On this first of three days or oral arguments before the Supreme Court, the Obamacare lawyers appear to be taking a major beating from liberal and conservative USSC justices alike, over the Obamacare mandate. And they weren't even supposed to be dicussing the mandate at all, on this first day!
You may recall that, back before it was passed, the leftists were insisting that Obamacare would not introduce any new taxes. When people asked about these fines for nonparticipation, the leftists hastily assured everybody they were a penalty, not a tax. They repeated over and over that there were no new taxes in Obamacare. And they even wrote the bill that way, calling them "penalties", never "taxes". They managed to get just enough votes in Congress by persuading a few representatives and Senators that these were not, repeat not, taxes. The Congressmen believed them, and voted Yes.
Fast forward to 201x, and the first lawsuits hitting the courts. Nearly every state had people screaming about this unconstitutional program, and particularly about the mandate which forced you to either join or pay these penalties. A lot of people protested that the govt had no right to force people to buy insurance that way, or penalize them for NOT doing so.
The same leftists that assured us these were penalties (not taxes), now did a complete 180 and announced in court that they were taxes, not penalties. And since Congress clearly has the power to lay and collect taxes, Obamacare was completely constitutional, they told us (now). And they even used that same line in court, telling the District Court of Nothern Florida that Obamacare was constitutional because all these things were taxes, not penalties.
But then reality reared its ugly head. To the leftists' dismay, Judge Vinson actually read the law he was being asked to approve. And he noticed that, in stark contrasts to the leftists' assurance that Obamacare's fines were a "tax", they were described over and over in the law as "penalties". Judge Vinson insensitively declined to be persuaded by the leftists' pleas, and pointed out that while their pleas may be constitutional, the written law was not. And he struck down the mandate. (And also the rest of the scheme).
Today, those same leftists are trying to make the same arguments before the Supreme Court. And they seem to getting no farther with the Supremes, than they did with Judge Vinson. Apparently the Supremes also read the actual law. How rude of them. The Supreme Court justices (both the conservatives and the leftist justices) are giving the leftists' lawyers a pretty good beating over this point. Justice Alito even remarked to one of them, "General Verrilli, today you are arguing that the penalty is not a tax. Tomorrow you are going to be back and you will be arguing that the penalty is a tax. Has the Court ever held that something that is a tax for purposes of the taxing power under the Constitution is not a tax under the Anti-Injunction Act?"
It's gotten so crazy, that the leftist lawyers started twisting themselves into pretzel shapes, trying to have it both ways. One of them even started referring to the penalties as "tax penalties" at times, and "penalty taxes" at other times. I wish I were there to see it - it's getting to be a real three-ring circus in there.
And all this is BEFORE they are scheduled to discuss the mandate at all - that comes tomorrow!
