"So The Mandate Falls? Big Deal."
So says Sheldon Whitehouse:
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), a former state attorney general who sits on the Judiciary Committee, said that the individual mandate might very well fall, but that the law’s defenders have gotten “overexcited” about it. The rest of the law will most likely survive, he said, preserving popular provisions that should help Democrats in the 2012 elections.
“So the mandate falls? Big deal,” Whitehouse said. “I think a family able to keep their sick kids on insurance even though they have pre-existing conditions, kids out of college able to stay on their parents’ policies while they look for that first job with healthcare — things like that are what will stick. Irrespective of what the Supreme Court says, that’s the things people really care about and are counting on.”
I think Whitehouse knows better than that. If the conservatives on the Supreme Court are willing to strike down the mandate, they'll take the rest of ACA with it. Other than Medicaid expansion, I'm not as enamored of ACA as others, to say the least. But Whitehouse seems to be readying a political argument against the conservatives on the Supreme Court and off of it.
My prediction remains a 2012 punt by the SCOTUS conservatives, dismissing the case on standing issues (the Anti-Injunction Act argument will be the vehicle I bet.)
Speaking for me only
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