Telling Quotes and Links From Today's Obamacare Hearings in the SCOTUS

[BluePhantom]

Well I have listened to the full audio and read the transcript. Links are:

Audio

Text

It's always dangerous to project the court's opinion, but there are some very telling statements I want to quote below. Now I am only going to quote Justices Kennedy, Roberts, and Scalia because they are the three the liberals and MSM are praying to God will vote to uphold Obamacare. The rest are kind of written in stone: Thomas and Alito will vote to strike it down, while Justices Kagan, Sotomayer, Breyer, and Ginsburg will vote to uphold it.

Based on these quotes I would say that Obamacare is in very, very deep trouble.

Justice Kennedy

"Could you help -- help me with this. Assume for the moment -- you may disagree. Assume for the moment that this is unprecedented, this is a step beyond what our cases have allowed, the affirmative duty to act to go into commerce. If that is so, do you not have a heavy burden of justification?I understand that we must presume laws are constitutional, but, even so, when you are changing the relation of the individual to the government in this, what we can stipulate is, I think, a unique way, do you not have a heavy burden of justification to show authorization under the Constitution?"​

​

"But the reason, the reason this is concerning is because it requires the individual to do an affirmative act. In the law of torts, our tradition, our law has been that you don't have the duty to rescue someone if that person is in danger. The blind man is walking in front of a car and you do not have a duty to stop him, absent some relation between you. And there is some severe moral criticisms of that rule, but that's generally the rule. And here the government is saying that the Federal Government has a duty to tell the individual citizen that it must act, and that is different from what we have in previous cases, and that changes the relationship of the Federal Government to the individual in a very fundamental way."​

​

Justice Scalia

"Wait. That's -- it's both "Necessary and Proper." What you just said addresses what's necessary. Yes, has to be reasonably adapted. Necessary does not mean essential, just reasonably adapted. But in addition to being necessary, it has to be proper. And we've held in two cases that something that was reasonably adapted was not proper, because it violated the sovereignty of the States, which was implicit in the constitutional structure. The argument here is that this also is -- may be necessary, but it's not proper, because it violates an equally evident principle in the Constitution, which is that the Federal Government is not supposed to be a government that has all powers; that it's supposed to be a government of limited powers. And that's what all this questioning has been about. What -- what is left? If the government can do this, what -- what else can it not do?"​

​

"JUSTICE SCALIA: You're saying that all the discussion we had earlier about how this is one big uniform scheme and the Commerce Clause, blah, blah, blah, it really doesn't matter. This is a tax and the Federal Government could simply have said, without all of the rest of this legislation, could simply have said, everybody who doesn't buy health insurance at a certain age will be taxed so much money, right?

GENERAL VERRILLI: It -- it used its powers together to solve the problem of the market not -

JUSTICE SCALIA: Yes, but you didn't need that.

GENERAL VERRILLI -- providing affordable coverage -

JUSTICE SCALIA: You didn't need that. If it's a tax, it's only -- raising money is enough.

GENERAL VERRILLI: It is justifiable under its tax power.

JUSTICE SCALIA: Okay. Extraordinary."​

"Oh, no, it's not. They all involved commerce. There was no doubt that what was being regulated was commerce. And here you're regulating somebody who isn't covered. By the way, I don't agree with you that the relevant market here is health care. You're not regulating health care. You're regulating insurance. It's the insurance market that you're addressing and you're saying that some people who are not in it must be in it, and that's -- that's different from regulating in any manner commerce that already exists out there."​

Chief Justice Roberts

"The key in Lochner is that we were talking about regulation of the States, right, and the States are not limited to enumerated powers. The Federal Government is. And it seems to me it's an entirely different question when you ask yourself whether or not there are going to be limits on the Federal power, as opposed to limits on the States, which was the issue in Lochner."​

"Right. Right. That's exactly right, but it doesn't seem responsive to my concern that there's no reason -- once we say this is within Congress's commerce power, there's no reason other than our own arbitrary judgment to say all they can regulate is the method of payment. They can regulate other things that affect this now-conceded interstate market in health care in which everybody participates."​

"But what I'm concerned about is, once we accept the principle that everybody is in this market, I don't see why Congress's power is limited to regulating the method of payment and doesn't include as it does in any other area. What other area have we said Congress can regulate this market but only with respect to prices, but only with respect to means of travel? No. Once you're -- once you're in the interstate commerce and can regulate it, pretty much all bets are off."​

"CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Is your argument limited to insurance or means of paying for health care?

