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US Supreme Court Tag

A couple of days ago I charitably described Andrew Cohen's embarrassingly gushing celebration of Justice Sonia Sotomayor and her new book in The Atlantic as "treacly drool." It is not alone, accompanied now by a full court liberal press (NPR, CBS News, the New York...

Mary Jo Kopechne could not be reached for comment....

The big shock in the Supreme Court's Obamacare ruling was not that the law was upheld.  Most people thought there was a substantial chance Justice Kennedy would side with the four liberal Justices. But almost no one thought that it would be Chief Justice John Roberts...

Just breaking, via The Hill: The Supreme Court announced Friday that it will hear a challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) — the federal law that defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman. The court also agreed to hear a...

Argument was heard today in the Supreme Court in Fisher v. University of Texas. The issues, as summarized at ScotusBlog were: This morning the Court heard oral arguments in what is likely to be one of the highest-profile cases of this Term: Fisher v. University of...

The conundrum - how to be intellectually consistent that the mandate was an unconstitutional penalty to force people into commerce, yet deal with the fact that The Chief and the four liberal Justices called it a constitutional tax. I said the only solution to this pretzel...

I guess that doesn't surprise me. Also, does Christie thread the needle on the tax/penalty issue?  Or just muddle things even more?  (not his fault, really) Via Mediaite: Sure. Yeah. I mean, listen, I thought all along that it was a tax. And I don’t think it’s exclusively...

Saving Obamacare by calling a penalty a tax has created all sorts of political contortions. What if the Supreme Court had called a dog a cat, would we then be required to call a dog a cat, particularly if it were better for us? That's where we...

Via @DrMartyFox: Via Newsbusters: And the laughs continue: Obama Budget chief Jack Lew refuses under intense Chris Wallace grilling to admit Obamacare funding mechanism is a tax. Telling.— Brit Hume (@Kimsfirst) July 1, 2012 ...

There's not much I can add to what I have already said about the unreality of the reaction to the Obamacare decision by the conservative silver lining crowd. A growing chorus understands. John Yoo: Conservatives are scrambling to salvage something from the decision of their once-great judicial hero...

I have expressed my frustration with those who see some salvation in the supposed advancement of constitutional federalism in the ruling by Chief Justice Roberts and the four conservative dissenters that the Commerce and Necessary and Proper Clauses did not justify forcing people into commerce. Those...

The self-delusion that yesterday's affirmation of Obamacare's mandate under the taxing power of Congress was a conservative victory continues in full force today.  (See links and quotes at HotAir and Instapundit) Judicial restraint now means ignoring the will of Congress as to the purposes and structure...

Makes many of the points I made today, including rejecting the delusion that this was a victory: ...

Some well-meaning people are peddling the notion that today's Obamacare decision was a long term victory, that we lost the battle but won the war, that there was some master plan by Chief Justice Roberts to gut the expansion of Commerce Clause power under the...

The most disturbing thing about today's decision is not that we lost on the mandate. The majority opinion on the Commerce Clause (the Chief Justice plus the conservative dissenters) was quite good, and vindicated those who mounted an argument as to "inactivity" to the derision...