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Nah...6-3 for the defendant. Roberts will say what you said, and Kennedy will add "You guys are morons, but luckily for you the plaintiffs are worse."
Look for the "Escape Hatch" W/SCOTUS
- Thread starter Yagents
- Start date
Nah...6-3 for the defendant. Roberts will say what you said, and Kennedy will add "You guys are morons, but luckily for you the plaintiffs are worse."
I've learned a long time ago, trying to read the tea leaves of the questions asked during these things will leave you very frustrated at the end when the decision comes down.
Truth is, the oral arguments are not the meat and potatoes part of the decision. They look at all of the paperwork filed, precedents, and ironically, what was actually said in the law. The oral arguments are there to serve as an opportunity to summarize your case.
I doubt the supremes care about the chaos. If they did, ACA would have been still borne since it caused significant chaos when it was launched. How many people lost insurance then? Probably more than will lose it if they overturn the subsidies.
For the record, state insurance markets will not go into a death spiral if subsidies are stopped. The exchanges will, but the overall market will not. Only a small portion of people in any given state have insurance through an exchange and its subsidized. Most people still get it through their employer. This market will be unphased, meaning the overall market will not go into the death spiral everyone is predicting.
I'm expecting a 7-2 judgement in favor of the plaintiffs. The supremes (and courts in general) like to hold people accountable to what they wrote and signed off on. There are numerous exceptions to this, but those are exceptions and it usually is when there is clear evidence that it is out of context.
The Kennedy reading of his questioning, which is interesting and falls in line with what expected based on the pundits predictions, is a double edge sword. ACA was thrust upon states either way. Whether they say they are doing it now, or if you realize they already did it, there is no difference. His questioning could be along the lines of states didn't sign up for ACA in the first place, now they have to accept it, even if they said they don't want it. Do away with it all! This is why many states don't have the medicaid expansion.
All that said, the fix is pretty easy and after the DHS funding fiasco this week, the fix will go through congress pretty quickly anyway of having a change to allow funding for all states, regardless of who set up the exchange and who runs it.
Dan
Truth is, the oral arguments are not the meat and potatoes part of the decision. They look at all of the paperwork filed, precedents, and ironically, what was actually said in the law. The oral arguments are there to serve as an opportunity to summarize your case.
I doubt the supremes care about the chaos. If they did, ACA would have been still borne since it caused significant chaos when it was launched. How many people lost insurance then? Probably more than will lose it if they overturn the subsidies.
For the record, state insurance markets will not go into a death spiral if subsidies are stopped. The exchanges will, but the overall market will not. Only a small portion of people in any given state have insurance through an exchange and its subsidized. Most people still get it through their employer. This market will be unphased, meaning the overall market will not go into the death spiral everyone is predicting.
I'm expecting a 7-2 judgement in favor of the plaintiffs. The supremes (and courts in general) like to hold people accountable to what they wrote and signed off on. There are numerous exceptions to this, but those are exceptions and it usually is when there is clear evidence that it is out of context.
The Kennedy reading of his questioning, which is interesting and falls in line with what expected based on the pundits predictions, is a double edge sword. ACA was thrust upon states either way. Whether they say they are doing it now, or if you realize they already did it, there is no difference. His questioning could be along the lines of states didn't sign up for ACA in the first place, now they have to accept it, even if they said they don't want it. Do away with it all! This is why many states don't have the medicaid expansion.
All that said, the fix is pretty easy and after the DHS funding fiasco this week, the fix will go through congress pretty quickly anyway of having a change to allow funding for all states, regardless of who set up the exchange and who runs it.
Dan
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I don't know about that last part. There could be a coup de tat on Boehner by some of his Neo-Cons....it could get real messy. If someone thinks they can get an extra rung on the ladder by stonewalling you know they'll try it.
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Right Dan. If they cared about keeping things orderly, the SCOTUS would break with tradition and render a decision before April. Health Insurers have to formulate 2016 premiums and submit them to the states not later than May 1st. I've read that the Subsidy available -vs- No Subsidy Available premium spread is about 80%. (ie FFM states have an 80% increase if no subsidy)
-ac
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7-2? Which of the liberals do you think are going to overturn the subsidies?
- Thread starter
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No worries. My uncles' cousin, has a friend, who knows someone that lives in DC, who just saw Obama walk into the SCOTUS building back door.
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Another blog.
Live Blog: Supreme Court Hears King v. Burwell Health-Law Case - Washington Wire - WSJ
If you follow the money, hospital stocks are up big today. Even Ehealth stock turned positive. Money is on a defeat.
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Another blog.
Live Blog: Supreme Court Hears King v. Burwell Health-Law Case - Washington Wire - WSJ
If you follow the money, hospital stocks are up big today. Even Ehealth stock turned positive. Money is on a defeat.
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The thing that gets muddy- not that prediction is not already a muddy game- is that there are two aspects to what the court must decide, at least two I should say. One is the ruling on the interpretation and the other is the ruling on what the remedy or implementation timetable will be if the governments interpretation is overturned.
As I said yesterday " the libs will argue that everyone's private parts are going to fall off it you rule against the government and shut the subsidies down immediately." And indeed they went right at that argument like clockwork today, or at least Kagan did. I haven't really caught up in general.
The problem with that bullshiite argument is that- as with all court decisions- the court also gets to control when they go into effect or more often they will remand that part back down to the lower courts and tell them to work out a timetable. Sometimes a decision on a issue just permanently stops a law or practice immediately, sometimes it phases out or in over a longer period, sometimes it stops immediately but does not apply retroactively before the decision, and on and on with various combinations. The libsters on the court and conservatives as well both know that they have more options than just pulling the plug immediately or leaving it alone completely.