GENERAL VERRILLI: Yes. It's limited to insurance.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Well, now, why is that? Congress could -- once you -- once you establish that you have a market for health care, I would suppose Congress's power under the Commerce Clause meant they had a broad scope in terms of how they regulate that market. And it would be -- it would be going back to Lochner if we were put in the position of saying, no, you can use your commerce power to regulate insurance, but you can't use your commerce power to regulate this market in other ways. I think that would be a very significant intrusion by the Court into Congress's power. So, I don't see how we can accept your -*it's good for you in this case to say, oh, it's just insurance. But once we say that there is a market and Congress can require people to participate in it, as some would say, or as you would say, that people are already participating in it, it seems to me that we can't say there are limitations on what Congress can do under its commerce power, just like in any other area -*given significant deference that we accord to Congress in this area, all bets are off, and you could regulate that market in any rational way.

GENERAL VERRILLI: But this is insurance as a method of payment for health care services. And that

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Exactly. You're worried -

GENERAL VERRILLI: And that's -

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: That's the area that Congress has chosen to regulate. There's this health care market. Everybody's in it. So, we can regulate it, and we're going to look at a particular serious problem, which is how people pay for it. But next year, they can decide everybody's in this market; we're going to look at a different problem now, and this is how we're going to regulate it. And we can compel people to do things -- purchase insurance, in this case; something else in the next case -- because you've -- we've accepted the argument that this is a market in which everybody participates."​

 

[LockeJaw]

Well let's hope it's not just a smoke screen. All we can do is hope these justices understand what is at stake here.

 

[TakeAStepBack]

Good observations. I've heard it swing both ways in the breeze, if you will from many. We'll have to wait and see what happens.

 

[AquaAthena]

Well let's hope it's not just a smoke screen. All we can do is hope these justices understand what is at stake here.

June will be a long time coming before a decision is handed down. Then again, it will be here before we know it. And so will November.....

 

[BluePhantom]

Well let's hope it's not just a smoke screen. All we can do is hope these justices understand what is at stake here.

June will be a long time coming before a decision is handed down. Then again, it will be here before we know it. And so will November.....

Well you know I am kind of a SCOTUS junkie. It's my favorite branch of government. i think it's the most important and most powerful branch of government...I am an admitted member (a proud member) of the Antonin Scalia Fan Club. I have listened to a lot of SCOTUS audio arguments and I can tell you this. Very rarely do oral arguments ever really sway the justices. They pretty much have their minds made up before they ever walk into the courtroom and oral arguments are really more of a public forum wherein the justices blow the shit out of the other justices' arguments through the lawyers arguing the case.

So for example during the first hour of today's arguments when Obama's lawyer, Verrilli, was arguing what we saw was Kennedy, Scalia, Roberts, and Alito blasting the heck out of him while Breyer, Kagan, Sotomayer, and Ginsburg were tossing him "life preservers" through their questions. During the next hour we saw the opposite. So it's like they argue amongst themselves through the lawyers.

We saw a real good example of this today actually. During the end of Clement's arguments (representing the states opposition to Obamacare) Justice Sotomayer asked a question which she really thought was a killer (starting on page 77 of the transcript I believe) when she said:

"But that's exactly what Justice Marshall said in Gibbons. He said that it is the power to regulate; the power like all others vested in Congress is complete in itself, may be exercised to its utmost extent, and acknowledges no limitations other than those prescribed in the Constitution. But there is no conscription in the -- set forth in the Constitution with respect to regulating commerce."​

Well this was a major opportunity because she is killing herself with her own argument, but Clement didn't seize upon it because Breyer had just peppered him a moment before and it seemed like Clement was getting the two questions jumbled up and he was goig to miss the opportunity and bungle the answer to Breyer's question. What you saw was Roberts and Scalia, demand that he answer those questions one at a time because both of them knew that Sotomayer had just fucked up and Breyer's question at the very least had opportunity for their side and Roberts and Scalia wanted it read into the record.

