Thursday, December 4, 2014

Supremes and the ACA

The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case claiming that the administration is violating its own health care law, the ACA, which clearly specifies that financial subsidies can be given only to insurance purchased on "exchanges established by the state." By the individual states. So far just 13 states have set up such exchanges. Yet the administration is giving tax credits to plans bought on the federal exchange — serving 37 states — despite what the law says. This sounds like a clear violation of the ACA as created.
The administration is arguing that "exchanges established by the state" is merely sloppy drafting and that the intent all along was to subsidize all plans on all exchanges.
But that is not true, at least according to the esteemed Professor Gruber, the very loose cannon from the very loose administrative ship. On a separate video in a different speech, he explained what Obamacare intended: "If you're a state and you don't set up an exchange, that means your citizens don't get their tax credits."
The idea was simply to coerce states into setting up their own exchanges by otherwise denying their citizens subsidies.
This may have been a stupid idea, but it was no editing "error." And, like it or not, it is the law. It can be changed by Congress only, not by the Executive. This might be a great moment where a bullying and manipulative subset of the culture gets hoisted by its own petard.
For an honest Supreme Court, this will be a slam dunk. Or a Rodman rejection.

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