In poll #6 confirming this, NBC/Marist (yes, those guys) join the fray.
In their February poll, Obama was cruising along with a 51-33 lead over Mitt.

Fast-forward a few months, and the President is enjoying, if you want to go with that, a 47-43 edge. Four points now. A 14-point collapse in four months. Amongst registered voters. By a firmed pegged by Nate Silver of Five Thirty Eight as leaning Democratic.

I wonder how they'd feel knowing their President just levied a $1.7 trillion tax on them...hint hint, ad team.

Again, Go Big. The SC ruling today should just push us more.
Donate to the Romney Money Bomb HERE.

Posted by: CAC at 08:44 AM | Comments (178)
Post contains 129 words, total size 1 kb.

Volokh:

Scalia’s dissent, at least on first quick perusal, reads like it was originally written as a majority opinion (in particular, he consistently refers to Justice Ginsburg’s opinion as “The Dissent”). Back in May, there were rumors floating around relevant legal circles that a key vote was taking place, and that Roberts was feeling tremendous pressure from unidentified circles to vote to uphold the mandate. Did Roberts originally vote to invalidate the mandate on commerce clause grounds, and to invalidate the Medicaid expansion, and then decide later to accept the tax argument and essentially rewrite the Medicaid expansion (which, as I noted, citing Jonathan Cohn, was the sleeper issue in this case) to preserve it? If so, was he responding to the heat from President Obama and others, preemptively threatening to delegitimize the Court if it invalidated the ACA? The dissent, along with the surprising way that Roberts chose to uphold both the mandate and the Medicaid expansion, will inevitably feed the rumor mill.

If this "man" changed his vote due to Obama's and his liberal friends' hectoring... I don't know what to say.

And so if I have this right: The Federal Government may now levy a special tax on me if I do not comply with their specific directives about what I should buy, or do?

Can they tax abortions at a high rate?

If I don't eat broccoli, they can assign a special tax, right? After all, it's just a little tax. I have the choice to either eat broccoli or pay the tax.

They can do that, right?

Can they tax me at a high rate if I own a gun? How about if I refuse to own a gun?

The government may now, per Justice Roberts, assign special taxes on people if they do not live their lives the way the government prefers.

As an old fuddy-duddy justice said, a long time ago: The power to tax is the power to destroy.

Posted by: Ace at 08:37 AM | Comments (340)
Post contains 361 words, total size 2 kb.

Giving it to him on ObamaTax. Quotes now posted at Weekly Standard.

Obama's speech is here, wrapping up.

Posted by: Ace at 07:54 AM | Comments (379)
Post contains 34 words, total size 1 kb.

And then -- Nobody Home.

No, not Nobody Home, you say.

Yes, Nobody Home.

Because I must. more...

Posted by: Ace at 07:47 AM | Comments (143)
Post contains 61 words, total size 1 kb.

Afternoon 'Rons and 'Ettes.

Zakn Here, manning the Decks of The Good Ship Gaming Moron. I have a few things to post about above the fold, and then Vids, Propaganda, etx. You know the Drill.

Lego Batman 2 for the 3DS. I have the cart, but have not played it much. Not a fan of talking legos. Supposedly they polled it and the 5 yr olds that play it wanted the Legos to talk. LAWN. OFF IT.

more...

Posted by: Gang of Gaming Morons! at 10:00 AM | Comments (87)
Post contains 1594 words, total size 11 kb.

Executive Director of the DNC Patrick Gaspard actually said that.

Screencap here, thanks to @slublog.

Another DNC tweet -- now deleted -- said "TAKE THAT MOTHER******S!"

That's on drudge. I don't know if the bowlderization was in the original, or who in the DNC wrote it.

Posted by: Ace at 07:29 AM | Comments (233)
Post contains 64 words, total size 1 kb.

Via @MStevensG8r. Just funny, had to share.

Posted by: Ace at 07:14 AM | Comments (51)
Post contains 31 words, total size 1 kb.

...but remember, it was only Plan B, and we had little confidence in it until this past March.

Plan A was always to win the Senate and the White House and flush this piece of shit down the toilet through reconciliation.

Plan A was always Plan A. Plan B didn't start to exist until, what, mid-2011? When we got a favorable ruling in federal court? (And some unfavorable ones?)

And this never seemed all that likely, until John Roberts was so skeptical of the government's case in March. (And then later was swayed by non-legal arguments that court must retain its credibility; 5-4 decisions are illegitimate unless they benefit liberals.)

So, as much as this stings: This whole thing was a Double Secret Bonus attempt at undoing ObamaCare that debuted mid-2011 and then burst onto the scene just four months ago.

Just four months ago.

Plan A was always Plan A, and Plan A is still very much in play.

Ad Released:

more...

Posted by: Ace at 06:58 AM | Comments (283)
Post contains 174 words, total size 1 kb.

Via Patterico.

Opinion here. Enjoy the pain.

It's Constitutional. Bitches. So says Executive Director of the DNC Patrick Gaspard.

No, he really said that. Screencap here, thanks to @slublog.

Posted by: Ace at 06:47 AM | Comments (114)
Post contains 53 words, total size 1 kb.

Oh, no.

I'm drawing this from SCOTUSblog. They are still reading the decision, and say it's complicated. But for the moment, they say the mandate is okayed, as a "tax."

Roberts joined the liberals. The holding is apparently that it cannot be justified as a Commerce Clause power, but can be under the taxing power.

Medicaid expansion coercion limited but not thrown out. Again, via SCOTUSblog.

Further: The entire act is upheld, except for the Medicaid expansion, which is construed "narrowly." I assume that means they bless the law but signal to the executive they will impose limits in further adjudication.

Good Lord.

Roberts' vote saved the ACA -- so I guess 5-4 decisions are okay again.

Medicaid Limitation: Actually, they found for us on this, and yet the law still stands.

The majority opinion states:

TNothing 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.

So the federal government may now only offer extra money to encourage Medicaid expansion-- but may not take away funds (as the law was written) to penalize them if they don't.

This essentially makes Medicaid expansion voluntary.

Who Wrote It? Roberts, I believe, wrote the main opinion. When he wrote that the Commerce Clause could not support ObamaCare, he was joined by the four conservatives. The four liberals dissented on that point, claiming the Commerce Clause gives Ultimate Ninja Power. I believe that concurrence is written by Ginsberg. (Actually it would be a concurrence in part, dissent in part.)

The dissent is written by... Kennedy. Kennedy finds the whole thing must come down, and cannot be justified as a "tax." But he only has four votes for that.

Doctor Flaming Skull from Slublog.

Posted by: Ace at 06:17 AM | Comments (1008)
Post contains 333 words, total size 2 kb.