Syllabus of the decision - And my opinion of Roberts' opinion

Basically, Roberts states that because it looks KINDA like a tax, and that Congress isn't allowed to do what it wants under the Commerce clause, and just because there's nothing describing this situation in the Constitution....and something MUST be done... then its a tax.

Hmmmm, Congress is not allowed to mandate a penalty. In fact, can't use the Commerce clause at all for this....but can be allowed to tax us to encourage us to utilize what is mandated.....but its not a mandate...because its a tax.....and we now have a choice.....to pay. Or break the law.

Roberts is a progressive bastard. A lying, progressive crapweasel.

Here's a summary of what the sane people on the bench said. The Dissent.


For entire decision, go HERE.

Bolding mine.
OCTOBER TERM, 2011
Syllabus
NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as isbeing done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

NATIONAL FEDERATION OF INDEPENDENT
BUSINESS ET AL. v. SEBELIUS, SECRETARY OF
HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, ET AL.
CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

No. 11–393. Argued March 26, 27, 28, 2012—Decided June 28, 2012*
In 2010, Congress enacted the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in order to increase the number of Americans covered by health insurance and decrease the cost of health care. One key provision is the individual mandate, which requires most Americans to maintain“minimum essential” health insurance coverage. 26 U. S. C. §5000A.For individuals who are not exempt, and who do not receive health insurance through an employer or government program, the means of satisfying the requirement is to purchase insurance from a private company. Beginning in 2014, those who do not comply with the mandate must make a “[s]hared responsibility payment” to the Federal Government. §5000A(b)(1). The Act provides that this “penalty”will be paid to the Internal Revenue Service with an individual’s taxes, and “shall be assessed and collected in the same manner” as tax penalties. §§5000A(c), (g)(1). Another key provision of the Act is the Medicaid expansion. The current Medicaid program offers federal funding to States to assist pregnant women, children, needy families, the blind, the elderly, and the disabled in obtaining medical care. 42 U. S. C. §1396d(a). The Affordable Care Act expands the scope of the Medicaid program and increases the number of individuals the States must cover. For ex——————
*Together with No. 11–398, Department of Health and Human Services et al. v. Florida et al., and No. 11–400, Florida et al. v. Department of Health and Human Services et al., also on certiorari to the same court.

2 NATIONAL FEDERATION OF INDEPENDENT
BUSINESS v. SEBELIUS

Syllabus

ample, the Act requires state programs to provide Medicaid coverage by 2014 to adults with incomes up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level, whereas many States now cover adults with children only if their income is considerably lower, and do not cover childless adults at all. §1396a(a)(10)(A)(i)(VIII). The Act increases federal funding to cover the States’ costs in expanding Medicaid coverage. §1396d(y)(1). But if a State does not comply with the Act’s new coverage requirements, it may lose not only the federal funding for those requirements, but all of its federal Medicaid funds. §1396c.

Twenty-six States, several individuals, and the National Federation of Independent Business brought suit in Federal District Court,challenging the constitutionality of the individual mandate and the Medicaid expansion. The Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit upheld the Medicaid expansion as a valid exercise of Congress’s spending power, but concluded that Congress lacked authority to enact the individual mandate. Finding the mandate severable from the Act’s other provisions, the Eleventh Circuit left the rest of the Act intact.
Held: The judgment is affirmed in part and reversed in part.
648 F. 3d 1235, affirmed in part and reversed in part.

1. CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Part II, concluding that the Anti-Injunction Act does not bar this suit.
The Anti-Injunction Act provides that “no suit for the purpose of restraining the assessment or collection of any tax shall be maintained in any court by any person,” 26 U. S. C. §7421(a), so that those subject to a tax must first pay it and then sue for a refund. The present challenge seeks to restrain the collection of the shared responsibility payment from those who do not comply with the individual mandate. But Congress did not intend the payment to be treated as a “tax” for purposes of the Anti-Injunction Act. The Affordable Care Act describes the payment as a “penalty,” not a “tax.” That label cannot control whether the payment is a tax for purposes of the Constitution, but it does determine the application of the Anti-Injunction Act. The Anti-Injunction Act therefore does not bar this suit. Pp. 11–15.

2. CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS concluded in Part III–A that the individual mandate is not a valid exercise of Congress’s power under the Commerce Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause. Pp. 16–30. (FINALLY, SOME RESTRAINT. BUT HE COULD HAVE SAID THIS WHILE DISMISSING.)

(a) The Constitution grants Congress the power to “regulate Commerce.” Art. I, §8, cl. 3 (emphasis added). The power to regulate commerce presupposes the existence of commercial activity to be regulated. This Court’s precedent reflects this understanding: As expansive as this Court’s cases construing the scope of the commerce power have been, they uniformly describe the power as reaching “activity.” E.g., United States v. Lopez, 514 U. S. 549, 560. The individual mandate, however, does not regulate existing commercial activity. It instead compels individuals to become active in commerce by purchasing a product, on the ground that their failure to do so affects interstate commerce.
Construing the Commerce Clause to permit Congress to regulate individuals precisely because they are doing nothing would open a new and potentially vast domain to congressional authority. Congress already possesses expansive power to regulate what people do. Upholding the Affordable Care Act under the Commerce Clause would give Congress the same license to regulate what people do not do. The Framers knew the difference between doing something and doing nothing. They gave Congress the power to regulate commerce, not to compel it. Ignoring that distinction would undermine the principle that the Federal Government is a government of limited and enumerated powers. The individual mandate thus cannot be sustained under Congress’s power to “regulate Commerce.” Pp. 16–27.(AT LEAST THIS IS RIGHT BUT HE COULD HAVE STATED THIS WHILE DISMISSING.)

(b) Nor can the individual mandate be sustained under the Necessary and Proper Clause as an integral part of the Affordable Care Act’s other reforms. (SO...MANDATES ARE ILLEGAL. PERIOD.) Each of this Court’s prior cases upholding laws under that Clause involved exercises of authority derivative of, and n service to, a granted power. E.g., United States v. Comstock, 560 U.S. ___. The individual mandate, by contrast, vests Congress with the extraordinary ability to create the necessary predicate to the exercise of an enumerated power and draw within its regulatory scope those who would otherwise be outside of it. Even if the individual mandate is “necessary” to the Affordable Care Act’s other reforms, such an expansion of federal power is not a “proper” means for making those reforms effective. Pp. 27–30.
3. CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS concluded in Part III–B that the individual mandate must be construed as imposing a tax on those who do not have health insurance, if such a construction is reasonable.(SO THE MANDATE IS ILLEGAL. BUT WE'LL TAX YOU IF YOU DON'T HAVE INSURANCE SO GO BUY IT.)
The most straightforward reading of the individual mandate is that it commands individuals to purchase insurance. But, for the reasons explained, the Commerce Clause does not give Congress that power.It is therefore necessary to turn to the Government’s alternative argument: that the mandate may be upheld as within Congress’s power to “lay and collect Taxes.” Art. I, §8, cl. 1. In pressing its taxing power argument, the Government asks the Court to view the mandate as imposing a tax on those who do not buy that product. Because “every reasonable construction must be resorted to, in order to save a statute from unconstitutionality,” Hooper v. California, 155 U. S. 648, 657, the question is whether it is “fairly possible” to interpret the mandate as imposing such a tax, Crowell v. Benson, 285
U. S. 22, 62. Pp. 31–32.
4. CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Part III–C, concluding that the individual mandate may be upheld as within Congress’s power under the Taxing Clause. Pp. 33–44.
(a) The Affordable Care Act describes the “[s]hared responsibility payment” as a “penalty,” not a “tax.” That label is fatal to the application of the Anti-Injunction Act. It does not, however, control whether an exaction is within Congress’s power to tax. In answering that constitutional question, this Court follows a functional approach,“[d]isregarding the designation of the exaction, and viewing its substance and application.” United States v. Constantine, 296 U. S. 287, 294. Pp. 33–35.
(b)
Such an analysis suggests that the shared responsibility payment may for constitutional purposes be considered a tax. The payment is not so high that there is really no choice but to buy health insurance; the payment is not limited to willful violations (OF COURSE NOT. YOU CAN BUY INSURANCE AND PAY THE "TAX), as penalties for unlawful acts often are; and the payment is collected solely by the IRS through the normal means of taxation. Cf. Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Co., 259 U. S. 20, 36–37. None of this is to say that payment is not intended to induce the purchase of health insurance. But the mandate need not be read to declare that failing to do so is unlawful. Neither the Affordable Care Act nor any other law attaches negative legal consequences to not buying health insurance, beyond requiring a payment to the IRS. And Congress’s choice of language—stating that individuals “shall” obtain insurance or pay a “penalty”—does not require reading §5000A as punishing unlawful conduct. It may also be read as imposing a tax on those who go without insurance. (WHAT THE HELL? THIS IS WHERE HE STRETCHES THE LOGIC. ITS NOT A PENALTY. YOU ARE JUST FORCED TO PAY THE IRS FOR NOT BUYING INSURANCE. THIS IS A CROCK OF CRAP.)See New York v. United States, 505 U. S. 144, 169–174. Pp. 35–40.
(c)Even if the mandate may reasonably be characterized as a tax, it must still comply with the Direct Tax Clause, which provides:“No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be taken.” Art. I, §9, cl. 4. A tax on going without health insurance is not like a capitation or other direct tax under this Court’s precedents. It therefore need not be apportioned so that each State pays in proportion toits population. Pp. 40–41.(EVEN THOUGH YOU ARE BEING DIRECTLY TAXED FOR NONCOMPLIANCE.)
5. CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS, joined by JUSTICE BREYER and JUSTICE KAGAN, concluded in Part IV that the Medicaid expansion violates the Constitution by threatening States with the loss of their existing Medicaid funding if they decline to comply with the expansion. Pp. 45–58.
Cite as: 567 U. S. ____ (2012) 5

