If the SCOTUS rules Obamacare unconstitutional...

[Sbane]

What would be the most interesting outcome, and I tend to think it's kind of likely though I am no expert on law, would be if the individual mandate is struck down and it is severed from the rest of the law except the pre-existing condition and community rating portion. It might not, actually should not be severed from that portion since the mandate is necessary to make covering pre-existing conditions and community rating possible. The rest of the law should be severed as it does not have anything to do with the individual mandate. Can the law experts please let me know what they think the possibility of that happening is? Seems like a perfect moderate hero option for Kennedy.

This would be interesting as suddenly covering pre-existing conditions would become a political football, and I doubt either party will be able to resist covering them again. Though it will be interesting to see what the tea party faction does as the Republican solution seems to be to make a health care tax, which you can get back if you prove you have insurance. Might that be attacked as a new tax by the idiot faction of the Republican party?

[Sbane]

What is the chance that parts of the bill that are clearly unrelated to the individual mandate like Medicaid expansion or letting people stay on their parent's insurance till 26 will be upheld? I guess things get murky when talking about state exchanges as they might have assumed a healthier population participating than might be the case without the mandate. So could we have a situation where most things are thrown out besides a few provisions that are clearly not related and won't require intimate knowledge of the health system to figure out? Or would they just say "f it, let's throw it all out"?

[Sbane]

As for politics, if suddenly people find out that their kids won't have insurance next year, or their niece won't be covered for her pre-existing condition next year, even people in the middle might get more motivated to vote for Obama and especially the Democrats down ballot.

[Sbane]

http://www.scotusblog.com/2012/03/argument-recap-a-lift-for-the-mandate/

"A common reaction, across the bench, was that the Justices themselves did not want the onerous task of going through the remainder of the entire 2,700 pages of the law and deciding what to keep and what to throw out, and most seemed to think that should be left to Congress.  They could not come together, however, on just what task they would send across the street for the lawmakers to perform.  The net effect may well have shored up support for the individual insurance mandate itself."

 

I was thinking the same....can't wait to listen to the oral argument tonight provided cspan has it on their website again.

[Sbane]

Yes a rebuke by the supreme court will hit Obama, but he can just hammer the republicans on how people with pre-existing conditions are now going to be thrown out. He can appeal to moms whose not so little kids will be kicked out of their insurance as well. People fundamentally do not understand what happened in 2010. According to the exit polls, Americans were evenly divided on health care bit voted by 7 points for the Republicans. If the 2010 election was decided on healthcare there's a good chance Pelosi would still be speaker, when you factor in the incumbency advantage.

[Sbane]

Look, I cannot guarantee that Obama will not get hurt or benefit from this, since it makes him look incompetent. But I think it will help Democrats, if not in 2012 then definitely in 2014. It doesn't have to be that way. The Republicans could offer and pass an alternative that covers people with pre-existing conditions and helps out the poor and young. This would neutralize any Democratic advantage and might help Republicans. But considering the Republican base, is that really possible?

[Sbane]

The truth is that nobody knows what impact it might have. The only other remotely similar situation was in 1936 when the conservatives in SCOTUS had struck down a number of FDR's New Deal laws.

Everything depends on who wins the message war. At another time, running against SCOTUS would have been political suicide. But nowadays, after Bush v. Gore, Citizens United, etc., 75% of Americans believe that the Justices decide more on partisan basis rather than legal one (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-15/supreme-court-seen-influenced-by-politics-in-health-care-ruling.html). So there is fertile ground there for Obama and the Democrats to run against a Supreme Court that has essentially become an unofficial branch of the Republican party.   

They can run on it but who are they going to win?  With a roughly 35-25-40 split in this country, politically (left-center-right), I don't see how running against a conservative court wins elections.  I think folks on the left continually overestimate the power of the left's message.  Without translating it into something meaningful, it's just politics and most people tune that sht out.  I think a lot of people will be thanking SCOTUS for striking it down.

Independents hold in even lower regard SCOTUS than Democrats in the poll I linked.

And I don't think that the parents who will see their kids kicked out of their insurance or the seniors who will fall again in the donut hole will be especially thankful towards the court, regardless the ideology.

Kids won't be kicked off of insurance.  The age 26 thing is actually a net win for insurers, as those are healthy bodies.

And how do you figure that? If the entire law is struck, which might happen if the Supreme Court feels lazy, kids will be kicked off of their insurance.