How ObamaCare's fiercest critic all but admitted the legal case against it was a scam

Liberals always claimed that the case before the Supreme Court was a farce. Now they've been proven right.

ObamaCare supporters cheer in front of the Supreme Court building
(Image credit: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

In late June, in an opinion written by Chief Justice John Roberts, the Supreme Court forcefully rejected an invitation to willfully misread the Affordable Care Act in a way that would have destroyed health insurance markets in a majority of states. While the outcome of the case was not shocking, the forcefulness of Roberts' opinion was certainly surprising. One explanation for it can be found in the defiant postmortem written by the architect of the suit, the Cato Institute's Michael Cannon.

Cannon's op-ed begins with a familiar tactic of the ACA's opponents — a ludicrous distortion of the legislative process. According to Cannon, Democrats passed the ACA "[i]n haste. In desperation. Without knowing what was in it. With no bipartisan support. By one vote." Well, the charge of a lack of bipartisan support is true, although also irrelevant — congressional Democrats can hardly be blamed for not garnering any support from a party committed to a strategy of opposing any legislation supported by President Obama.

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Scott Lemieux

Scott Lemieux is a professor of political science at the College of Saint Rose in Albany, N.Y., with a focus on the Supreme Court and constitutional law. He is a frequent contributor to the American Prospect and blogs for Lawyers, Guns and Money.