Whether Chief Justice John Roberts changed his mind, or is the latest example of Republican justices “evolving” on the bench, he has done the improbable: liberals are praising a Supreme Court that they had trashed as a player in a right-wing conspiracy. Old sins like Citizens United are washed away, as are President Obama’s spring musings about the dangers of an unelected court unaccountable to public opinion. The about-face is jarring even in a political atmosphere where the right result typically makes right.
I’ll offer two quick cautionary notes, though, on the politics,and on the arguably more significant trend signified by the outcome. First, a rebuttal to Democratic wishfulness that healthcare is now a politica lwinner for Barack Obama: the better evidence is that it will be a media inflated victory that is worth no votes. Just as Democrats miscalculated in 2010 by assuming that the passage of the healthcare law would prove that they could get things done, they are probably drawing th ewrong lesson today if they assume the Court’s rescue of a deeply unpopular law somehow validates the Obama term.
The notion that the Supreme Court’s imprimatur alters the electoral equation implies that the hostility to Obamacare among Independents and swing voters is related to their doubts about the law’s legitimacy. To the contrary, there is considerably more polling evidence that the political middle’s resistance to the Affordable Care Act is grounded in bread and butter realities: sticker shot at the cost; reflexive doubts that any fledgling federal bureaucracy will work the way it is supposed to; and a suspicion that for all the hoopla, the reform won’t lower their premiums or improve their coverage. The constitutional gripe never really permeated the congressiona ldebate, and it has become a rallying point only within the GOP’s Tea Party base and on the intellectual right: two places that are not exactly part of the persuadable voter universe, and two sectors that aren’t about to rethink thei ropinion based on a one vote escape act.
Good morning and welcome to a special edition of Prix Fixe Politics! At 11:30 PM Wednesday night, I hailed a cab to the second most important address in all of America – One First Street NE, Washington, DC. I arrived at the Supreme Court, not realizing how tense and dramatic the next twelve hours would get. I want you to relive Thursday with me – I hope it gives you a different perspective on this historic moment. With that, here is today’s special SCOTUS menu…
Appetizer: It was actually around 2:00 PM Wednesday that I first stopped by the Court to see if the mayhem had begun. No protestors, no supporters, no media in sight…and there were only 3 people in line at that point. It was less electric than an LA Clippers game in the 90’s and 00’s. The third woman in line was kind enough to inform me that the Court reserves about 60 spots for the general public on oral argument and opinion days. While she wouldn’t hold a place for me, she gave me her phone number and suggested I call her later in the evening to gauge the crowd. Sure enough, when I called her at 11:30 PM, she let me know the line had grown to roughly 40. So, in khakis and a button-down, with only a half-full bottle of water, I took a cab to the Court and got in line. If you didn’t recognize the building behind us, you could easily have mistaken the group for college freshmen on move-in day. The average age was 25 or 26 at most. They brought foam egg crates and yoga mats to sleep on, blankets and sleeping bags to sleep under. Some wore sandals and shorts, others wore suits and suspenders. Justice truly knows no dress code. There were over-eager undergraduates and case-citing law students, with some Masters in Public Health candidates sprinkled in. And even though all sides of the aisle were represented and the Capitol Building shone illuminated across the street, there wasn’t one political argument all night.
Main Course: By the time 5:00 AM rolled around, I learned that a lone Crystal Geyser water bottle does not make for a good pillow. People were stirring and the media circus was arriving. While the mood was still surprisingly relaxed at that time, 8:00 AM was another story. The Court security lined us up single-file and handed out a numbered gold card to each person. I got #36, and could breathe a quick sigh of relief that I’d make it into the courtroom. The guards moved us along 10 at a time, left, right, left, right. Walking up the first few stairs and heading to the side of the Court, I got a different feeling than I do when I enter the Capitol or White House. For me, at least, I didn’t feel the same sense of patriotism, but more of a feeling of permeating purpose. Finally moving toward and into the Court reminded me how monumental a moment this could be in the course of defining the parameters of American government, determining the next President, and shaping the political conversation for years to come. And when you pass CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin in the hall of the Supreme Court, you know there’s no better place to be if law and policy is your bag.
As we lined up once again and prepare to head upstairs, a rosy Michelle Bachmann appeared out of nowhere to join the front of the line. She hadn’t looked that cheerful since she won the Ames straw poll last August. Eventually, after we make our way upstairs and check cell-phones and bags in a locker room, I am led to a seat directly behind Bachmann. She’s not the only congressional Republican on hand: Reps. Tom Price and Catch McMorris-Rogers are a few rows ahead. Senators Hatch and Barrasso found good seats in the middle, too. Paul Clement, attorney for the National Federation of Independent Businesses, was already seated in the back section when Donald Verrilli and others from the Solicitor General’s Office arrived to take their seats only a few rows from the bench.
