My short take for Politico on the King case.
The Supreme Court has finally spoken. It never really needed to speak at all. The Court’s 6-3 decision to uphold federal subsidies under the Affordable Care Act was simple and emphatic, written by Chief Justice Roberts, no less. Justice Antonin Scalia’s dyspeptic dissent indicates the extent of the administration’s legal victory. Stock prices for the Hospital Corporation of America jumped approximately 8 percent with this decision, providing some sense of the economic havoc that might otherwise have ensued.
I’m gratified by the outcome. But I remain saddened by the full history of this case….
More here.
It’s a shame that the best health policy minds in both parties spent many months battling over this preposterous thing. We could have been trying to make better policy. IBy tethering themselves to King and then suffering a comprehensive legal defeat, conservatives ironically set back their own efforts while further embedding ACA within the fabric of American life.
MF_Blog_1957 says
I had thought the first argument against Obamacare to reach the Supreme Court was the most cynical nonsense of the past 100 years to reach the Court. Then, there is King v. Burrell which was Cuckooland cynicalness, and it received three dyspeptic, irrational tirades posing as dissents which embraced the Cuckooland argument. We are indeed in constitutional hysteria driven by the Twin Towers of perpetual adolescents: cynical Republicans who just want to deny any policy "victory" to the "other side" and the Business Libertarians.
AnBheal says
I think there's a Third Tower, of Elephant In The Living Room proportions…..ever notice how the President is black? And how Obamacare might provide some healthcare to black people? Remember that old quote: "ain't no Southern cracker so dirt-poor that he won't steal food from his baby's mouth and give it to a banker, so long as he's assured none of it will go to a nigger". That's a big part of this, and of all American politics since 1865.