is getting flak. The judge is setting himself up to get slapped in the dick.

What if the Judge is setting national injunctions from being slapped down and this is his way of stopping the San Fran judges?

 

[faustian]

That's a big part of why the decision is getting flak. The judge is setting himself up to get slapped in the dick.

The severability issue hasn’t been settled in any circumstance, much less the current circumstance

Seems like the early front runner is the argument that in 2017 Congress intended to sever the IM from the ACA

I just don’t see that argument holding up. The intent of the 2017 Congress doesn’t just automatically supersede anything and everything. Removing the IM from the equation means it now becomes a question of whether Congress can decide to arbitrarily meddle in cost shifting within a private industry, except without the IM Congress has no claim to tax power and a substantially weaker claim to an already weak claim to commerce power

 

[7437]

Because John Roberts was a closeted liberal, and a series of rulings (including this one) exposed him. Libs like to legislate from the bench because they hate the fucking constitution.

...... in a thread about a conservative judge overruling the legislature.

 

[hillelslovak87]

Murcan healthcare, lol

These conservatives reeeeeeally want to go back to the Hilary Clinton HMO racket. Must be really tough having to choose between Obama's signature policy and Hilary's. If only they had something better to provide that wasn't absurd and wouldn't lead to deaths and personal bankruptcies nationwide.

 

[Philo-Publius]

...... in a thread about a conservative judge overruling the legislature.

As a response to a statement made by the OP in the original post itself...

 

[EGarrett]

Like alcohol and tobacco taxes?

I addressed that already. They are unconstitutional, but they can't muster enough public outrage since they are vices, in the same way that certain population groups get shafted by the government because they can't get enough voters on their behalf.

Now, why don't you actually respond to the very clear argument I've said several times in this thread? Arbitrary, uneven and punitive "taxation" allows a government to completely sidestep the entire system of lawmaking, criminal justice, and even constitutional rights, by simply taxing any behavior they don't like at a trillion dollars and putting the desired group in jail for "tax avoidance?"

 

[Cubo de Sangre]

I guess you're in the mood to talk more idealistically, and I'm looking at it practically. SCOTUS ruled on the ACA. I'd place more faith in the thing about taxation needing to originate in the house and the ACA being produced by the senate. If that's true.