Supreme Court agrees to hear Obamacare challenge

[alnorth]

Oral argument in March. That the Supreme Court agreed to hear the appeal is not really a surprise, but what may be a surprise is the amount of time for oral arguments. The Obamacare supreme court oral argument will be 6 hours, which obliterates the modern record for longest oral argument. (in the earliest days of the court they had days of oral argument, but in the last couple generations, oral argument was typically one hour per case. The prior modern record was 4 hours in 2003 for a campaign finance reform law)

The court will hear arguments on four issues.

#1) The constitutionality of the requirement that almost all Americans obtain health insurance by 2014. (2 hours)

#2) If the mandate in #1 is struck down, will the entire law need to be struck down? (90 minutes)

#3) Does the anti-injunction act bar challenges to Obamacare's mandate. (in other words, if the answer to this question is yes, then the court will not answer #1, #2, and probably #4 at this time. The Obamacare challenge would be thrown out and the people who are opposed to the mandate would have to wait until 2014 to re-file the case) (90 minutes)

#4) The constitutionality of the expansion of Medicaid. (1 hour)

The court refused to hear challenges to the new requirements for employers, so that would stand unless the entire law was tossed.

Update:

Oral Argument Schedule:

Monday, March 26: Issue #3 (its probably fitting that this should be heard first)

Neither side wants to argue that the supreme court can't rule until 2015, so the supreme court appointed an outside attorney to make that argument. This is a rare issue where both the feds and the states agree.

Outside attorney: 40 minutes
Feds: 30 minutes
NFIB and states: 20 minutes

Tuesday, March 27: Issue #1

Feds: 1 hour
States: 30 minutes
NFIB: 30 minutes

Wednesday, March 28: Issues #2 and #4

Issue #2:

The states believe if the mandate is struck down, then the whole law must be struck down, and the feds believe if the mandate is struck down, the ban on pre-existing conditions must also be struck down. Neither side believes that only the mandate can be struck down, leaving the rest of the law intact, so the court appointed an outside attorney to make that argument.

Outside attorney: 30 minutes
Feds: 30 minutes
NFIB and states: 30 minutes

Issue #4:

Feds: 30 minutes
States: 30 minutes

[BucEyedPea]

Originally Posted by Lightrise

Well yes the GOP is a total fraud of family values. I don't think there is any question in that, and I'm not partisan. However, the Democrats, and Obama himself preferred single payer as did the nation. So, if it turns out unconstitutional...I guess that means that Romney and Gingrich who were the ones originally pushing this got it wrong...fraud of family values....LOL

You don't speak for the nation and it does not have one mind. I don't want single payer. I want reform but not single payer or Obamacare.

[KCTitus]

Originally Posted by Lightrise

Well yes the GOP is a total fraud of family values. I don't think there is any question in that, and I'm not partisan. However, the Democrats, and Obama himself preferred single payer as did the nation. So, if it turns out unconstitutional...I guess that means that Romney and Gingrich who were the ones originally pushing this got it wrong...fraud of family values....LOL

The nation preferred single payer? Really? Obamacare is opposed by about 70% of the nation. So if the 'non single payer' is opposed why would single payer be accepted?

[Baby Lee]

Originally Posted by cosmo20002

I don't think either one should be called death panels. But if you are going to label a potential single-payer system as having one, you have to acknowledge that the same situation already exists today.

When the argument turns to bureaucrats making decisions, I don't see much difference between a govt bureaucrat and an insurance company bureaucrat, except that the insurance co, mindful of profits, is probably more likely to deny coverage.

Insurance can be dropped for better coverage, can be forced to endure bad PR costing them additional customers, and can be sued for breach of contract.

[Fairplay]

Good News!!

The liberals are lubing up their base to prepare for the bad and terrible news that the Supreme court will strike down Obamacare with articles such as this.

Article title "Supreme Court Poll: Only 44 Percent Of Americans Approve Of The Job The Court Is Doing"


Here is link to article, not much to see though.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...n_1580139.html