Read the rest of… Zac Byer: EXCLUSIVE Report from Inside the Supreme Court on Obamacare Decision Day
“Congress’s use of the Taxing Clause to encourage buying something is . . . not new. Tax incentives already promote, for example, purchasing homes and professional educations. See 26 U. S. C. §§163(h), 25A. Sustaining the mandate as a tax depends only on whether Congress has properly exercised its taxing power to encourage purchasing health insurance, not whether it can. Upholding the individual mandate under the Taxing Clause thus does not recognize any new federal power. It determines that Congress has used an existing one.” –Chief Justice John Roberts
The Supreme Court earlier today upheld “Obamacare.” The majority opinion, drafted by Chief Justice Roberts, essentially recognized that taxation to influence consumer behavior in this country is nothing new. Republican leadership is already vowing to kill it. I’m curious to know what provisions of insurance reform they will kill first . .
The first provisions include barring insurers from discriminating against children with pre-existing conditions, allowing parents to opt to keep their own children covered on their plans until they turn 26, and fixing the Medicare reimbursement gap (the “doughnut hole”) that costs seniors several hundred dollars each year. Will the GOP fight to continue medical discrimination against children? Will they kill legislation to reimburse seniors? Will they stop parents from keeping their children covered until age 26?
The law has also required states to create high-risk pools that cover individuals denied private insurance due to pre-existing conditions. Will they now ask the adult with multiple sclerosis to give up that coverage?
Moving forward, health insurance reform will establish insurance exchanges and purchasing cooperatives where insurers that currently enjoy monopolies over entire regions will face competition from other private insurers. Will the GOP kill private sector competition in favor of retaining insurance monopolies? Will they prevent small business and the self-employed from entering into purchasing cooperatives so they can enjoy the discounted coverage that results from economies of scale?
The GOP laments the effects of Obamacare (modeled after RomneyCare) on the economy, especially small business. But the only small businesses impacted by healthcare legislation are those that employ over 50 people. About 96% of all small businesses do not employ over 50 people, and so will not be effected. As for those that do employ over 50 people, most of them already provide healthcare. They will now be getting tax credits to make their coverage of employees far more affordable. Will they take these small business tax credits away?
So in the coming days, I look forward to hearing from GOP leadership, specifically, whose health care will you be killing?
By John Y. Brown III, on Thu Jun 28, 2012 at 12:00 PM ET
Today I was reminded that habits we start in youth seem to easily become part of us for many years without questioning.
When I was 7 my Uncle Lorn told me that it bad for my neck and back to sleep with a pillow.
41 years later I still refuse to sleep with a pillow.
When I was 8 years old a friend of the family told me he liked to eat peanuts whole –shell and all. I wanted to impress him.
40 years later I still eat peanuts with the shell.
So, I did at least two things today because a 7 year old and an 8 year old decided it was a good idea at the time. And I’ve never taken the time to question either–from the perspective of an informed adult.
Which leads to the next (and scarier) question: What else did I do this week bc my 7 or 10 or 12 year old self made a lifelong decision for me many years ago?
No full meal yet, but wanted to send regards from the line in front of the Supreme Court.
I’m #42 in line to get in and hear the opinions read in the morning — as you know, the healthcare decisions are expected.
First 60 are reserved for public…so I lucked out.
But, I am so ill-prepared. One water bottle, and the same button down and khakis I wore since Tuesday morning and through a red-eye flight. Everyone has sleeping bags and pillows, foam egg crates and blankets. And 95% of us are under 25 years old!
By John Y. Brown III, on Wed Jun 27, 2012 at 12:00 PM ET
“Abs”
No, not abs that I have now….or abs I’m comitting to have in the future.. I am at a point in my life where I will likely never talk about abs in the present or future tense ever again.
The best I can do is mention abs as an occurence in the past—something that existed years ago and, for a period of time, I was proud of. A reflection. A reminescence of something positive t can still recall and remind people about–form once upon a time, A sweet memory.
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently warned consumers about a potentially dangerous counterfeit version of Adderall tablets being sold on the Internet – the tablets contained the painkillers tramadol and acetaminophen rather than the active ingredients of the authentic ADHD drug, Adderall. In addition, thousands of packages containing unapproved and counterfeit drug products sold to unsuspecting Americans on Internet sites continue to be seized by US Customs and Border Protection. The Web sites peddling these products place Americans’ health at risk, distributing products that can cause more harm than good.
The AWARXE consumer protection encourages consumers to make an informed choice when buying medications online by using resources provided by the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy® (NABP®). As part of its mission to protect the public’s health, NABP has reviewed, more than 9,800 Web sites selling prescription drugs. AWARxE alerts consumers that only 3%, or 328, of these sites appear to be in compliance with state and federal laws and NABP patient safety and pharmacy practice standards. The other 97% of these sites are considered rogue sites and are listed as Not Recommended on the AWARxE Web site, www.AWARErx.org.
