ObamaCare vs. the First Amendment
by JAMES TARANTO, online.wsj.comMay 22nd 2012 4:51 AM
By
Maybe the president can recast ObamaCare as a jobs program. So lengthy, complex and intrusive a law cannot help but create massive amounts of work for lawyers.
Catholic institutions filed a series of lawsuits yesterday seeking to vindicate their rights under the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. At issue is the regulation mandating that all employer-provided insurance policies cover birth control, including sterilization procedures and abortifacient drugs, in violation of church teachings.
His eminence the plaintiff, Cardinal Dolan.
In a March interview for The Wall Street Journal, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, told this columnist that President Obama had reneged on assurances to "take the protection of the rights of conscience with the utmost seriousness," in Dolan's words. By refusing to grant a conscience exemption for religious employers, the administration set up a high-profile political clash over what its partisans term the Republican "war on women," though it would be more accurately described as a Democratic act of aggression against faithful Catholics.
"The lawsuits have been filed in eight states and the District of Columbia by the Archdioceses of Washington and New York, the Michigan Catholic Conference, Catholic Charities in Illinois, Mississippi, Missouri and Indiana, health care agencies in New York and two dioceses in Texas," the Associated Press reports. Another plaintiff is Notre Dame, "which in February had praised President Barack Obama for pledging to accommodate religious groups and find a way to soften the rule."
The New York Sun observes in an editorial that the controversy "has the potential to emerge as one of the great civil rights lawsuits of our time" and that "a much wider population than the millions of Catholics in this country has a stake in the outcome."
It also has the potential to be rendered moot, in any one of three ways. First, if Republicans do well this November, Congress could repeal ObamaCare next year. Second, short of full repeal, a Romney administration could rescind the mandate or offer an exemption sufficient to satisfy the plaintiffs--though that might leave open the possibility of lawsuits from left-wing groups arguing that the ObamaCare statute, or some equal-protection theory, requires the imposition of the mandate.
The third possibility is a U.S. Supreme Court ruling striking down ObamaCare in its totality (the individual mandate as exceeding Congress's authority under the Constitution, the rest of the law as unworkable absent the mandate). As we noted in March, at oral arguments Justice Antonin Scalia seemed clearly sympathetic to this approach, and Justice Anthony Kennedy to be taking it seriously.
Those arguments left the left in a state of high anxiety, and The Wall Street Journal notes in an editorial today that Democratic politicians and liberal journalists are "making one last attempt to intimidate the Justices," especially Chief Justice John Roberts:
Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy recently took the extraordinary step of publicly lobbying the Chief Justice after oral argument but before its ruling. "I trust that he will be a Chief Justice for all of us and that he has a strong institutional sense of the proper role of the judicial branch," the Democrat declared on the Senate floor. "The conservative activism of recent years has not been good for the Court."
He added that, "Given the ideological challenge to the Affordable Care Act and the extensive, supportive precedent, it would be extraordinary for the Supreme Court not to defer to Congress in this matter that so clearly affects interstate commerce."
To summarize Leahy's message: If you don't uphold this law, passed on a party-line vote, my party will accuse you of partisanship. The intent is so transparent, and the argument so ridiculous, one is half-tempted to admire its sheer brazenness.
The Capitalist vs. the Anticapitalist
Barack Obama and Newt Gingrich have something in common beside the size of their egos. Like Gingrich, Obama is now coming under attack from members of his own party for running ads attacking Mitt Romney for having been a professional capitalist.
Most famously, Cory Booker, the mayor of Newark, on Sunday "blasted the Obama campaign's targeting of [Romney's] venture capital firm as 'nauseating' and a 'distraction from the real issues,' " as Politico notes. Booker has backpedaled and, as the Puffington Host reports, now says he's " 'upset' by Republicans 'manipulating' his words." In other words, he's being quoted accurately and taking heat for it within his own party.
But Booker is far from alone. The Romney campaign posted an ad featuring Booker's comments along with similar ones from Harold Ford Jr., a former Tennessee congressman, and Steve Rattner, an erstwhile Obama economic adviser, and proclaiming, "Even Obama's own supporters have had enough."
Buzzfeed.com reports that Ed Rendell, the former Pennsylvania governor and Democratic National Committee chairman, calls Obama's Bain ads "very disappointing" and adds: "I think Bain is fair game, because Romney has made it fair game. But I think how you examine it, the tone, what you say, is important as well."
Virginia's Sen. Mark Warner, a former venture capitalist, tells MSNBC "that Bain Capital was 'very successful' and 'did what they were supposed to do,' " the Washington Examiner reports.
Most scathing is Arthur Davis, a former congressman from Alabama and unsuccessful candidate for that state's governorship. Here's his contribution to a Politico forum:
It's hard to imagine a more instructive couple of days for those who want to know where the Democratic Party's head is at: its only high-profile African American moderate [Booker] just got a brushback pitch for leaning in too close to the Independent thought zone; the Obama camp looks ominously like a cult of personality that tolerates no dissent; and the reelection campaign just doubled down on the European leftist notion that business is fair only when it operates in a sanitized, risk free manner.
