If you have been following the King v. Burwell case then you know that a pretty important decision regarding the Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare, will be released very soon – maybe even on Monday or Tuesday of next week. Do we have any clues as to which way the decision will go?
The decision has already been made
Realize that for a decision to be announced in the next week or two, the judges have already ruled. Right now they (or their staff) are busy finishing up their summaries. The opinion and supporting documents and case law have to be carefully checked and rechecked, and the judges that didn’t agree with the decision have to research and write their dissent. There is probably also government overhead and red tape. Once all of that is ready the Chief Justice will schedule the release of their ruling based on a lot of factors – one of which is the desire not to step on the toes of other big decisions. This gives the press and the public the time to absorb the decisions and to be sufficiently impressed with the Court’s brilliance.
But the longer a decision remains secret, the greater the chances that it will leak out. And with this administration, probably the most corrupt ever, smart money is on the fact that Obama and his allies already knows how the court has ruled.
I could be wrong, but…
On Monday, June 15, President Obama said the following: “This should be an easy case. Frankly, it probably shouldn’t even have been taken up.” Then the next day, Tuesday, June 16, Harry Reid said almost the same thing – “The Supreme Court shouldn’t have taken up this case.”
If we assume that Obama already knows the court’s decision, the logical conclusion is that he doesn’t agree with it. Why else go out of his way to undermine the court? If the Supremes had ruled in his favor the best course would have been not to comment at all. Or perhaps say something like “Well, we’ll just have to wait and see what the Supreme Court says.”
If the Supreme Court has in fact ruled against the subsidies, the first thing to realize is that millions of people will not suddenly lose their coverage – they may simply be forced into a less expensive plan that they can afford on their own. But I don’t even think that will happen. I believe that many of the Republicans actually are afraid of getting the ruling the majority of Americans want because it means they will have to put up or shut up on Obamacare.
Republicans talk every chance they get about repealing the Affordable Care Act. Remember? They said originally there was nothing they could do because they didn’t have a majority in either chamber. Then WE gave them the House of Representatives. So they said they couldn’t do anything because they didn’t have the Senate. So WE gave them the Senate. They had the opportunity to cut off funding for much of the program but they backed down. They are running out of excuses and WE are running out of patience.
I expect them to do the same thing in this case – if the court hands down a ruling that deals a body shot to Obamacare I am sadly convinced that the Republicans will step in to fix it. And WE will be stuck with this disaster until the government takeover of healthcare is complete. Then it will be too late to do anything.
Well, this article was obviously wrong…