(a)The Spending Clause grants Congress the power “to pay the Debts and provide for the . . . general Welfare of the United States.” Art. I, §8, cl. 1. Congress may use this power to establish cooperative state-federal Spending Clause programs. The legitimacy of Spending Clause legislation, however, depends on whether a State voluntarily and knowingly accepts the terms of such programs. Pennhurst State School and Hospital v. Halderman, 451 U. S. 1, 17. “[T]he Constitution simply does not give Congress the authority to require the States to regulate.” New York v. United States, 505 U. S. 144, 178. When Congress threatens to terminate other grants as a means of pressuring the States to accept a Spending Clause program, the legislation runs counter to this Nation’s system of federalism. Cf. South Dakota v. Dole, 483 U. S. 203, 211. Pp. 45–51.
(b)Section 1396c gives the Secretary of Health and Human Services the authority to penalize States that choose not to participate in the Medicaid expansion by taking away their existing Medicaid funding. 42 U. S. C. §1396c. The threatened loss of over 10 percent of a State’s overall budget is economic dragooning that leaves the States with no real option but to acquiesce in the Medicaid expansion. The Government claims that the expansion is properly viewed as only a modification of the existing program, and that this modification is permissible because Congress reserved the “right to alter, amend, or repeal any provision” of Medicaid. §1304. But the expansion accomplishes a shift in kind, not merely degree. The original program was designed to cover medical services for particular categories of vulnerable individuals. Under the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid is transformed into a program to meet the health care needs of the entire non elderly population with income below 133 percent of the poverty level. A State could hardly anticipate that Congress’s reservation of the right to “alter” or “amend” the Medicaid program included the power to transform it so dramatically. The Medicaid expansion thus violates the Constitution by threatening States with the loss of their existing Medicaid funding if they decline to comply with the expansion. Pp. 51–55.
(c)The constitutional violation is fully remedied by precluding the Secretary from applying §1396c to withdraw existing Medicaid funds for failure to comply with the requirements set out in the expansion. See §1303. The other provisions of the Affordable Care Act are not affected. Congress would have wanted the rest of the Act to stand, had it known that States would have a genuine choice whether to participate in the Medicaid expansion. Pp. 55–58.
6. JUSTICE GINSBURG, joined by JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, is of the view that the Spending Clause does not preclude the Secretary from withholding Medicaid funds based on a State’s refusal to comply with the expanded Medicaid program. But given the majority view, she agrees with THE CHIEF JUSTICE’s conclusion in Part IV–B that the Medicaid Act’s severability clause, 42 U. S. C. §1303, determines the appropriate remedy. Because THE CHIEF JUSTICE finds the withholding—not the granting—of federal funds incompatible with the Spending Clause, Congress’ extension of Medicaid remains available to any State that affirms its willingness to participate. Even absent §1303’scommand, the Court would have no warrant to invalidate the funding offered by the Medicaid expansion, and surely no basis to tear down the ACA in its entirety. When a court confronts an unconstitutional statute, its endeavor must be to conserve, not destroy, the legislation. See, e.g., Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New Eng., 546 U. S. 320, 328–330. Pp. 60–61.
ROBERTS, C. J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, II, and III–C, in which GINSBURG, BREYER, SOTOMAYOR, and KAGAN, JJ., joined; an opinion with respect to Part IV, in which BREYER and KAGAN, JJ., joined; and an opinion with respect to Parts III–A, III–B, and III–D. GINSBURG, J., filed an opinion concurring in part, concurring in the judgment in part,and dissenting in part, in which SOTOMAYOR, J., joined, and in which BREYER and KAGAN, JJ., joined as to Parts I, II, III, and IV. SCALIA, KENNEDY, THOMAS, and ALITO, JJ., filed a dissenting opinion. THOMAS, J., filed a dissenting opinion.
_________________
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The Republic's No-Good, Horrible, Very Bad Day....and Chief Justice Roberts is a lying sack of....