So the reality is that it's a done deal one way or the other. The justices know how they are going to vote. They just have to go through the process of getting it on the record and from what we have seen in their approach, my guess is that Obamacare is in its death throes.

 

[BluePhantom]

BTW...Clements' arguments were absolutely fantastic. If there was any question in Kennedy's mind prior to today's arguments there won't be anymore

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Soty believes that the commerce clause allows Congress the power to regulate all human activity

 

[BluePhantom]

Soty believes that the commerce clause allows Congress the power to regulate all human activity

well Breyer clearly agrees. So does Kagan. Judging by the comments asked by Ginsburg I think she is more focused upon where her next can of Ensure is coming from, but be that as it may....no surprise there. This is yet another argument for why we must elect Romney over Obama. There will be a SCOTUS replacement in the next four years and it had better be a conservative justice or we're fucked.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

Based on these quotes I would say that Obamacare is in very, very deep trouble.

WE are in very deep trouble.

I don't think there is any doubt that the SCOTUS will find against the Affordable Care Act. Or at least, the usual suspects will. Anybody who believes this is a fair hearing is just plain stupid.

I'll be honest in that I have been enjoying the savings because of the parts that are already in force and it pisses me off to know that these fat cats who are so fucking crooked will be finding against the American people and that I will have to pay more because of them.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

Soty believes that the commerce clause allows Congress the power to regulate all human activity

well Breyer clearly agrees. So does Kagan. Judging by the comments asked by Ginsburg I think she is more focused upon where her next can of Ensure is coming from, but be that as it may....no surprise there. This is yet another argument for why we must elect Romney over Obama. There will be a SCOTUS replacement in the next four years and it had better be a conservative justice or we're fucked.

If you were really a SCOTUS junkie, you would never say anything THIS utterly stupid. Seriously, you have no friggin clue.

 

[BluePhantom]

I don't think there is any doubt that the SCOTUS will find against the Affordable Care Act. Or at least, the usual suspects will. Anybody who believes this is a fair hearing is just plain stupid.

Are you suggesting that because it appears that there will be five justices who feel this law is unconstitutional that it's not a fair hearing?

 

[J.E.D]

I'd say this is a pretty telling quote from Kennedy that shows he's open to the gov't's argument:

And the government tells us that's because the insurance market is unique. And in the next case, it'll say the next market is unique. But I think it is true that if most questions in life are matters of degree, in the insurance and health care world, both markets -- stipulate two markets -- the young person who is uninsured is uniquely proximately very close to affecting the rates of insurance and the costs of providing medical care in a way that is not true in other industries. That's my concern in this case.

 

[jillian]

I don't think there is any doubt that the SCOTUS will find against the Affordable Care Act. Or at least, the usual suspects will. Anybody who believes this is a fair hearing is just plain stupid.

Are you suggesting that because it appears that there will be five justices who feel this law is unconstitutional that it's not a fair hearing?

i think this court can't afford another 5 to 4 hearing that cuts on partisan grounds.

a fair hearing would mean they uphold precedent.

 

[BluePhantom]

I'd say this is a pretty telling quote from Kennedy that shows he's open to the gov't's argument:

And the government tells us that's because the insurance market is unique. And in the next case, it'll say the next market is unique. But I think it is true that if most questions in life are matters of degree, in the insurance and health care world, both markets -- stipulate two markets -- the young person who is uninsured is uniquely proximately very close to affecting the rates of insurance and the costs of providing medical care in a way that is not true in other industries. That's my concern in this case.

