Politics & Current Events
2Vermont
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Q re: Supreme Court
I was just checking the update for how Day 2 went for the oral arguments re: Obamacare. Regarding the individual mandate, I read that it looks like 4 liberal judges seem set to vote for it and 3 conservative against (leaving two undecided). I guess I just don't understand why liberal or conservative should come into play. Something is either constitutional or not, no? Can someone explain this to me?
And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this Rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.
Re: Q re: Supreme Court
a lot will depend on how you interpret the constitution.
A liberal judge is more likely to allow the fed gov't more powers where as conservative judges tend to be mores strict constructionists.
Above Us Only Sky
Ditto pp - there are different ways to interpret the Constitution. It's rarely as simple and black and white as being constitutional or not.
For the same reasons people around here disagree over whether the mandate is constitutional or whether the birthcontrolgate is constitutional.
Whether something is or is not constitutional is not an easy question, and there are different ways of interpreting the constitution.
For example, liberals tend to believe that the Commerce Clause, which gives the federal government the power to regulate interstate commerce, should be interpreted broadly (eg anything touching upon interstate commerce falls within federal powers), and conservative see it more narrow (eg you need a heightened showing that something relates to or affects interstate commerce for the feds to have the power to do it). Other parts of the Constitution have similar splits as to how to read them.
Liberals also tend to believe that the constitution is a living document, and the words in it take on present day meanings. Some conservatives tend to read the definitions of the words as if they existed at the time the Constitution (or the amendment) was written ("originalism"), which is a slightly different approach than another conservative philosophy, "strict constructionism."
I'm speaking in very, very generally here. Each justice often has their own nuanced way of approaching these things. But basically, the best way to think about it is that reading and interpreting the Constitution is a lot like reading and interpreting the Bible. People can differ in their interpretation and application of it, but it does not mean that one person is right and the other is wrong.
Please tell me who the four "liberal" justices are.
I am the 99%.
Probably the same justices @USAToday thinks they are? http://ow.ly/9W3Xc Just pointing out this doesn't stem from @2Vermont.
I don't know off-hand. I would have to go back to the article I found that was updating the SC arguments (and I don't have the time...sorry...it is part of the link that Druid had in the oral arguments thread though).
As for most of your responses, yeah, I would like things simpler ...lol...
Thank you to ESF....your response was very helpful. I know it was general, but that is a good way to explain things to my non-lawyer brain. :-)
Rachel Maddow did a piece on this yesterday, about how the court is increasingly seen as a partisan tool, and how they may want to avoid another 5-4 decision that would further cement that impression in the wake of Citizens United and Bush v Gore
If you can watch video, it's a good clip
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#46875101
Oh, c'mon. This seems to be a no-brainer. I find it telling that the four "liberal" justices, by any account I have read, have already made up their minds. There is no chance that they will change their minds. The arguments don't matter. They're apologists and defenders of the law.
On the other hand, "conservative" justices seem like they are more open-minded going into it, particularly Chief Justice John Roberts and maybe Scalia. Kennedy it goes without saying could be the swing vote.
I really like what I am reading about how it might be less "extreme" to knock down the whole law rather than simply some parts. It's foolish to let the law stand without the funding mechanism that makes it palatable.
Jeffrey Toobin says that the individual mandate is doomed and that it might be plane wreck or train wreck for the administration. At least it's popular and helped the Democrats at the polls in 2010. Oh wait, it wasn't and didn't. The law should be struck down because getting rid of the mandate would give voters a false sense of security, when really a lot of the damaging provisions would stand, and costs would go out of control.
It looks like from what I'm reading out there now that they seem to be leaning towards striking down the whole thing rather than trying to keep other parts if they decide the individual mandate is unconstitutional.