In honor of the horrible, no good, crappy, dishonest, clusterf#ck of a SCOTUS opinion by that coward Roberts who stretched logic to absurd lengths to justify his capitulation of his duty, stretched it so thin that even I could tell that he contradicted himself within one paragraph, to justify REWRITING the law, and thus giving power to Congress to tax us for ANYTHING....



A RE-POST OF TWO VERY RELEVANT PIECES BY CONCRETEBOB


Its a Dessert Topping, Its a Floor Wax

Heritage Foundation Morning Bell

The New York Times confirmed Friday that in preparation for defending constitutionality of the Obamacare individual mandate in court, an Obama Justice Department legal brief argues that the penalty used to enforce the mandate is “a valid exercise” of Congress’s power to impose taxes. Mr. Obama’s own Justice Department further repudiates the President’s earlier statement by noting that the penalty is imposed and collected under the Internal Revenue Code, people must report it on their tax returns, and that the Congressional Budget Office estimates that it will cost Americans $4 billion a year. Yale Law School professor Jack Balkin told a meeting of progressive activists last month that President Obama “has not been honest with the American people about the nature of this bill. This bill is a tax.”

The fact that the Obama administration and their allies are now admitting the individual mandate is a tax betrays their very real fear that the Supreme Court could find Obamacare’s individual mandate unconstitutional. In the bill itself, Congress identified the Commerce Clause as the source of their authority to force all Americans to buy health insurance. But as our legal team has made imminently clear, the mandate does not purport to regulate or prohibit commerce of any kind. To the contrary, it purports to “regulate”—and penalize—inactivity. If the Supreme Court allows the Obamacare individual mandate to stand, then Congress could do anything it wanted. They could: require us to buy a new Chevy Impala each year to support the government-supported auto industry; require us to buy war bonds to pay for the Iraq and Afghan wars; or force us to eat our vegetables.

Its a Dessert Topping, Its a Floor Wax, Its A Fine, Its NOT a Tax

"Legal arguments for Obamacare's individual mandate fail the 'Alice in Wonderland' test and the duck test. In two court challenges to the law in the past 11 days and a court hearing today on a third, the Obama administration's legal position is fading faster than the Cheshire Cat.

'The provisions of the Health Care Reform Act at issue here, for the most part, have nothing to do with the assessment or collection of taxes,' Judge Steeh ruled.

This is so important that the federal district judge in Florida, in Thursday's preliminary ruling in the second case, spent 22 pages analyzing it. If the fine is a penalty rather than a tax, Congress' power is far less extensive.

Judge Roger Vinson noted Congress repeatedly called the fine a 'penalty,' explicitly changing its description from a 'tax' that earlier versions of the bill assessed by name. Citing Alice's admonition to Humpty Dumpty that words can't 'mean so many different things' as Humpty intended, Judge Vinson concluded, 'Congress should not be permitted to secure and cast politically difficult votes on controversial legislation by deliberately calling something one thing ... [only to] argue in court that Congress really meant something else entirely.'

Judge Vinson explained that no matter what Congress called it, the assessment was designed to act as a punishment, not a revenue measure. Hence, it's not a tax.

