THIS WEEK IN POLITICAL NEWS -- 3/30/12 [Friday Morning Edition]

THE CASE OF THE CENTURY: This week, the Supreme Court heard three days of arguments on the constitutionality of Obamacare (it’s okay to call it that now). On Monday, the Court heard argument on the implications of the Tax Injunction Act, which holds that taxpayers cannot challenge the constitutionality of a tax until they pay it. If the law applied to Obamacare, the Court would not be able to hear the case until the “tax” portion (the penalty for having no insurance) kicks in, in 2014. The Justices seemed to have no trouble getting around the law, and appeared poised to move forward and rule on the law’s constitutionality now. (Dahlia Lithwick’s wrap-up of Day One is here.) On Tuesday, the Court heard the real meat of the argument: whether the individual mandate is constitutional. By all accounts the Government did not have its best day in court. The conservative justices repeatedly pressed Solicitor General Don Verrilli for a “limiting principle” -- i.e., a way to say that, while the government could force you to buy insurance, it couldn’t force you to do other things, like join a gym or buy broccoli. Although there are myriad convincing, simple, and clear limiting principles on hand, Verrilli struggled to articulate any to the Court, leaving court-watchers perplexed, frustrated, and predicting disaster. The bottom line is that the health care market is unlike any other market: In no other market do we allow people to take what they need even when they haven’t or can’t pay for it. When Verrilli brought up this point, saying that we have “obligated ourselves” to caring for the sick and dying when they show up at the hospital, regardless of ability to pay, and that’s why the mandate is both necessary and unlikely to spill to other sectors, Justice Scalia retorted, “Well, don’t obligate yourself!” Let them die! If that seems extreme, Wednesday’s arguments ventured even farther down the rabbit hole, when the Justices contemplated doing away with all of Medicaid. For reals. There were two arguments on Wednesday: First, the Court puzzled over what portions of the law would have to fall if they found the mandate unconstitutional (i.e., whether that provision was severable from the rest of the bill or whether it would take other parts -- or the whole thing -- down with it). Turning the entire idea of judicial restraint upside down, Justice Kennedy suggested it would somehow show more restraint to strike down the entire law than to just cut out the mandate. Huh? (The role that the filibuster plays here is also interesting.) Then it discussed the expanded Medicaid provision. Garrett Epps explains: “The ACA offers states massive new Medicaid funding, but to get it they must expand their eligibility rules for low-income people. Clement argued that this was ‘coercive.’ The precedent for this argument was as follows: nothing.” And yet, the conservatives seemed to be buying it! They seemed to take seriously the idea that Medicaid itself may be unconstitutional. There’s really only one possible reaction: !!!!!!!!!!. Do that -- make 10 exclamation points -- with your face, and you have an image of how every non-radical legal prognosticator looked this whole week. What was perhaps most remarkable was the extent to which the conservatives on the bench had internalized the various right-wing talking points about the law -- talking points that have nothing to do with the constitutionality but focus instead on the politics, the policy, or made-up outrages that don’t exist in the law at all. It’s impossible to say what will happen at this point. But it is certainly true that liberal scholars who took the Court vastly underestimated the politicized, partisan zeal with which the conservative Justices would attack Obama’s singular achievement.

Some more recommended reading: Jon Chait has a great take on the conservative panic that engendered the outrage to Obamacare here. Jonathan Cohn marvels at the idea that the decision not to use the word “tax” could be the entire basis for striking down the law. Read Dahlia Lithwick’s wrap-up of Day Two and Day Three. Matt Yglesias points out that there’s no “limiting principle” on the power to tax, but that doesn’t make taxes unconstitutional. And Mark Tushnet wonders if Scalia has jumped the shark.

GOP LASHES ITSELF TO RYAN BUDGET: Yesterday, the House voted to approve Paul “I’m Extremely Radical But The Media Pretends Not To Know That” Ryan’s budget, which, you’ll recall, essentially ends the federal government by 2050 (excluding defense, Social Security, and Medicare), and spells complete doom for Medicaid (although the Supreme Court might just beat him to the punch on that one!). Oh, and in justifying his budget’s large increases in defense spending even as it eviscerates the rest of government operations, Paul Ryan asserted that the generals who had requested a smaller budget were simply lying. What do you know, the budget passed 228 to 191, with every single Democrat, joined by 10 Republicans, opposing the measure. (It should be noted that most of those GOP no-votes appear to be based on the idea that the bill is not radical enough.) Given the extreme nature of the budget, and its extreme unpopularity, it’s worthwhile to point out, again, that this vote was wholly unnecessary and is thus fairly mystifying. “To tell the truth,” Jon Bernstein writes, “I can’t really think of any good precedent: a vote on something that neither the party’s conservative or moderate wings wants to take on something that has no chance of advancing beyond that chamber.” Ed Kilgore’s explanation: “All in all, it appears House Republicans are so upset that they were backed into a bipartisan agreement last year...that they want to put on a demonstration of what Congress would be like if there were no Democrats in it. Democrats should be very grateful.”

ROMNEY LOVES THE TASTE OF HIS SHOE: This meme is getting a little old, I admit, but sometimes it’s just too good to pass off. After extolling the trees in Michigan, giving shout-outs to his friends who own football and Nascar teams, telling audiences that he enjoys firing people and that his $300,000-plus earnings from public speaking were “not much,” Mitt Romney told a hilarious anecdote this week about his father closing down auto factories in Michigan and moving the jobs to Wisconsin. More substantively, Romney faced perhaps the toughest questions he’s received yet on his opposition to Obamacare from, of all people, Jay Leno. Leno asked him whether he would rescind the coverage guarantees for people with preexisting conditions, and Romney cagily answered that those people would still have coverage if they already have insurance. Leno pressed, asking about those who haven’t been able to get insurance before. What would happen to them? Romney wouldn’t really give an answer, but the implication was clear: What do we do about those people? Nothing. Even more interestingly (and hilariously), Romney’s answer provided an excellent explanation for why a mandate is necessary. Romney told Leno, “Well, if they’re 45 years old, and they show up, and they say, I want insurance, because I’ve got a heart disease, it’s like, `Hey guys, we can’t play the game like that. You’ve got to get insurance when you’re well, and if you get ill, then you’re going to be covered.’” Exactly! You can’t let people wait until they get sick before they try to buy insurance, especially if we have a requirement that insurance companies cannot discriminate against people with preexisting conditions. The anti-discrimination provision necessitates a mandate, so that people don’t game the system and drive up prices for the rest of us. Romney clearly understands this; indeed, he seems to sincerely believe in its veracity. And yet, there he goes, proclaiming that Obamacare is part of a “broader attack on economic freedom unlike anything we have ever seen before.” In the race for who has less intellectual honesty and a lower respect for his voters, no one beats Romney.

GOOD NEWS -- Idaho Drops Ultrasound Bill; Wisconsin Recall Happening: Good News Item #1: “The Republican-controlled Legislature is backing away from a bill requiring women seeking an abortion to have an ultrasound. The legislation stalled after State Representative Thomas F. Loertscher said on Tuesday that he would not schedule a committee hearing, ending the bill’s chances this year.” Item #2: The recall of Wisconsin governor Scott Walker is officially on, and is expected to be set for June 5.

Must Read of the Week: The right-wing fringe has taken it upon itself to smear Trayvon Martin. Because we all know that if he ever did anything wrong in his life ever, then he totally deserved to get shot and killed on his way home from the corner store.
Fun Video of the Week: The Daily Show team is absolutely brilliant on Trayvon Martin’s death and its racial meanings.