As for Booker, my hope is that the pushback won't turn him into just another faux centrist who won't risk offending his base. He already looks a little less brave and a lot more conventional after the forgive me video from the bunker he released on Sunday. In fairness, a public servant with his gifts and history with Obama deserved much better.
Among these critics, only Warner and Booker are current elected officials, and Warner's criticisms were quite mild. One wonders, though, if there may be a wider discomfort in the party with Obama's attacks on capitalism--leaving open the possibility that a post-Obama Democratic Party will take a more moderate approach to economics.
Perhaps the most interesting criticism of Obama comes from an admirer of the president whose own ideology is rather indistinct: David Brooks of the New York Times. Brooks defends private equity--the aspect of Bain Capital's work for which the Obama campaign is attacking Romney--as having "forced a renaissance that revived American capitalism":
The large questions today are: Will the U.S. continue this process of rigorous creative destruction? More immediately, will the nation take the transformation of the private sector and extend it to the public sector? . . .
The implicit argument of the Republican campaign is that Mitt Romney has the experience to extend this transformation into government.
The Obama campaign seems to be drifting willy-nilly into the opposite camp, arguing that the pressures brought to bear by the capital markets over the past few decades were not a good thing, offering no comparably sized agenda to reform the public sector.
In a country that desperately wants change, I have no idea why a party would not compete to be the party of change and transformation. For a candidate like Obama, who successfully ran an unconventional campaign that embodied and promised change, I have no idea why he would want to run a campaign this time that regurgitates the exact same ads and repeats the exact same arguments as so many Democratic campaigns from the ancient past.
We tend to think Brooks overestimates both Romney and Obama. It would delight us if he turns out to be a radical reformer of government, à la Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin. But as yet the best we can say is that, in contrast to Obama, he isn't actively hostile to economic freedom--which, to be sure, would be a big improvement.
As for Obama, can it really be true that Brooks has "no idea" why the re-election campaign is so backward-looking and unimaginative? Now that he's actually been in office for 3½ years, it's clear that's what Obama is all about. Ideologically he is an old-style progressive leftist, committed to expanding the size and scope of government. Politically, he is obligated to serve the interest groups that make up the Democratic coalition.
He was able in 2008 to run "an unconventional campaign that embodied and promised change" only because the media and significant numbers of voters were dazzled by style and tuned out the substance. He was an inkblot; people saw in him what they wanted to see. Brooks is taking especially long to figure out it wasn't really there.
Two Cillizzas in One!
- "In Washington, there's an old cliche: A gaffe is when a politician is accidentally honest. That's what happened to Newark (N.J.) Mayor Cory Booker during an appearance on NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sunday."--Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blake, Washington Post website, May 21
- "Newark Mayor Cory Booker clearly misspoke on NBC's 'Meet the Press' Sunday when he lumped attacks on former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney's record at Bain Capital into the same category as attacks on President Obama's connection to Rev. Jeremiah Wright."--Cillizza, Post website, May 22
Worst Political Advice Ever
Writing for the Daily Beast, Michael Medved advises the Romney campaign to throw money away buying ads in states that he has little or no chance of carrying. Seriously:
Though the Romney campaign will naturally resist investing precious resources on lost-cause states with hugely expensive media markets (California, New York, and Illinois), they should overcome their reluctance.
Why? "To prevent the very real chance that Mitt Romney will win the Electoral College even while losing the popular vote badly to Barack Obama."
Medved's scenario is based on a scenario in which the election outcome is roughly the same as in 2008, except that Romney swings "as few as 650,000 votes to [John] McCain's totals in just six decisive states." In these circumstances, Obama would outpoll Romney nationwide by millions of votes even while losing the election.
"It's easy to imagine the national levels of rage, and impossible not to envision the president of the United States lending his voice to the angry chorus," Medved writes:
In the five weeks before Dec. 17, the day when electors formally assemble in their respective state capitals, the president could push electors to shift support to him--even if they defied state legislation requiring winner-take-all distribution of electoral votes to the victor in that state and ignored laws of 24 states threatening punishment to "faithless electors." The arguments would be fiery and, most likely, somewhat effective: insisting that basic fairness and democratic principle should trump any concern over the creaky, 19th-century relic known as the Electoral College.
We certainly wouldn't put it past Obama to be a bad loser, but this is far-fetched on many grounds. For one, the speculation about faithless electors is silly. Regardless of the national popular vote, electors are partisans of the party that prevailed in their state; they have no incentive to switch.
For another, presidential campaigns are national by nature, even though focused on particular states. If Romney wins, he will almost certainly improve on McCain's margins in most red states and cut into Obama's 2008 margins in most blue states as well as flipping some swing states. That's what Obama did in 2008 compared with 2004, which is why he managed to pick up some states (notably Indiana and North Carolina) that hadn't even been swing states four years earlier. (Oddly, Medved doesn't advise Romney to campaign hard in red states, even though a vote from a friendly state counts just as much toward a "popular-vote victory" as one from an unfriendly state.)