His 22-page analysis is an exposition of the logic that if something is called a duck, acts like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck -- and the same goes for a penalty. The tax issue is vital because it's the Obama administration's fallback position if it loses on the first and biggest dispute, which is whether Congress has the power under the Commerce Clause not only to regulate commerce, but to force individuals to engage in specific commerce."

--The Washington Times

The Vetting - Obama Channels Derrick Bell in Attack on Supreme Court

The Vetting - Obama Channels Derrick Bell in Attack on Supreme Court

Its all those racist white men on the Supreme Court. yeah, thats it, racist white men; yeah yeah. Devious, cunning, calculating and dangerous to the original intent of the writers of the Constitution.

The president deliberately confused judicial activism--the wholesale manufacture of rights and laws by judges in accordance with their personal or political views--with judicial review, the power courts have to overturn unconstitutional legislation, which the Supreme Court has exercised since Marbury v. Madison (1803).

What is important about Obama’s attack on the Supreme Court yesterday is not that he attacked “judicial activism,” but that he attacked the court at all. It is clear that Obama does not even believe what he said about judicial review—i.e. that courts should not overturn a “duly constituted” law that had received a majority vote in the legislature. If he did, his Department of Justice would not be suing the state of Arizona over its immigration law, and would not be suing the state of Texas over its new voter ID law. In that sense, his comments are merely partisan hypocrisy.

But Obama, following Bell, does believe that the Supreme Court does not deserve the respect accorded to it by his predecessors (even FDR “usually waited” until the Court had made its decisions before criticizing it).

As always, we should pay more attention to Obama’s actions than his words. The very fact that he disparaged the Court is more important than the muddled substance of what he said.

The Imperial President: Obama Wages War on SCOTUS, Congress

The Imperial President: Obama Wages War on SCOTUS, Congress

President Obama’s latest attack on the Supreme Court is just the latest evidence of his deep-rooted disdain not just for the Constitution, but for the system of checks and balances it represents. Prior to his election, Obama told Americans that we were just days away from “fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” He didn’t mean that simply in terms of policy, although he certainly wanted redistributionist policy to take center stage. He meant it in terms of governmental structure.

Obama doesn’t like that “big, messy, tough democracy.” He wants what Arthur Schlesinger Jr. once called The Imperial Presidency. He wants the Supreme Court to do his bidding, or shut up. He wants Congress to get out of the way. He wants power, in its purest, most unbridled form. Should he win re-election, he will undoubtedly pursue that vital goal. After all, how are you going to get “fundamental change” without fundamentally undermining the Constitutional structure?

The Man Is Earning His Pay

Attorney General Cuccinelli announces he will seek expedited review of Virginia health care lawsuit in the Supreme Court

RICHMOND (February 3, 2011) – Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli announced today that Virginia will file a petition to ask the United States Supreme Court to take Virginia’s health care lawsuit now, as opposed to waiting for the case to first be decided by the court of appeals. The Petition for Certiorari Before Judgment in the United States Supreme Court in the case of Commonwealth v. Sebelius will be filed pursuant to Rule 11 of the Rules of the United States Supreme Court.

“Given the uncertainty caused by the divergent rulings of the various district courts on the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, we feel that it is necessary to seek resolution of this issue as quickly as possible,” said Cuccinelli. “Currently, state governments and private businesses are being forced to expend enormous amounts of resources to prepare to implement a law that, in the end, may be declared unconstitutional. Regardless of whether you believe the law is constitutional or not, we should all agree that a prompt resolution of this issue is in everyone’s best interest.”

Normally, appeals of decisions of United States district courts are first heard in the federal courts of appeals. But Rule 11 provides that an immediate review in the U.S. Supreme Court is permissible “upon a showing that the case is of such imperative public importance as to justify deviation from normal appellate practice and to require immediate determination in” the Supreme Court.

Cuccinelli noted, “Rule 11 is the exception to the general rule, but this case and the other cases challenging the constitutionality of PPACA are truly exceptional in their own right. There are a number of suits pending throughout the country challenging the constitutionality of PPACA. Presently, 28 states have filed suits challenging the authority of Congress to enact this law. That, in and of itself, is exceptional and makes the cases excellent candidates for immediate review in the Supreme Court.

