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I think a lot of the talking heads were completely wrong in their predictions of what the Supremes would do. I can state that now, since hindsight is 20-20.

I'm personally glad since I've been trying to figure out my healthcare options if I retire early in a few years. It's good to know recision and pre-existing conditions won't keep me from purchasing insurance.

For those who believe in market based solutions - hopefully the market will drive prices down. If a company charges too much, people will shop around... like they do for car insurance.

Victory for my side! ;)

I always had a good feeling that the Surpreme Court would uphold Obama Care.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. on Thursday joined the liberal wing of the Supreme Court to save the heart of President Obama’s landmark health-care law, agreeing that the requirement for nearly all Americans to secure health insurance is permissible under Congress’s taxing authority.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/s...

Roberts wrote that the portion of the health-care law that expands Medicaid “violates the Constitution by threatening existing Medicaid funding.”

On the Medicaid expansion provision, the states that will choose not to expand Medicaid will likely be Red States like Mississipi. Tough luck for the non-college educated, low-income folks there who lack insurance. They'll know which side to vote for the next time around.

I just wish the supreme court wasn't so polarized and becoming so liberal vs. conservative. It's suppose to determine constitutionality not ideals of political minds (with 5-4 decisions based on the politics of the person you were appointed by).

The reality is now it's not an individual mandate at all and instead it's a tax on people for not buying something. I don't like the prescience it sets where it's giving taxing authority for something you don't purchase.

How it's a tax? If you have insurance from your employer then this law will not affect you. If you are self employed and decide not to buy insurance, you want a free ride when you end up in a hospital and declare bankruptcy?

Do you buy car insurance?

In this case, I do admire the Court's prescience in dealing with the needs of society.

The law didn't change. It's still the same mandate it was before the decision. Judge Roberts (and concurring judges Kagen, Sotomayor, Bryer and Ginsburg) agreed with the less strongly argued case, that Congress has the power to tax, instead of the more strongly argued case for the powers granted under the commerce clause. The legal claim upheld does nothing to change the law. It's still the same mandate as it was before the decision. (Though Grover Norquist might hate it even more now.)

It's a tax because that's what made it constitutional. The same is true of social security, it's a tax also so there's no guarantee that you'll get anything from the system. EMTALA of 1986 is law that made it a requirement for hospitals to provide care regardless of ability to pay. It survived constitutionality on the premise that if you take medicare tax dollars than government could regulate your business.

My comment was based on the constitutionality, not whether it's right health care system or the wrong one. Health care is a contentious issue.

Everybody is probably going to need health care at some point in their life but most of us want somebody else to pay the high cost of having the best services on demand. Health "insurance" should cover the unexpected, the accidents, the random cancer early in a person's life, not standard things that happen when you get old.

This law does nothing to change the escalating costs of health care.

I think this decision is a good compromise:
- It upheld the basic law. Given the divisions in Congress and the stupid expansion of the filibuster, it would have been impossible to make any health care laws if this one was struck down
- It didn't use the commerce clause to uphold the law. Doing so would have noticeably widened a part of of the constitution that's already being grossly abused to reduce states' rights
- If red states don't want to accept government money to pay for the health of poor people, that's unfortunate, but they're basically just letting Washington keep money that would otherwise go to their state economy. I suspect in the long run, most states will either take the money or suffer.

Exactly.

I don't see how this decision is polarizing. The Court deferred to Congress and let the law that Congress passed stand.

In this case the Court stayed out of "judicial activism" and left politics to the politicians. Roberts did the right thing.

Now we all know why Scalia was ranting like a nutcase on Monday.
http://www.salon.com/2012/06/25/antonin_...

I'm mildly surprised there wasn't a single curse word in Scalia's dissent. He has jumped the shark.

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/en...

Brian: Yup, it definitely is a victory for Obama and he sorely needed some good news, especially after the month he had.

However, the GOP will make hay of this, too. Romney raised $1MM in 3 hours following the ruling, when he called for repeal.

I think the GOP would have been more hurt by Obamacare being overturned than the Dems. Now, the GOP can campaign against ACA, even though I believe the chances of repeal are nil.

