A Question, Now That ObamaCare Lost Another Appeal

Posted on | August 12, 2011 | 31 Comments

by Smitty

HotAir, and the rest of the blogosphere, has the story of the 11th Circuit delivering yet another finely shaded variation on the theme of “no matter how you slice it, ObamaCare comes up ‘turd'”. Jazz Shaw notes via Politico:

Team Obama says they are “confident” that they will still prevail. They now have 90 days to appeal to either the Supremes or the full 11th circuit.

My question: What is the source of this confidence?

ObamaCare, whether you are for or against the notion, is a BFD. The Vice President said so. That it’s a BFD is not contentious.

What is the source of the Presidence confidence his BFD will previal, when neither the courts nor the people seem terribly thrilled about the concept? Three follow-up questions:

Did God tell President Obama that this was His will? I don’t claim to have heard any explicit Divine voice speaking audibly, myself. But maybe the President did.
Does this confidence spring from a stash of *ahem* sitting around somewhere? Wouldn’t want to accuse the President of anything, at all, but that might have some explanatory power here.
Is the President, in his confidence, not dealing any longer with reality in the ‘reasonable person’ mode? I’m no doctor, and a blog post is no diagnosis, but the overall Presidential detachment may cross the line into the spooky realm Real Soon Now.

ObamaCare is certainly one tragic plotline in the larger tragedy that is the Obama Administration, which is the climax of the tragic epic of Progressivism. If it wasn’t so flipping expensive and uncertain, one would be tempted to say that it’s a great time to be a blogger. Instead, we must continue the struggle for liberty in the face of the Tyranny of the Progressives.

Category: Barack Obama, Uncategorized

Comments

31 Responses to “A Question, Now That ObamaCare Lost Another Appeal”

M. Thompson
August 12th, 2011 @ 11:12 pm

I think it is the boundless egotism of Mr. Obama that gives them this foolish belief that Obamacare is Constitutional.
Anonymous
August 12th, 2011 @ 11:31 pm

The boundless egotism, plus a compliant bureaucracy, plus the sure knowledge that there are 34 Copperheads in the Senate, so impeachment is off the table…
Doug
August 12th, 2011 @ 11:40 pm

Because Baracky doesn’t know how to play poker.

“Don’t call my bluff Eric”
Rose
August 12th, 2011 @ 11:47 pm

It’s that he just doesn’t really care. He just wants his way. That’s the game for him. It wouldn’t matter what the agenda item was, he just wants to win – and he is a ‘win by any means necessary’ kind of guy, like unsealing private divorce records to knock off his opponent. He should have been jailed for that. Instead, it’s how he got ahead. He is a ruthless creature, and if you could peel off the mask, you’d see the lizard skin underneath.
Anonymous
August 12th, 2011 @ 11:58 pm

Well it isn’t as if he could say in view of this humiliating defeat we’ll appeal it anyway.
McGehee
August 13th, 2011 @ 12:11 am

Is the President, in his confidence, not dealing any longer with reality in the ‘reasonable person’ mode?

“Any longer”…? You’re such a kidder.
Beto Ochoa
August 13th, 2011 @ 12:15 am

Charlie Rose on Bloomberg tonight with Fareed Zakaria and two other morons. If they are how the Progressive Mind works it’s no wonder Obama’s delusional.
Anonymous
August 13th, 2011 @ 1:10 am

“he is a ‘win by any means necessary’ kind of guy” = ends justify the means. Check.

“like unsealing private divorce records to knock off his opponent” – wow. you’re one of the few that know or remember this. Kudos.

“you’d see the lizard skin underneath” – kinda like “V”, at least, they weren’t eating their own.
JeffS
August 13th, 2011 @ 1:14 am

Indeed, McGehee. I think it likely that Obama has been in La La Land since he was 6 years old or so.
Adjoran
August 13th, 2011 @ 3:16 am

Here’s Obama’s devilish scheme (I’m sure it was actually devised by someone much cleverer than Obama, but that doesn’t narrow it down too well): they will ask for a hearing of the full 11th Circuit. There is NO chance of the ruling being changed, but it buys them time so that SCOTUS doesn’t get the case this coming term, so it cannot be resolved before the election.