Of the sites reviewed, those currently listed as Not Recommended are characterized as follows:
87% do not require a valid prescription
50% offer foreign or non-FDA-approved drugs
59% use an online questionnaire to evaluate patient health and medication needs, which can be very dangerous
24% are located outside of the United States and selling drugs illegally to patients in the US
Lives have been lost due to people buying medicines from sites that send dangerous drugs without medical oversight that may have been tampered with, expired, or even fake.
FDA regulations and federal and state laws help ensure a secure drug supply chain for products distributed within the US, such as those purchased by patients at the local community pharmacy. In fact, the US drug supply chain is one of the safest in the world. But what happens when consumers go outside of this safety net by purchasing drug products on the Internet that are shipped from locations around the world?
Read the rest of… Carmen Catizone: Americans Can Protect Themselves from Web Sites Selling Dangerous Counterfeit Drugs
By John Y. Brown III, on Tue Jun 19, 2012 at 12:00 PM ET
What we do is only what we do. Not who we are. (Or why lawyers shouldn’t commit suicide)
As my teen kids get older I encourage them to find “their people”–the groups where they feel they belong and are most at home with. Their tribe, so …to speak. For me, one of the first such groups I found this kinship with was lawyers. I’m one myself, though non-practicing. I found that my interests, ways of thinking, sense of humor, social concerns and life aspirations lined up well with other lawyers–more so than say engineers, accountants, or medical professionals.
Lawyers are a quirky bunch. I joked the other day that one appeal of the profession is that it allows an individual to take his or her collective character defects and bill for them. It’s an exacting, hyper-competitive and idealized profession where each day you start off feeling like Perry Mason but finish the day feeling more like Melville’s Bartleby the Scrivener. And so it’s not a shock that attorney’s, as a group, suffer a notably higher than average rate of depression, addiction and suicide. It’s a profession that is both analytical and philosophical. Lawyers are trained to think more and feel less. And many eventually find themselves, on their bad days, on an intellectual precipice staring down, as Nietzsche observed, at the abyss. And the abyss can seem both all consuming and mocking. And since lawyers are not encouraged to ask for help themselves –since they aspire for the controlled hero role in their jobs– they are left alone to do as they are trained to do: To “think their way” out of a problem that was created, ironically, by over-thinking.
My mother tells me my favorite book as a young child was What People Do All Day by Richard Scarry. In the book it explains how everyone has a job to do during the day. Some are bakers, some are firemen, some our merchants, some are farmers, some are moms, some are repairmen, some are are doctors and some are lawyers. And so on. And each has some task or assignment for the day that makes everything kind of work together.
The reason I started this post was to link to this story —an eloquent reflection on on the legal profession by one of Kentucky’s wisest and most insightful practitioners, Supreme Court Justice Bill Cunningham, who recently lost yet another friend and colleague to suicide. Click here to read the story.
But I think I’d rather end this post on a more mundane note. Or rather a mundane hope. That lawyers, like the characters in Richard Scarry’s “What People Do All Day” realize they are only doing a job, completing a task, fulfilling a role that makes society somehow work. If it wasn’t being a lawyer they’d be doing some other job that makes society function. And that it’s just a job, like any other. And that they are just people too. Mostly just trying to stay busy all day.
And others in our busy little towns have jobs that can help those struggling with depression, addiction and thoughts of suicide. And that these people need to stay busy too–from people who need them and reach out for their help. Or our busy little towns won’t work so well.
Whether Chief Justice John Roberts changed his mind, or is the latest example of Republican justices “evolving” on the bench, he has done the improbable: liberals are praising a Supreme Court that they had trashed as a player in a right-wing conspiracy. Old sins like Citizens United are washed away, as are President Obama’s spring musings about the dangers of an unelected court unaccountable to public opinion. The about-face is jarring even in a political atmosphere where the right result typically makes right.
The notion that the Supreme Court’s imprimatur alters the electoral equation implies that the hostility to Obamacare among Independents and swing voters is related to their doubts about the law’s legitimacy. To the contrary, there is considerably more polling evidence that the political middle’s resistance to the Affordable Care Act is grounded in bread and butter realities: sticker shot at the cost; reflexive doubts that any fledgling federal bureaucracy will work the way it is supposed to; and a suspicion that for all the hoopla, the reform won’t lower their premiums or improve their coverage. The constitutional gripe never really permeated the congressiona ldebate, and it has become a rallying point only within the GOP’s Tea Party base and on the intellectual right: two places that are not exactly part of the persuadable voter universe, and two sectors that aren’t about to rethink thei ropinion based on a one vote escape act. 
