THERE ARE ACTUALLY TWO SILVER LININGS
The Supreme Court ruling on Obamacare is not an entire loss for conservatives. This may seem a minor point - but it's actually huge. And it may cause the whole law to fall apart under its own weight.
Congress cannot penalize states for not participating in the Medicaid expansion by taking away their existing Medicaid funding. So there's no way to enforce a huge part of the law. The Medicaid expansion would have covered about half (or 17 million) of the people expected to be covered under this bill. The ACA bill originally said if states refuse to participate in expanding Medicaid eligibility requirements that their existing Medicaid funding would be taken away. The Court ruled that this is unconstitutional. Their existing funding cannot be stripped.
From ScotusBlog.com: "The key comment on salvaging the Medicaid expansion is this (from Roberts): "Nothing in our opinion precludes Congress from offering funds under the ACA to expand the availability of health care, and requiring that states accepting such funds comply with the conditions on their use. What Congress is not free to do is to penalize States that choose not to participate in that new program by taking away their existing Medicaid funding." (p. 55)
On this one point - while the Court upheld the law, it has set conditions that in reality may cause the whole thing fall a part.
The other silver lining is that this will keep conservativces MOTIVATED for November.
The bottom line is we have to elect Romney in November and we have to hold his feet to the fire on his promise to repeal this atrocious law. And we must work to elect as many conservative Republicansto Congress as possible.
Here is the Court's official opinion:
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/11pdf/11-393c3a2.pdf
One thought on the politics of all this is that this is a HUGE TAX ON THE POOR! People who don't have jobs and can't afford insurance will by 2016 have to pay $700 a year in a "tax" (penalty) for not having insurance. Insurance they no doubt don't have because they're out of work and too poor to afford it.
Obama promised he would never raise taxes on anyone making under $250,000. But this will be a huge tax increase for the poorest of people.
Obama tries to spin it...http://www.breakingnews.com/topic/affordable-care-act-upheld
I thought Romney had an excellent response:
