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Agschmid

(28,749 posts)
Wed Mar 4, 2015, 10:24 PM Mar 2015

Friendly Reminder: No One Knows Anything About How SCOTUS Will Rule on Obamacare

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And that’s a wrap on oral arguments at the Supreme Court in King v. Burwell. My colleagues will have some insightful analysis of the legal battle over the four words that could decide the fate of Obamacare for you in a bit. But for now I just wanted to offer a friendly public service announcement as reactions begin to flood Twitter and the rest of the Internet: Take the looming predictions about how the court will ultimately rule on the subsidy issue with a heaping of salt.

For proof of how SCOTUS watchers (and headline writers) can overreact in the wake of oral arguments, we have to look no further than the last time the high court heard a case that had the potential to decide the fate of President Obama’s health care law. After watching the first day of arguments in the 2012 blockbuster, Jeffrey Toobin famously declared that it was “a train wreck” for the White House. “This law looks like it’s going to be struck down,” the CNN legal expert and New Yorker writer said at the time. “I’m telling you, all of the predictions, including mine, that the justices would not have a problem with this law were wrong.”

Toobin was far from alone in making that assessment. But in the end, of course, the high court voted 5–4 to preserve the individual mandate and avoid delivering what would have likely been a death blow to the Affordable Care Act.


As you may remember, much of the immediate analysis was focused on Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, the White House lawyer tasked with saving Obamacare then, as he is again this week. Verrilli stuttered, stumbled, and coughed out of the gates during the March 2012 arguments, drawing an onslaught of criticism from court watchers and prompting serious handwringing from liberals. “Verilli seemed more like a nervous first-year law student than a respected advocate who had appeared before the court on 17 previous occasions,” declared the Daily Beast. Mother Jones went one step further, writing that Verrilli’s performance just might “go down as one of the most spectacular flameouts in the history of the court.” After the solicitor general’s argument and the rest of the day’s action, “the Obama administration better start preparing for the possibility of a future without the individual mandate,” warned the Huffington Post.


Source.
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Friendly Reminder: No One Knows Anything About How SCOTUS Will Rule on Obamacare (Original Post) Agschmid Mar 2015 OP
Rachel brought that up, too. It's not over till the overweight soprano yodels. nt Hekate Mar 2015 #1
I didn't know Scalia was a soprano? Agschmid Mar 2015 #2
Only if... Hekate Mar 2015 #3
Message auto-removed Name removed Mar 2015 #4
I'm starting to feel the same way... Agschmid Mar 2015 #5

Response to Agschmid (Original post)

Agschmid

(28,749 posts)
5. I'm starting to feel the same way...
Wed Mar 4, 2015, 11:31 PM
Mar 2015

I got my back up on that issue and took a side, and in retrospect I wish I had waited it out a bit.

I'll stay on the sidelines now since we really don't have a clear picture of what's happening with either issue.

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