If Romney were to follow Medved's advice and campaign in states he can't win or doesn't need, he would also increase the possibility of the outcome Medved fears in reverse--i.e., that Obama wins the election while Romney "wins the popular vote." Popular-vote divergence or not, Romney would probably be a more gracious loser than Obama. But one suspects that's not why either man is running for president.
Homer Nods
"Pow Wow Chow," the cookbook to which Elizabeth Warren contributed possibly plagiarized recipes, was published in 1984, not 1994 as we said in an item yesterday (since corrected).
Out on a Limb
"Curvaceous Client Says Gloria Allred Only Fought for Publicity"--headline, FoxNews.com, May 22
We Blame George W. Bush
"Woman Blames Eclipse for S. San Francisco Crash"--headline, Associated Press, May 21
Leave Elizabeth Warren Alone!
"Indian politicians often seek emotive issues as a pretext for presenting themselves as stout defenders of their voters"--tweet, @TheEconomist, May 21
The Lonely Lives of Democrats
"Democrats Wait by Phone for President Obama"--headline, Politico.com, May 22
Freedom's Just Another Word for Nothing Left to Lose
"Joplin: Remember, Rejoice, Rebuild"--headline, WhiteHouse.gov, May 22
Before He's Elected, He's Already Seeking Higher Office
"Candidate: I'll Smoke a Joint on Hill"--headline, Politico.com, May 21
Doesn't This Prove Their Point?
"Some said I lacked 'gravitas,' which I've since decided is Latin for 'testicles.' "--Katie Couric, quoted by NewsBusters.org, May 21
They Finally Got Around to Cleaning Out Helen Thomas's Old Desk
"Oldest-Ever Pigment Found in Fossilized Ink Sacs"--headline, MSNBC.com, May 21
Don't Listen to Them
"Silence Overlooked as a Method of Communication Today, Say Speakers"--headline, Catholic News Service, May 21
The Loved One
"Scotty From Star Trek's Ashes to Be Blasted Into Space"--headline, Daily Telegraph (London), May 21
Himmler Had Something Similar
"Campers Have a Ball"--headline, Telegram (St. John's, Newfoundland), May 22
Questions Nobody Is Asking
"Will Donald Trump Give Keynote Speech at RNC Convention?"--headline, DailyCaller.com, May 21
Answers to Questions Nobody Is Asking
"Why I Support the Reelection of President Obama"--headline, RealClearPolitics.com, May 21
Look Out Below!
"American Eagle Outfitters to Drop 77kids"--headline, Patch.com (Braintree, Mass.), May 22
It's Always in the Last Place You Look
- "Giant Gorilla Stolen From Car Dealer Lot May Have Been Found"--headline, Corpus Christi (Texas) Caller Times, May 21
- "I Found Myself Abroad"--headline, Patch.com (Milford, Conn.), May 21
News of the Tautological
"Police Complaint Case Summaries Provide Scant Detail"--headline, Lawrence (Kan.) Journal World, May 21
Bottom Stories of the Day
- "Food Catches Fire at Bill Miller's"--headline, San Antonio Express-News website, May 22
- "Powell Not Ready to Endorse Obama for Re-Election"--headline, Associated Press, May 22
'Correct in a Mythical Sense'
From one Bernie Quigley writing at TheHill.com comes the funniest defense we've seen yet of Elizabeth Warren, the Thirty-Second Indian:
Elizabeth Warren might be excused for wanting to be Native American. She can claim an old American soul, going back generations in Oklahoma. In the heartland it is almost universal for those who have been there for a few generations to claim Indian blood; that is, to wish it were there even if it isn't. It is not so much a lie as it is the acculturation of personal and regional American myth; the fabric of old-soul American consciousness. "Our spirit will walk among you," said Chief Joseph. Indeed it does. . . .
So Warren's claim to be "part Indian" is correct in mythical terms.
"Correct in mythical terms" is the best excuse since "fake but accurate." Meanwhile, did you hear Warren has signed a contract for a new memoir? It's called "The Will to Powwow."
Join Fans of Best of the Web Today on Facebook.
Click here to view or search the Best of the Web Today archives.
(Carol Muller helps compile Best of the Web Today. Thanks to Paul Jones, Michele Schiesser, John Williamson, T. Young, Mark Zoeller, Rod Pennington, Eric Jensen, Ethel Fenig, David Gerstman, Zack Russ, Ed Lasky, Jeryl Bier, Neil Green, Russell Hilleke, George Mitchell, Merv Benson, Richard McMillan, Ralph Boeker, Eliezer Medwed, Lynn Bateman, Miguel Rakiewicz, Mark Finkelstein, Joseph Haggerty, Alex Hoyt, John Bobek, Richard Belzer, Leonard Peirce, Kris Tufts, Bill Hoyt and Robert Godwin. If you have a tip, write us at opinionjournal@wsj.com, and please include the URL.)
Original Page: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304019404577420380698797006.html?mod=asia_opinion
Shared from Pocket
Victor Cuvo, Attorney at Law
No comments:
Post a Comment