Supreme Court Upholds Health Care Law 28JUN12

VICTORY!!!!! THERE IS JUSTICE IN THIS WORLD!!!!! I honestly expected this court to demolish the Affordable Care Act in a continuation of their assault on the Republic that started with their presidential election of 2000 and their citizens united decision. I am so very surprised, and so happy! Congratulations AMERICA!!!!! WAY TO GO U.S. SOLICITOR DONALD B VERRILLI JR. AND PRESIDENT OBAMA!!!!!!
Here is the link Supreme Court ruling
http://www.scribd.com/doc/98542507/Supreme-Court-Health-Care-Decision-Text#download

by Mark Memmott

Enlarge David Goldman/AP An officer stands outside the Supreme Court as media and the public gather Thursday.

Live updates about the Supreme Court's decision today that the Affordable Care Act is constitutional:
Update at 10:24 a.m. ET. The Lede:
"The Supreme Court has upheld President Obama's signature health care law," NPR's Carrie Johnson writes. "Chief Justice John Roberts says the individual mandate survives because the penalty it imposes for not having insurance is considered a tax."
Also, NPR reports, "on the issue of the Medicaid expansion, a majority of the court said Congress can expand Medicaid, but can't strip states of all their Medicaid funds if they fail to do the expansion."
Update at 10:21 a.m. ET. "Yes We Did!":
Supporters of President Obama broke out in chants of "Yes We Did!" outside the court building as word came that the law has been upheld.
Update at 10:19 a.m. ET. The "Money Quote":
According to SCOTUSBlog, "the money quote from the section on the mandate is: 'Our precedent demonstrates that Congress had the power to impose the exaction in Section 5000A under the taxing power, and that Section 5000A need not be read to do more than impose a tax. This is sufficient to sustain it."
Update at 10:14 a.m. ET. "Entire ACA Is Upheld:"
According to SCOTUSBlog, "the bottom line [is that] the entire ACA [Affordable Care Act] is upheld, with the exception that the federal government's power to terminate states' Medicaid funds is narrowly read."
Update at 10:10 a.m. ET. Individual Mandate Is Constitutional:
In a dramatic conclusion to the year's most divisive legal debate, SCOTUSBlog says the U.S. Supreme Court has just ruled that the so-called individual mandate in the 2010 Affordable Care Act is constitutional — a decision that it's believed means the entire law passed by President Obama survives.
Update at 10:07 a.m. ET. Health Care Opinion Being Released:
About 10 minutes earlier than expected, the health care opinion is now being released.
Update at 10:02 a.m. ET. "Stolen Valor" Act Is Unconstitutional:
In the day's first decision, as SCOTUSBlog reports, the court affirms a Ninth Circuit decision that ruled the so-called Stolen Valor act is unconstitutional. The act made it a crime to lie about being the recipient of military medals. The justices voted 6-3 to affirm the lower court.
Update at 10 a.m. ET. Court Is In Session:
The justices have come to the bench, according to reporters at the court.
Update at 9:55 a.m. ET. On The Timing:
It's most likely, court watchers say, that the health care decision will be released around 10:15 a.m. ET. It will come after some less notable cases.
Meanwhile, NPR's Arnie Seipel reports that outside the court building "the sidewalks are packed." He reports "the strangest sight so far has been a pair of belly dancers with a small band who support single-payer."
Update at 9:50 a.m. ET. There Are Four Issues.
As SCOTUSBlog's Lyle Denniston says, there are really four issues confronting the justices:
— Does the court have the authority to decide the constitutionality of the so-called individual mandate?
— If so, is that mandate constitutional?
— If the mandate isn't constitutional, do some or all parts of the act go down with it?
— Is the act's expansion of Medicaid constitutional?
SCOTUSBlog, by the way, is also live blogging.
Our Original Post:
If everything goes as expected, sometime between 10 a.m. ET and 10:30 a.m. ET we should get word about the Supreme Court's most-anticipated decision of the year — on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act; the health care overhaul enacted in 2010.
Every U.S. news outlet, including NPR, has exhaustively previewed the decision, so we won't go over that ground yet again, except to point to the post we did Wednesday called "Here's How To Learn What The Supreme Court Says About Health Care." It has background and links you may find useful.
We'll use this post to cover the news as it comes in, so as decision time draws near be sure to hit your "refresh" button to see our latest updates.
NPR's Ari Shapiro, Carrie Johnson and Nina Totenberg will be reporting on the NPR Newcast and Morning Edition once the decision is released, and on All Things Considered later in the day. At 7 p.m. ET, NPR will be broadcasting and streaming special coverage of the decision and what it means. Click here to find an NPR member station.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/06/28/155901105/live-blog-the-health-care-ruling?sc=nl&cc=brk-20120628-1024

Supreme Court upholds health-care law, individual mandate 28JUN12

VICTORY!!!!! THERE IS JUSTICE IN THIS WORLD!!!!! I honestly expected this court to demolish the Affordable Care Act in a continuation of their assault on the Republic that started with their presidential election of 2000 and their citizens united decision. I am so very surprised, and so happy! Congratulations AMERICA!!!!! WAY TO GO U.S. SOLICITOR DONALD B VERRILLI JR. AND PRESIDENT OBAMA!!!!!! Here is the link to the Supreme Court decision
http://www.scribd.com/doc/98542507/Supreme-Court-Health-Care-Decision-Text#download

