Several possibly even tangentially related points:
1) The importance of electing a Republican president so that conservative justices can be appointed does not work. Even if Roberts proves reliable from here on out, Bush's appointee ensured that Obama's signature piece of legislation stands. The Robot had better update his website:
As president, Mitt will nominate judges in the mold of Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Thomas, and Alito.
2) The reasoning strikes me as totally spurious. While the administration did argue that the mandate included a tax--as well as arguing that it did not--the bill was sold to the American people under the auspices of tax-neutrality. It should not be surprising that the government would lie to its citizens, especially when the upside is a free service that will, apparently, pay for itself.
3) If the government has an unlimited power to tax, the Republicans can
actually use this to their advantage. I recommend a tax of $5,000 on
every abortion, to ensure that poor people aren't required to murder
their progeny and to help with the deficit. Other purchases could be
taxed as well, a smug tax on Prius drivers for instance. These measures
aren't conservative, but at least they would be amusing, and much more
effective than the usual GOP policy of nominating justices to stab party
faithful in the back.
4) It is all but certain that this bill will cost far more than we were promised. It will take a few years until the costs become clear, and no doubt the poor economy will be blamed for any failure to meet expectations, but government spending always costs more than promised. For a sobering example, see here.
5) The Republic is doomed, but it has been doomed for awhile now, so there's no reason to be melancholic about this decision. We were insolvent before Obamacare, and although we're more insolvent than before, that's not especially significant. In some respects, this law is actually a good thing, insofar as it should hasten the collapse. So put on a happy face and continue to prepare for the national default.
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I happened upon this article while searching for discussion of Plato’s Republic Book X. This article “Obamacare stands” seems erroneous so I made a post but saw that I had made a typo. I had to delete it because the edit feature was no longer available. I am here reposting…
Committing the fallacy of omission means leaving out relevant information to enhance one's own opinion. The facts left out of "Obamacare (Affordable Health Care Act) stands," is that the freeloading penalty fee is a penalty fee under the tax laws but is not really a tax but a fine for not having insurance found out at the time of expecting healthcare but not being able to show that insurance is had, and affects about 1% of the people, not all of the people, and especially does not affect those who have insurance. It is a prevarication to imply that all of the people would be taxed. It is a typical Republican ignoble strategy to attempt to denigrate a decent healthcare law that helps millions of people. Much good of this bill is consistently hidden by conservatives who have no plan of their own to cover underprivileged people. Criticisms are welcome but not omission of facts which are in effect lies.
Needless to say, I found discussion on Plato’s Republic Books VIII and IX but X seems not to have materialized.
Your clarification is helpful, but I don't see that it changes much. I don't know if the law is decent; no one does, or can, until we find out how it's implemented.
Anyway, here's the link to the discussion of the last section of Plato's Republic.
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