“We did not make this decision lightly. Given his unique responsibilities to fund and implement PPACA as Governor of Virginia, Governor McDonnell is particularly concerned about the possibility of wasting precious and strained taxpayer dollars preparing for a law that may well be struck down. Recognizing the tremendous amount of time and resources that are and will be expended to implement a law that two federal judges have ruled contains unconstitutional provisions, Lieutenant Governor Bolling and Speaker Howell have joined the governor in requesting that my office seek expedited review. Additionally, I have been encouraged to attempt to expedite this case by Democrats as well as Republicans in Virginia's General Assembly, and of course, the bipartisan passage of Virginia's Health Care Freedom Act last year was the very first step in this entire process here in the commonwealth.

“Despite the fact that the Department of Justice has not agreed to join in a Rule 11 motion, in a filing with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit to set an expedited schedule for its appeal of Virginia's district court victory, the Justice Department stated, ‘The constitutionality of [PPACA] has public policy implications of the highest magnitude.’ In other words, according to the Justice Department itself, a case cannot have public policy implications that are more important than this case. We agree and feel that reinforces the fitting nature of our request for immediate review in the Supreme Court,” Cuccinelli said.

The Petition for Certiorari and Appendix are currently being assembled by the legal printer for the attorney general and will be filed with the court as soon as is practicable.

Justice Thomas On CU v FEC Decision

So it would appear that the original law dates back to the early 1900's with a Democrat Senator from Dixie trying to keep the black man in his place and silence the mean old Republican corporations.

Justice Defends Ruling on Finance

Justice Thomas responded to several questions from students at Stetson University College of Law in Gulfport, Fla., concerning the campaign finance case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. By a 5-to-4 vote, with Justice Thomas in the majority, the court ruled last month that corporations had a First Amendment right to spend money to support or oppose political candidates.

“I found it fascinating that the people who were editorializing against it were The New York Times Company and The Washington Post Company,” Justice Thomas said. “These are corporations.”

The part of the McCain-Feingold law struck down in Citizens United contained an exemption for news reports, commentaries and editorials. But Justice Thomas said that reflected a legislative choice rather than a constitutional principle.

He added that the history of Congressional regulation of corporate involvement in politics had a dark side, pointing to the Tillman Act, which banned corporate contributions to federal candidates in 1907.

“Go back and read why Tillman introduced that legislation,” Justice Thomas said, referring to Senator Benjamin Tillman. “Tillman was from South Carolina, and as I hear the story he was concerned that the corporations, Republican corporations, were favorable toward blacks and he felt that there was a need to regulate them.”

It is thus a mistake, the justice said, to applaud the regulation of corporate speech as “some sort of beatific action.”

Justice Thomas said the First Amendment’s protections applied regardless of how people chose to assemble to participate in the political process.

“If 10 of you got together and decided to speak, just as a group, you’d say you have First Amendment rights to speak and the First Amendment right of association,” he said. “If you all then formed a partnership to speak, you’d say we still have that First Amendment right to speak and of association.”

“But what if you put yourself in a corporate form?” Justice Thomas asked, suggesting that the answer must be the same.

Asked about his attitude toward the two decisions overruled in Citizens United, he said, “If it’s wrong, the ultimate precedent is the Constitution.”

Flat Tax or Fair Tax - We Need One or the Other

10% Flat Tax across the board. No deductions, no exemptions. Paid quarterly. Everyone pays.
If you want to access the "real cash" flowing daily in America, a 10% National Retail Sales Tax will get anyone who buys stuff. A VAT will only add to the base cost of goods, and will be passed on to the consumer.

Repeal the Sixteenth Amendment
by Paul Moreno
01/14/2010

One hundred years ago, Congress sent a constitutional amendment to the states to permit the federal government to tax incomes. The pressure for an income tax had been building ever since the Supreme Court declared the 1894 income tax unconstitutional -- as a “direct” tax, it had to be apportioned among the states according to population. Such apportionment would defeat the principal aim of the tax’s southern and western Populist proponents, which was to shift the tax burden onto the high-income states of the Northeast.

In 1909, these Populists wanted a corporate income tax as well as a personal income tax. The story goes that the conservative Republicans, led by Sen. Nelson W. Aldrich of Rhode Island, agreed to enact a corporation tax but let a personal income tax depend on the ratification of a constitutional amendment -- one that they were confident the states would not ratify. Aldrich openly stated that he would vote for the corporation tax in order to defeat the income tax.