 By Robert Barnes and N.C. Aizenman

The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the individual health-insurance mandate that is at the heart of President Obama’s landmark health-care law, saying the mandate is permissible under Congress’s taxing authority.
The potentially game-changing, election-year decision — a major victory for the White House less than five months before the November elections --will help redefine the power of the national government and affect the health-care choices of millions of Americans.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. sided with the majority in voting to uphold the law, Obama’s signature domestic initiative.
Passage of the legislation by the Democratic-controlled Congress in 2010 capped decades of efforts to implement a national program of health care. The legislation is expected to eventually extend health-care coverage to more than 30 million Americans who currently lack it.
Republicans in Congress and GOP presidential challenger Mitt Romney have vowed to try and repeal the measure after the November elections.
The health-care issue thrust the Supreme Court into the public spotlight unlike anything since its role in the 2000 presidential election. The court’s examination of the law received massive coverage — especially during three days of oral arguments in March — and its outcome remained Washington’s most closely guarded secret.
The court reviewed four questions: whether it was within Congress’s constitutional powers to impose an “individual mandate” to purchase health insurance; whether all or any additional parts of the law must be struck down if the mandate is rejected; whether an expansion of Medicaid was unduly coercive on the states and whether all of those questions can even be reviewed before the mandate takes effect.
The most crucial issue before the court was considered to be the individual mandate, known technically as the “minimum coverage” provision, because striking it down would jeopardize the ability of insurers to comply with other, more popular elements of the health-care law without drastically raising premiums. Under those other provisions, for example, insurers can no longer limit or deny benefits to children because of a preexisting condition, and young adults to up age 26 are eligible for insurance coverage under their parents’ plans.
During oral arguments in March, conservative justices indicated they were skeptical about the individual mandate, the provision in the 2,700-page health-care law that requires nearly all Americans to obtain health insurance by 2014 or pay a financial penalty.
Arguing the case for the Obama administration, Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. defended the law as a constitutional exercise of congressional power under the charter’s commerce clause to regulate interstate commerce. He said lawmakers were regulating health insurance to deal with the problem of millions of people who lack coverage and therefore shift costs to the insured when they cannot pay for their medical care.
The court rejected the commerce clause argument, but ruled that Congress nevertheless had the power to impose the mandate because it can be considered a tax.
Paul D. Clement, representing Florida and 25 other states objecting to the health-care law, argued that Congress exceeded its power in passing the law, which he said compels people to buy a product.
Although the most controversial provisions of the law are not scheduled to take effect until 2014, a complex web of new rules has already extended coverage and expanded benefits across the country.
No initiative has exemplified Obama’s progressive domestic agenda or inflamed his conservative opponents like the health-care law, officially called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The court’s decision will resonate throughout the election season, not only in the presidential campaign but in House and Senate races across the country.
The law provoked an unlikely debate about the Constitution. Opponents saw it as a trespass on individual and state’s rights by an omnipotent federal government, and supporters viewed it as a long-sought guarantee of health care to Americans regardless of where they live or work.
As a mark of the case’s importance, the justices spent more than six hours over three days hearing oral arguments on the constitutional questions and related issues. It was the most time than the court has spent on any issue in nearly half a century.
As soon as Obama signed the health-care bill in March 2010, opponents raced to challenge it. Early court decisions followed a predictable pattern, with district judges appointed by Democratic presidents upholding the law and Republican appointees striking it down.
But at the appeals court level, that changed. In a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta, Judge Frank Hull, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, joined with a Republican colleague in saying that the individual insurance mandate in the “unprecedented” legislation exceeded congressional authority. The judges said that if the law were constitutional, it would be impossible to say what action on the part of the government would go too far.
At the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit in Cincinnati and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, two prominent Republican-appointed judges agreed that the law is intrusive but said it is within Congress’s powers.
In Cincinnati, Judge Jeffrey Sutton, a George W. Bush appointee, was the deciding vote to uphold the act. In Washington, Senior Judge Laurence Silberman, named to the bench by President Ronald Reagan, wrote an opinion saying that the question was political, not constitutional.
“It certainly is an encroachment on individual liberty,” Silberman wrote. But then — alluding to other cases in which the Supreme Court has ruled that the commerce clause gives Congress power — he added that “it is no more so than a command that restaurants or hotels are obliged to serve all customers regardless of race, that gravely ill individuals cannot use a substance their doctors described as the only effective palliative for excruciating pain, or that a farmer cannot grow enough wheat to support his own family.”
Even as the legal wrangling grew to a crescendo, some aspects of the law were already being enforced. Those include requirements that many insurance plans allow young adults to stay on their parents’ policies until age 26; cover a range of preventive services, including birth control, without imposing co-payments or other out-of-pocket costs; eliminate lifetime dollar limits on coverage; and begin phasing out annual caps.
The three cases the Supreme Court considered were National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius; Florida, et al., v. Department of Health and Human Services; and Department of Health and Human Services v. Florida, et al.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/supreme-court-to-rule-thursday-on-health-care-law/2012/06/28/gJQAarRm8V_print.html