This puts the final SCOTUS case sometime in 2013, BUT states and companies will have had to make contingency plans to implement it, since it is the law until overturned. If enough money and bureaucratic infrastructure has been committed to implementation, SCOTUS will be reluctant to overturn the law and cause major disruption (at least Mr. Justice Kennedy will, and he’s the key vote).

We can hope Mr. Justice Kennedy doesn’t forget how he and his colleagues were insulted and humiliated by Obama at the SOTU, but this tactic seems ObamaCare’s best chance of survival.
Anonymous
August 13th, 2011 @ 3:31 am

Has a temporary stay been issued?
Anonymous
August 13th, 2011 @ 3:41 am

Barack Obama, high as a kite and dumb as a biscuit.
ThePaganTemple
August 13th, 2011 @ 11:56 am

The only part of the law that was declared unconstitutional was the requirement to purchase insurance. According to the eleventh district, all other parts of the law are fine. I just don’t get that. What’s constitutional about telling an insurance company what kind of coverage they have to offer, and presumably what price they have to offer it at? How can anybody possibly explain, with a straight face, that its legitimate for the government to force an insurance company to keep coverage of “children” on their parents policies up until the age of twenty-six. The whole damn law should be thrown out.
McGehee
August 13th, 2011 @ 12:35 pm

If Disqus would let me “Like” this comment multiple times, I would.
ThePaganTemple
August 13th, 2011 @ 2:11 pm

Are appellate judges lifetime appointees? I thought they were, so I can’t figure out why this turd would get a pass on all but the one point. Its like they’re sending a message, maybe to Kennedy, go ahead and decide in favor of this piece of shit legislation, mandate and all, so we can put this behind us and move on without having to worry about hiring extra security.
MMMojo
August 13th, 2011 @ 2:22 pm

Well, obviously, the answer is the necessary and good & plenty clause discovered in late 2009 by some guy from Detroit, MI.

With that out the way, and in all seriousness, the 11th Cir. case attacked the law from the perspective of the individual mandate. The District Court judge ruled the the individual mandate (IM) was an improper exercise of Congressional authority, but, also, that without the IM, the entire law fell apart for several reasons. The appeals panel found that the ruling on the IM was correct, but that the rest of the law could stand.

Other cases have attacked other aspects of the law, including the parts that deal with insurance company regulations. One assumes that there has been some level of coordination between the Plaintiffs in these cases, and that all of the various cases will come to the S. Ct. in one form or another.

However, once you get past the idea that the New Left wants to do anything other than collapse The System and destroy the traditional American free market system, all of this makes sense. Upholding the IM is irrelevant to the overall plan to collapse The System.

If the S. Ct. ultimately upholds the 11th Cir. appellate panel, thus nuking the IM, but leaving the remainder of the law in place, the insurance policy/plan that you have today will be eliminated before the 2016 elections. Your insurer will have no choice because the financial incentive just isn’t there as a result of ObamaCare mandates. However, even if your private insurer manages to hang-on, and doesn’t bankrupt itself by continuing your policy, your employer would be utterly foolish to continue your plan.

