Obamacare vs The Supreme Court - Round 2

DonDiego opines the Judges can rule that the subsidies cannot be paid through the Federal Exchange. And that they need not address recompense of the subsidies already paid.

malibber says they must address the recompense.

OK. No need to argue.

That the subsidies are not cash or a check but actually advanced tax credits predicated on one's estimated income, and not finalized until one files one's income tax, this is gonna be, . . . umm, . . . a real goat rope, as they say up heh' in the hills.. As a practical matter DonDiego suggests it will never be collected. But if it is, . . . all the better.

You are exactly right it will be left to the IRS and we all know how good they are at forgiving debt. I read somewhere today there are 200k people on Obamacare in Mississippi and the average subsidy is $4xx.oo dollars a month. Can you imagine the outcry when all of those Red State Republican's get a case of the butt hurts over the huge IRS bills they are going to receive.

[boldface added - DD]
DonDiego thanks malibber2 for the compliment.

However, DonDiego expects not all the hurt butts in Mississippi will be attached to Republicans.



This may turn out to be a good thing. Perhaps the bipartisan outcry will wake up the citizenry to the loss of contact with reality and overestimation of competence possessed by the President and the Legislators responsible for this defective legislation, . . . all, . . . that is all of one Party.

In any case, DonDiego proposes if the current implementation of the Law is, in fact, not in accordance with the actual written Law the actual written Law takes precedence and the implementation must be changed, i.e. subsidies cannot be awarded through the Federal Exchange.
What does malliber2 propose?

Oh, incidentally, with respect to the IRS. DonDiego wouldn't underestimate the IRS's capacity for forgiveness. The integrity and legality of IRS enforcement of The Obamacare has already been compromised. In an effort to spur enrollment in The Obamacare the IRS was instructed to employ the "honor system" and not verify eligibility for subsidies at all in the first year:
“For income verification, for the first year of operations, we are providing Exchanges with temporarily expanded discretion to accept an attestation of projected annual household income without further verification.”
Ref: Forbes

Well, here's the thing that's comical. You essentially have the same group of people talking out of different corners of their mouth on the same principle.
- Regarding the ACA: critics say the IRS has no legal authority to interpret sections of the healthcare law beyond its literal writings.
- Regarding IRS screenings: those same critics are livid the IRS was acting on written law instead of its traditional interpretation.

I wouldn't hold out much hope for anyone cheering for a win in scenario 1. Nevermind the ACA - you will have a million other examples of federal law that will suddenly have to be enforced differently than they are now.....not the least of which would be Karl Rove's super-pac having to pay taxes like everyone else.

PJ, what we're arguing about is that once it all comes out in the wash it will be proven to all, without question, that Obama fucked up on one more major issue. A trillion dollars here, and trillion dollars there................who cares.

The govt is now saying that it will reach it's 2015 enrollment goals. The 2014 enrollees (those that have actuially paid) has been dropping

Who told you that?

(Of course you're not including people who found jobs with employer health care or other life changes, are you?)

"The Health and Human Services Department is estimating that somewhere between 9 million and 9.9 million Americans will be enrolled in health coverage through the Obamacare marketplaces in 2015, HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell said Monday.
More specifically, the department is aiming for 9.1 million enrollees next year, Burwell said at the left-leaning Center for American Progress."
Ref: CBS News

Hmm, . . . way, way, . . . WAY back in April 2014 the Congressional Budget Office published its "Updated Estimates of the Effects of the Insurance Coverage Provisions of the Affordable Care Act [aka The Obamacare]", . . . a prediction of the costs of The Obamacare for the following decade.
The estimate for 2015 enrollment was 13 million.
Hmm, . . . 13, . . . minus 9.1, . . . divide, . . . hmm, hmm,hmm, . . . OK. If The Obamacare enrollment does reach 9.1-million, that'd be 30% less than the CBO estimated only 8 months ago.


But wait a minute! Wasn't The Obamacare supposed to be "deficit neutral"? Weren't the costs of Obamacare supposed to be covered by the insurance premiums and penalty "taxes" and things like taxes on medical equipment and such. DonDiego distinctly recalls posters on this very Forum stating just that; that the net cost of The Obamacare would be $zero.

Even the Congressional Budget Office’s cost estimate of the legislation [aka The Obamacare] issued in March 2010 concluded that — based on its scoring conventions and assuming the law would be fully implemented as written — the health care-related provisions of the plan would reduce the federal budget deficit by $124-billion over the FY 2010–2019 period.

Why The Obama Himself said : "I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits -- either now or in the future. I will not sign it if it adds one dime to the deficit, now or in the future, period."__REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT TO A JOINT SESSION OF CONGRESS ON HEALTH CARE, 9 September 2009
And The Obama even said "This legislation [aka The Obamacare] will also lower costs for families and for businesses and for the federal government, reducing our deficit by over $1 trillion in the next two decades. It is paid for. It is fiscally responsible."__REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT AT THE SIGNING OF THE HEALTH INSURANCE REFORM BILL, 23 March 2010


Uh-Oh!

Last month the Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee concluded: ". . . the Democrats’ health care law [The Obamacare] will increase the budget deficit by $131 billion over the current 10-year budget window (FY 2015–2024)."
Ref: www.budget.senate.gov

And that conclusion assumed enrollment would be 13-million in 2015, not 9.1-million !
This doesn't look good.


Oh, well, . . . stuff happens.
The good news is that this was all foreseen, . . . a long, long time ago:
". . . “the cool and deliberate sense of the community ought, in all governments, and actually will, in all free governments, ultimately prevail over the views of its rulers.”__ James Madison

Why that there Madison fella usually ranks in the top-20 Presidents, sometimes top10 among scholars; DonDiego wonders where the Obama will rank in a few years.

DonDiego, please stop all of this talk about numbers, past Obama promises, and deficit neutral. In the first place, most Liberals don't understand numbers and percentages and other such arithmetic. In the second place, most Liberals fully expect someone else to pay the cost overrun that they promised would never happen. The fact is, that most Liberals want their free shit now and if the cost of the can won't be paid for by Republicans now, then these Liberals are fully satisfied kicking this expensive can down the road for others to pay for in the future. They want their free shit now!

Don't worry their Liberal heads with things like facts. Even when they have the ability to understand the truth, that's when Liberals turn away, smoke a joint, turn up the music, and ignore reality.

DD don't worry, Forkie and PJ likely haven't even read the law so they are just like the folks in congress that voted for it.

Or like many American's according to Gruber, are too stupid so if they knew the truth, the bill would have never passed.

I wonder who is lying now??????