SK: Yeah, for a devout Catholic, that boy has a mouth on him. And, he ordinarily seems so sane...

If you don't purchase a house using a mortgage, you don't get the tax breaks. So that's a case where doing nothing /buying nothing means more tax.

Our tax code is full of moral decisions: Kids are good, mortgages are good, yada yada yada. In this case congress said "buying health insurance is good".

And did you really mean prescience - are you saying the supreme court can see the future? That's both scary and exciting at the same time.
(I assume you meant precedence.)

As far as the partisan nature of the court - in this case Roberts *didn't* vote in a partisan fashion. Are you saying you wish he had? Or are you complaining about the 8's predictable votes?

I think this will be good for folks with an entrepreneurial spirit. Even if they have a pre-existing condition, they can leave their corporate health insurance next week. They can go into business for themselves... spurring the economy, creating jobs. (Next week will be 18 months till 1/1/14... so Cobra can tide them over till the pre-existing condition part goes into effect.)
No longer will people be tied to employers *just* for healthcare. This is huge!

I think we can all agree Roberts threw everyone a curve ball. People were thinking Kennedy would be the swing vote, and he didn't seem very sympathetic in questions.
I actually think the Supremes handed Republican House members seeking re-election a gift. Not so much Romney; he implemented RomneyCare and has been flopping like a fish on the issue since the mandate became unpopular. But a lot of House Republicans will be able to make "Repeal ObamaCare" their *only* platform plank and get re-elected on it.

I agree, UCGal, but have you checked the price of COBRA lately? It is typically more per month than your employer even pays for your plan and can be VERY cost-prohibitive, depending on what kind of a plan you have at work. If you currently have a PPO, you may find that an HMO offered by your employer is all you afford at COBRA rates.

18 months at $600-$800 mo (for the ex-employee ONLY) is enough incentive to keep working, IMHO, at least until 2014.

Individual plans can cost less than COBRA, but until 2014, the carriers of these plans are allowed to underwrite them upon application and price them accordingly.

I'm pretty sure we've been through this before. The cost charged for COBRA (for most employees) can only exceed what the employer pays for the coverage by 2% for administrative costs.

Arizona victory, health care victory... it's shaping up to be good for Obama.

Obama will be in the history books pretty much forever.

Funny how we see thing differently.

Campaigning against something might work with the fervent base, but it's an uphill battle with the general electorate.

On the other hand, campaigning for something is always more positive.

I think that Obama's reelection prospects just looked brighter.

I think that poorgradstudent has it right. His analysis is always very even handed and realistic.

It can only be a small percentage (2%) over what the full cost is.
If you had a large employer - they get cheaper rates through economy of scale. If you had a small employer - your overall rates were higher. In that case it might be cheaper to shop around. Assuming no pre-existing conditions.

Trust me - I pay attention not just to the employee rates (subsidized) but the cobra rates - it's how I know my employer has been steadily increasing the employee paid percentage of the overall cost. With my large employer the cost of Kaiser Permanente (the cheapest option - even cheaper that the High Ded. plan... so the one I'm on) is about 20% via cobra than what KP quotes online. Assuming my family would even qualify... my husband has had knee surgery, is on a staten drug, etc... my son has an all all which might be considered a pre-existing condition.

My best friend is the poster child for a healthy person with a boatload of pre-existing conditions. She had scoleosis and a fused spine. She had a congenital condition with her kidney as a child. She's got an auto-immune condition that flares up a bit - similar to lupis. She had to turn down a job with a start up because it did not offer insurance. (Small company - everyone else got insurance through their spouse.) When she was laid off - she had to take a job in a grocery store bakery for insurance, while consulting as a programmer to pay her mortgage. Pre existing conditions are a HUGE deal if you have them. They literally impact where you work in order to get insurance.

Growing up, I always imagined conservative, religious people as well-dressed, well-behaved educated people who behave perfectly all the time.

Now, I know better. Conservatives tend to be the ranting and raving kinds full of personal flaws. Liberals are more composed, well-spoken and well-behaved. Think professorial Obama vs. ranting Gingrich. Compare and contrast Stephen Breyer to Antonin Scalia.

Brian Brian Brian. What am I gonna do with you?