That is a long winded way of saying that, for me, it is hard to predict where some justices stand until they see what the entire package is. We know that Kegan or whatever her name is and Ginsburg are too far gone to even talk about. And we know that Scalia and Thomas are not interested in anything Obama is trying to sell. Gets dicey after that. But assuming that there is such a thing as a moderate then a moderate might vote to keep the program subsidies alive because an immediate shutdown would be too chaotic. But a moderate might also easily support shooting the law down but letting current subsidies stay until Congress had XYZ months to clarify its intent or that states had XYZ months to vote on whether they wanted to have their own exchange or not, given the new clarity around the implications of not having one, if it goes that way.
Again, that bit about your private parts falling off immediately is the same draconian language that Kegan accuses other of using. There are lots of options for transitioning. But she does not want that because the scary stuff helps her pre-existing option.
Even though it is a silly game given the roll of the dice that it alwas is, I think I am going to sniff the glue and predict that the ruling will be against the governments position but for the reason that I just layed out. They will buy into some scheme or agree that they would be receptive to some schemed that did not turn the faucet off immediately. So essentially the conservatives would be saying to that: "Look we are going to allow subsidies that have been deployed but also give states and congress to re-state what they want to do, so what's your frigging problem with that?" What are Roberts and Kennedy etc going to say...."no, we think that statute is clear and we don't like the idea of states having time to vote on it again." I don't think so.
This thing is a mess and was always intended to be.
As I said yesterday " the libs will argue that everyone's private parts are going to fall off it you rule against the government and shut the subsidies down immediately." And indeed they went right at that argument like clockwork today, or at least Kagan did. I haven't really caught up in general.
The problem with that bullshiite argument is that- as with all court decisions- the court also gets to control when they go into effect or more often they will remand that part back down to the lower courts and tell them to work out a timetable. Sometimes a decision on a issue just permanently stops a law or practice immediately, sometimes it phases out or in over a longer period, sometimes it stops immediately but does not apply retroactively before the decision, and on and on with various combinations. The libsters on the court and conservatives as well both know that they have more options than just pulling the plug immediately or leaving it alone completely.
That is a long winded way of saying that, for me, it is hard to predict where some justices stand until they see what the entire package is. We know that Kegan or whatever her name is and Ginsburg are too far gone to even talk about. And we know that Scalia and Thomas are not interested in anything Obama is trying to sell. Gets dicey after that. But assuming that there is such a thing as a moderate then a moderate might vote to keep the program subsidies alive because an immediate shutdown would be too chaotic. But a moderate might also easily support shooting the law down but letting current subsidies stay until Congress had XYZ months to clarify its intent or that states had XYZ months to vote on whether they wanted to have their own exchange or not, given the new clarity around the implications of not having one, if it goes that way.
Again, that bit about your private parts falling off immediately is the same draconian language that Kegan accuses other of using. There are lots of options for transitioning. But she does not want that because the scary stuff helps her pre-existing option.
Even though it is a silly game given the roll of the dice that it alwas is, I think I am going to sniff the glue and predict that the ruling will be against the governments position but for the reason that I just layed out. They will buy into some scheme or agree that they would be receptive to some schemed that did not turn the faucet off immediately. So essentially the conservatives would be saying to that: "Look we are going to allow subsidies that have been deployed but also give states and congress to re-state what they want to do, so what's your frigging problem with that?" What are Roberts and Kennedy etc going to say...."no, we think that statute is clear and we don't like the idea of states having time to vote on it again." I don't think so.
This thing is a mess and was always intended to be.
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Adding on to Winters comment:
Argument analysis: Setting up the private debate on the ACA : SCOTUSblog
Note the last paragraph:
Verrilli disputed that, saying that a ruling against the government would lead to an immediate cut-off of subsidies. So, Alito responded, the Court might do what it did in a 1982 case, Northern Pipeline v. Marathon Oil, postponing for about three months a decision striking down an important new bankruptcy law, giving Congress a chance to fix the situation — as, indeed, Congress did.
"That would be a proper disposition," if the Court were to rule against the government, the Solicitor General said.
Scalia immediately jumped in: "Do you think Congress is just going to sit there and let all of these disastrous consequences occur?….If there are disastrous consequences, Congress will react."
There was nothing in those remarks, by either of those two Justices, to indicate that they were questioning whether the predictions of a serious social problem would, in fact, follow the ruling against a nationwide subsidy system.
Dan....I get that you hate ACA. But 7-2 for the plantiffs? On what planet? 6-3 in favor of ACA wouldn't shock me. Kennedy doesn't want the chaos and Roberts can hang his hat on the Chevron Deference.
Argument analysis: Setting up the private debate on the ACA : SCOTUSblog
Note the last paragraph:
Verrilli disputed that, saying that a ruling against the government would lead to an immediate cut-off of subsidies. So, Alito responded, the Court might do what it did in a 1982 case, Northern Pipeline v. Marathon Oil, postponing for about three months a decision striking down an important new bankruptcy law, giving Congress a chance to fix the situation — as, indeed, Congress did.
"That would be a proper disposition," if the Court were to rule against the government, the Solicitor General said.
Scalia immediately jumped in: "Do you think Congress is just going to sit there and let all of these disastrous consequences occur?….If there are disastrous consequences, Congress will react."
There was nothing in those remarks, by either of those two Justices, to indicate that they were questioning whether the predictions of a serious social problem would, in fact, follow the ruling against a nationwide subsidy system.
Dan....I get that you hate ACA. But 7-2 for the plantiffs? On what planet? 6-3 in favor of ACA wouldn't shock me. Kennedy doesn't want the chaos and Roberts can hang his hat on the Chevron Deference.
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