To the Republicans’ surprise, the states quickly ratified the Sixteenth Amendment, and we have both corporate and personal income taxes.

The income tax, as its opponents a century ago predicted, has become a monstrosity. It has spawned a system of special privileges and penalties as Congress uses it to promote and discourage all sorts of policies that have nothing to do with raising revenue, nothing to do with the Constitution’s grant of power to “collect taxes… to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.”

The income tax is also the source of our deranged health-insurance system. During World War II, the government prohibited employers from competing for workers via higher wages. Instead, employers began to offer health insurance as a tax-deductible fringe benefit.

The ridiculously arcane tax code has spawned entire industries, costing billions of dollars, in which individuals and businesses lobby for exemptions, try to exploit loopholes, or simply struggle to comply with the code. The system is so ridiculously complex that the Secretary of the Treasury (the chief tax-collector) and the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee (the chief author of the tax law) can claim that they failed to pay their taxes because they didn’t understand the tax code.

Our dysfunctional tax system has led many to advocate a radically simplified “flat tax.” Others call for the abolition of the income tax and adoption of a national sales or “value-added” tax (VAT). Conservatives dislike the VAT idea because, as an indirect and hidden tax, it makes it much easier for the government to raise taxes. Liberals dislike the VAT because it is regressive, taxing everyone’s consumption equally, rather than falling more heavily on the rich.

The problem is that, like Nelson Aldrich, we will end up with both an income tax and a VAT. Indeed, that could happen even if we did repeal the Sixteenth Amendment. A good argument can be made that the amendment was unnecessary, because Congress had always had the power to tax incomes, and it was the Supreme Court that got it wrong when it struck down the 1894 income tax. The federal government had collected an income tax during the Civil War, which the Supreme Court upheld (at least with regard to professional earnings) in 1881.

So, to be really certain, we need to amend the Constitution in such a way as to prohibit income taxation.

More Barack Obama Birth Certificate Case Info

Press Release:
Lightfoot v Bowen...Mission Viejo, Ca. (NS/OrlyTaitz) -
On December 2nd a Petition for an extraordinary Writ of Mandamus was filed in the Supreme Court of California.

This petition (as seen in the attachment) states that Mr. Obama has not proven his "natural born citizen" status and cannot be sworn as a president of the United States and the commander in Chief.

There are 7 plaintiffs in this case and they include Vice Presidential candidate for Ron Paul, on the ballot in CA, Ms Gail Lightfoot, 4 electors and two registered voters...A number of plaintiffs in this action are veterans and former servicemen, that are concerned about a prospect of Mr Obama becoming the Commander in Chief of the US army, without providing any information, as to his citizenship at birth and currently, particularly citizenship of Indonesia, Kenya and Great Britain (Kenya was a British colony in 1961, at the time of Mr. Obama's birth) without providing his immigration records, passports or even as much as the original birth certificate from Hawaii, that is supposed to show the name of the hospital and the name and the signature of the doctor, that can be verified against the vital records from the hospital.

Within two days of filing on Friday 12.05.08. at 9:45 PM, the Supreme court of California has issued a denial, that will allow the attorney on the case, Ms. Orly Taitz, an Application for Emergency Stay in the Supreme Court of the United States as early as Monday, the 8th of December. The case will be reviewed by the Supreme Court JudgeAnthony Kennedy...

PDF file of the petition can be found on:http://drorly.blogspot.com...

More information on the case will be provided at the press conferenceat the National Press Club in the Washington DC, to be held on 12.08.08. at 1:30 Eastern time...

Ms. Taitz is also one of two attorneys, representing Ambassador Alan Keyes et all against Ms. Bowen, CA Secretary of State et all. This case will be heard in CA Superior court prior to the Certification of votes...(pdf file of Keyes v Bowen is also on the drorly.blogspot.com)...
Orly Taitz, Esq...26302 La Paz ste 211Mission Viejo, Ca 92691--~--~---------~--~----~

The Lawyers involved in the Obama birth certificate case have asked for any concerned Veterans who are interested to show up Monday Dec. 8th at 1:30 PM ET in Washington, DC at the National Press Club for the Press Conference...

The Birth Certificate Issue is Still Alive

And still a huge question mark for a lot of people.