Conservatives look and talk just like liberals. They just tend to be a little whiter, a little more likely to have a penis, and they smoke less dope.

Have to say I'm happy with the SC today too. I was not wanting Obamacare to pass on the commerce clause, but I'm perfectly happy with the way it did pass.

Obamacare is not perfect, it's definitely not my idea of the perfect healthcare legislation, but I think it is a long shot better than what we had before.

I'm an independent, and I have to tell you the Republicans are alienating me more and more with their BS. Romney, *their candidate*, passed this same stuff in his state! The individual mandate was the brainchild of the Republican Heritage Foundation! Yet they seem so outraged at "Obama"'s plan...

To top it off, they hold the Holder vote on the same day...ya think that's coincidence? Makes me ill...

He is the only SCOTUS member who has ever scared me. This man should not be on the SC. He's not balanced. I don't have the slightest inclination to believe he can be a fair judge.

The 7-8 predictable votes. Where any kind of relatively 50-50 legislation is a 5-4 vote. Things should either be constitutional or not most decisions should be 9-0 maybe 7-2 We have a mechanism to amend the constitution if it's truly something the people want. The problem is our 2 party system has succeeded at dividing us down the middle on silly stuff like God guns and gays and there's no room for a good decision where a constitutional amendment would succeed. People just want to be on the winning side instead of the good decision side.

Maybe the ACA is a good law but when half like it half don't like it and 99% don't really know how it really affects them it's scary how adamant people get about it.

$600 - $800 would be about the mo premium for standard PPO coverage working for a small business of under 50 employees (the vast majority of law firms are small businesses). I know larger firms pay premiums which are significantly less than that (in exchange for more insureds).

UCGal, if you lose your job before your kids reach 18 (or 23 if they are FT college students) and it turns out to be too expensive to insure them thru COBRA, they should be able to get individual coverage for $90-$110 mo ea. This is of course barring anything serious such as being childhood cancer survivors, asthmatic or diabetic, etc.

If they qualify for "Healthy Families" thru the state, the premium is about $37-$54 mo ea ... free if the parent(s) are on TANF or any kind of gov't disability.

The biggest reason I'm glad it was upheld?

I'm going to a big party in a few days that will be filled with Republicans. I was not looking forward to their gloating if it had been struck down.

I'm certainly not going to gloat, so maybe this topic will be discussed little if at all...at least I can hope that is true.

SK: I'm willing to put up with a lot of insults, but that dope crack was too much!

I went to an arch-conservative Catholic HS where the motto was, "There ain't no hope without dope!" If it weren't for the weed, dude, I'd be in San Quentin right now.

For reals.

You must hate tax deductions then.

You did't buy a house? You get taxed a lil harder.

They may smoke less dope but they do more meth.

Not sure that we all look and talk the same.

Last weekend I was in University City at UPenn in Philadelphia. I had dinner at the Vientiane Cafe and all the customers there were young, thin and fairly attractive. That day, everyone was White. I bet they were well-educated and liberal leaning also.

Real capitalists (as some conservatives here have called them), such as those who work at Google, Facebook, Apple, etc.. tend to be liberal also.

In the 80s, preppies were conservatives, but today the science and computer savvy yuppies tend to be liberal.

What's the image of the typical conservative that comes to mind?

This is all in good fun and I hope we can look at ourselves and have a good laugh. I'm perfectly fine with being perceived as a tree hugging, tofu eating, late sipping, iPhone carrying, Mini-Cooper driving metrosexual.

I remember being in the Hotel Adlon on the Unter den Linden in Berlin in 1936. All the patrons were young, thin, attractive and steeped in the culture that gave us Schiller, Goethe, Bach and Beethoven. They all looked resplendent in their SS, SD and Wehrmacht uniforms.

Interestingly, they all had strong opinions on how to handle the "undesirables" (you know, those that don't look, act or think like us) and were also all ardent believers in the "triumph of the will."

At some point, it all becomes a distinction without difference. Personally, I don't want everyone to look, act or think the same. Vive la difference as your French compatriots would say, Brian. I know you believe that your heart's in the right place, but your beliefs are your business and mine are mine and the gubment has NO BUSINESS in either.