Supreme Agony, Statist Ecstasy

I do not agree with Chief Justice John Roberts' decision.  It explodes government's taxation powers.  I side with the dissenting minority, so this is an explanation, not a justification.

Democrats are right. The Supreme Court is political. It's complex interrelationship with the other branches always has been, going all the way back to President Andrew Jackson’s famous quote defying a Supreme Court decision: “John Marshall has made his decision. Now let him enforce it!”

The Supreme Court tore up FDR in the early days of his creating alphabet soup agencies. But the public began to perceive them as obstructionist in a time where the federal government needed latitude, so they softened their stance to guard their power. Later, President Roosevelt would overreach, threatening to pack the court. The public rejected that as well, and thus continued the political balancing act.

The result was a continued expansion of federal power that was begun at the start of the progressive era.

Chief Justice Roberts Saved the Day

In a feat of cowardly political and legal jujitsu, Chief Justice John Roberts made a political calculation, joining with the liberal justices to avoid a five alarm political firestorm in an election year. This kicks the issue back into the political arena where it belongs. Being on the winning side, he got to write the majority opinion and shape it, carving the precedent as narrowly as possible.

He allowed Obamacare to stand while simultaneously checking an expansion of federal power under the commerce clause.

Roberts apparently found the two other likely outcomes too earth-shattering

Striking it down completely could have set a precedent that government does not have the power to tax us in this way, setting the stage for the destruction of Social Security and Medicare, which are funded by mandatory taxation.

Small government conservatives like me thrill at the prospect, but suddenly shattering a model that tens of millions depend on is not the smart way to do something, and such radical remedies are not conservative.

Commerce Clause expansion was the argument upon which opponents hung their opposition.  The other outcome he avoided was allowing government to claim it had this authority under the commerce clause. That would have been catastrophic, essentially declaring that there is nothing the federal government may not do if it posits an appropriate pretext.

He ingeniously rejected the notion that this was permissible under the commerce clause, thereby saving us from another expansion of this already gargantuan federal government permission slip. It was also a stroke of genius to declare this as falling under the federal government’s already-established taxation power.

This decision sets no precedent

Government already and still does have too much power, but this did not grant it any new ones. There is no precedent here, no new rights created.  What the ruling does do is egregiously expand government's taxation powers. The government can tax what it wants when it wants to, and that is the bucket the Chief Justice has dumped Obamacare into.

They won’t force you to eat your arugula or put solar panels on your roof, they will just tax you punitively if you don’t. Could we end up being taxed by the pound? Why not? This opens the way for Bloombergian taxation of all kind of stuff that’s bad for you: Fatty meats, cheesecake, ice cream…

But the power was already there. Has been for a hundred years, it is just metastasizing now.

Elections have consequences. The final vote on Obamacare will be this November.

Bonus Material:
Market-based Alternatives to Obamacare
Why Obamacare will fail: A Reading List
Why Obamacare is Doomed