This is just a small snippet from RightSideNews

Supreme Court Justice David Souter's Clerk informed Philip J. Berg, the lawyer who brought the case against Obama, that his petition for an injunction to stay the November 4th election was denied, but the Clerk also required the defendants to respond to the Writ of Certiorari (which requires the concurrence of four Justices) by December 1. At that time, Mr. Obama must present to the Court an authentic birth certificate, after which Mr. Berg will respond.
If Obama fails to do that, it is sure to inspire the skepticism of the Justices, who are unaccustomed to being defied. They will have to decide what to do about a president-elect who refuses to prove his natural-born citizenship.

News Alert: The Partial-birth Abortion Ban Stands

This just released from Washington Post:

"The Supreme Court today narrowly upheld a nationwide ban on a controversial abortion procedure, handing a major victory to President Bush and his social conservative allies.

In a 5-4 vote, the court ruled that the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, which Bush signed into law in 2003, does not violate a woman's right to have an abortion, which has been the law of the land since the landmark 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade.
The dramatic decision delivered to abortion opponents the promise of a more conservative court reconstituted by Bush."

I can just hear the screams of horror from N.O.W.
Countdown to the next march on Wahsington in 5, 4, 3, 2....

***UPDATE***

Here is a sobering statistic from the article:
"Kennedy wrote in his opinion that of the approximately 1.3 million abortions performed each year in the United States, 85 to 90 percent are done during the first trimester of pregnancy, meaning that they are not regulated by the 2003 law."

Wow, just wow.

New Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito!

Neener Neener Neener



Dark Eyed Junko said...

I can appreciate your enthusiasm and support for the new Justice, but your comment "Neener neener neener" is more hurtful than helpful. It's become too commonplace for people to take sides, as if rooting for a football team. Unfortunately, that way of thinking only undermines the political process by impeding meaningful discussion of the issues. I see the same thing happening equally with both sides of the spectrum, and it makes me sad that people are too preoccupied with the thrill of victory to see how contemptuous it all is to our democracy.

6:03 PM

f mcdonald said...

After the sophomoric way SUPREME COURT JUSTICE ALITO was maligned, ridiculed and demeaned by certain members of the United States Senate, the leftwing blogosphere, the Deaniacs, the NAGS, etc., etc., I think Neener Neener Neener is quite appropriate and easily understood.

10:12 PM

Other said...

Life forces us to take sides and then our only choices are how to respond. There is no progress or even change without conflict. We learn how to walk because we are in conflict with gravity; sitting on the floor not being able to reach something.
It isn't like a football game because there are so many sides to choose from. This really complex game has few rules and they keep changing and then you pick whether you're going to carry the ball for awhile or be a cheerleader. Nobody gets to be a referee or stand on the sidelines, there are no bleachers just a really really big invisible playing field with no lines drawn. and there is no gaterade or Theisman trophy you just get to stay in the game

10:48 PM

f mcdonald said...

Your comment is beautifully written. After reading it, the image that came to mind was Thunderdome.

It seems to me the natural world is incredibly ordered. The more closely science examines it the more this is shown to be true. Man is part of this natural order and law. Men survive the most horrible, brutal circumstances sometimes not even wanting to do so because buried deep within their being is hope. It may be unrecognized and unacknowledged but it is there.

"We don't need another hero
We don't need to know the way home
All we want is life beyond the thunderdome "

3:07 PM

AlitoBlog.com: Are You Ready For Some Hardball?

As Washington braces for Alito's Armageddon, Human Events has created AlitoBlog.com as a one stop source of updated information for activists and news junkies with blow by blow accounts of the struggle to put Judge Samuel Alito on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Be armed with facts. Contact your representatives. Never forget what the media and democrats did to this good and decent man:

Mr. Chairman, in my 43 years on this earth, I have been able, with the help of others and with the help of God, to defy poverty, avoid prison, overcome segregation, bigotry, racism, and obtain one of the finest educations available in this country. But I have not been able to overcome this process. This is worse than any obstacle or anything that I have ever faced...

I will not provide the rope for my own lynching or for further humiliation.

Clarence Thomas, Friday, October 11, 1991 Morning Session

Prayers up for Sam Alito.

nickfinity said...

The confirmation should be interesting. I hope Alito can turn in a performance similar to Roberts.

10:35 AM