Paying $1,700 per person, per year, as a penalty (which is separate from the IM) for failure to provide insurance to employees is a heckuva lot less money than providing you with even the cheapest of the cheap Blue Cross/Shield plan. You will be dumped into Medicaid by your employer, it’s just a question of when. Once your employer dumps you and your fellow employees into Medicaid, there will not be a health insurer in the country that will survive on just individual policies, and private health insurance will be a thing of the past for everyone except the extremely well-off.
ThePaganTemple
August 13th, 2011 @ 2:46 pm

Damn, damn, damn. I think you got it. I’ll take it a step further. This is probably a way to give the Congress the opportunity to revisit single payer, or at the least some kind of public option. Yep, that would explain it. I don’t think the Left really cares anything about the individual mandates any more than we do. If they had their druthers it would definitely be a single payer system. Holy crap, in that case it doesn’t really matter what the Supreme Court decides from the left’s perspective, does it? They either get single-payer, public option, or we all get dumped into Medicaid. And if we don’t get a veto proof or filibuster proof majority in the Senate that’s what will happen. And we still might have to put up with no telling how many court challenges if we do repeal the damn law.
Bob Belvedere
August 13th, 2011 @ 3:06 pm

They don’t care about no stinkin’ Constitution!!!
Bob Belvedere
August 13th, 2011 @ 3:08 pm

The fluid in his womb was Kool-Aid [red].
Bob Belvedere
August 13th, 2011 @ 3:13 pm

Both of you, I think, are dead solid perfect.

We need a filibuster-proof majority of leveled-headed Right Wingers in the Senate and control of the Executive Regulation Machine.
Anonymous
August 13th, 2011 @ 3:41 pm

I think he will simply ignore any court rulings he doesn’t like.
Rebecca Harris
August 13th, 2011 @ 5:22 pm

The only way to stop this job-killing juggernaut is to vote the BFD out of office next year. He’s already proved to us that if the law goes against him, he’ll just appoint another czar and ignore the law.
McGehee
August 13th, 2011 @ 5:26 pm

My sense of the other case — where the district judge struck down only the individual mandate, just as the 11th Circuit just did in this one — was that the judge concluded that if the law would collapse without the individual mandate, then let it collapse.

Making it work without the unconstitutional part (I imagine the judge reasoned) is Congress’ responsibility, not the courts’. And I really couldn’t fault that reasoning; as a rule it’s better for judges to leave the lawmaking to the lawmakers.

So I think the correct response to this ruling is for Congress to repeal the whole damn thing — and if we end up back at the “we only control one house of one third of the government,” then the House should refuse to approve any funding for any part of ObamaCare unless a way is found for the law to work without the individual mandate.

Which of course there won’t be.
ThePaganTemple
August 13th, 2011 @ 5:53 pm

Here’s another, liberal, perspective from Andrew Cohen of The Atlantic, who calls the 11th Circuit decision a Manifesto
Anonymous
August 13th, 2011 @ 7:09 pm

A distinct possibility.
Anonymous
August 13th, 2011 @ 7:18 pm

There is an upside to only striking down the individual mandate. It pushes back on the ridiculous expansion of the commerce clause while still preserving repeal as a campaign issue. Not that Manic Progressives or even many independents care, but most Americans will only absorb the headline that Obmneycare has been struck down as unconstitutional.
Anonymous
August 13th, 2011 @ 7:29 pm

As I wrote at your place we don’t need an economic savant for president. We need one who understands that the size, power and the crushing regulations of the Federal Government is an unmitigated evil. If we are to regain our prosperity and our liberties the power and reach of the executive branch must be eviscerated.
ThePaganTemple
August 13th, 2011 @ 9:33 pm

Is it remotely possible Obama might have an ally in the court? An ally by the name Roberts?
Always On Watch
August 14th, 2011 @ 12:45 am

My prediction: if the individual mandate is struck down — and it should be — the push for the single-payer system will be on. The Dems will not back down entirely; they never do. A lesson there for the Right, I think.
Always On Watch
August 14th, 2011 @ 12:46 am

I don’t foresee any repeal of ObamaCare. Please prove me wrong by showing me one government program that has been repealed once that program has been established.
Teeing it up: A Round at the LINKs | SENTRY JOURNAL
August 14th, 2011 @ 1:00 pm

[…] THE OTHER McCAIN: A Question, Now That ObamaCare Lost Another Appeal […]