Yeah i caught that comment and that comment is the only reason why I am saying this is not a complete slam dunk. But I think on the whole Kennedy hit the government much harder than he did the opposition

 

[jillian]

well Breyer clearly agrees. So does Kagan. Judging by the comments asked by Ginsburg I think she is more focused upon where her next can of Ensure is coming from, but be that as it may....no surprise there. This is yet another argument for why we must elect Romney over Obama. There will be a SCOTUS replacement in the next four years and it had better be a conservative justice or we're fucked.

you understand that it was the Court that was supposed to be the last bastion of "liberalism", right?

political decisions like Jones v Clinton, Bush v Gore and Citizens United have all but destroyed the last vestige of the court's credibility.

And i say that as someone who couldn't wait to be admitted to practice before the Court because I so admired the Court and what it's done through history.

Now, it's got ....

well, it's got Clarence Thomas.

 

[BluePhantom]

I don't think there is any doubt that the SCOTUS will find against the Affordable Care Act. Or at least, the usual suspects will. Anybody who believes this is a fair hearing is just plain stupid.

Are you suggesting that because it appears that there will be five justices who feel this law is unconstitutional that it's not a fair hearing?

i think this court can't afford another 5 to 4 hearing that cuts on partisan grounds.

a fair hearing would mean they uphold precedent.

Well....I mean they release a lot of opinions that cut 5-4 on partisan grounds. This would be nothing new or nothing unusual. And as far as precedent is concerned I would agree except for two things. 1) it depends on which precedent the court feels is convincing. There is precedent in favor of the government's position and there is precedent opposing the government's position so it just depends on which one the court feels is the most applicable and convincing. 2) As Justice Kennedy pointed out today, we are entering a situation where there is no precedent if looked at in a particular way and if you look at it in that way that then what is more important is the precedent to be set instead of the precedent that has been established.

 

[alan1]

JUSTICE ALITO: All right. Suppose that you and I walked around downtown Washington at lunch hour and we found a couple of healthy young people and we stopped them and we said: You know what you're doing? You are financing your burial services right now because eventually you're going to die, and somebody is going to have to pay for it, and if you don't have burial insurance and you haven't saved money for it, you're going to shift the cost to somebody else.
Isn't that a very artificial way of talking about what somebody is doing?

JUSTICE ALITO: I don't see the difference. You can get burial insurance. You can get health insurance. Most people are going to need health care, almost everybody. Everybody is going to be buried or cremated at some point.

Wise points.

 

[BluePhantom]

What I mean Jillian is this...a) no matter what the ruling is there will be precedent to support the ruling. b) we can all sit here at this point and argue this point of law, and that point of the constitution...but we are really past that. This has now gone to the highest authority, and will be heard again tomorrow, and so what WE feel about it is really irrelevant now no matter what side you are on. All that matters is how those nine justices feel...and let's be really honest....how Justice Kennedy feels. So what we should really be considering at this point, is not whether you or I feel that this lawyer's arguments were compelling or that other one's were compelling....but did the justices themselves (Kennedy in particular) feel they were compelling.

 

[BluePhantom]

Soty believes that the commerce clause allows Congress the power to regulate all human activity

well Breyer clearly agrees. So does Kagan. Judging by the comments asked by Ginsburg I think she is more focused upon where her next can of Ensure is coming from, but be that as it may....no surprise there. This is yet another argument for why we must elect Romney over Obama. There will be a SCOTUS replacement in the next four years and it had better be a conservative justice or we're fucked.

If you were really a SCOTUS junkie, you would never say anything THIS utterly stupid. Seriously, you have no friggin clue.

Do you really think you are the best person to judge stupidity luddy? I mean...really? I mean Corky from "Life Goes On" could best you in a battle of wits.

 

[Conservative]

Soty believes that the commerce clause allows Congress the power to regulate all human activity

well Breyer clearly agrees. So does Kagan. Judging by the comments asked by Ginsburg I think she is more focused upon where her next can of Ensure is coming from, but be that as it may....no surprise there. This is yet another argument for why we must elect Romney over Obama. There will be a SCOTUS replacement in the next four years and it had better be a conservative justice or we're fucked.

If you were really a SCOTUS junkie, you would never say anything THIS utterly stupid. Seriously, you have no friggin clue.

Neither do you. Here... you need this...

I got you the Jr. version, because I honestly think the adult version is beyond your capabilities.