Into the Weeds!

Ok, it's the day after... time to get lost in those weeds.  Those of the legal variety for today...  lots of excellent commentary and analysis to sift through from around the web.  Here are some highlights:


Jack Balkin provides some great commentary on the mandate as tax issue as part of an ongoing discussion over at Slate, "That boring old tax argument was always a winner." 


The elusive Organon (who, it should be noted, spent much time drawing attention to the "mandate as tax" argument, before going Salinger on us) offered a rare communiqué yesterday in which he points us toward two particularly helpful blog posts:


Lawrence Solum (Legal Theory Blog), "The Decision to Uphold the Mandate as Tax Represents a Gestalt Shift in Constitutional Law."- provides helpful context in terms of our legal history.  (If you really want to get into the weeds, Solum raises another interesting point here, but definitely start with the other links)


Brad Joondeph (aca litigation blog), "A Marbury for our time."-  compares the ruling to another famous Supreme Court case from over 200 years ago, calling it "a stroke of judicial genius."


Jedediah Purdy, a professor at Duke Law School, also makes the Marbury comparison in his excellent post over at HuffPo, "How to Read the Health Care Opinion," although he sees much cause for concern in Roberts' reasoning.


For a stiffer dose of doom and gloom, Neal Katyal, a law professor at Georgetown, raises a number of serious concerns over the potential future ramifications of yesterday's decision in an Op-Ed for the NYT, "A Pyrrhic Victory."


And if you just need more, SCOTUSblog provide's plenty to chew on here, including another solid recap from Harvard Law professor Laurence Tribe.




The evidence mounts that the Supremes initially decided to throw out the law before Roberts changed his mind... we'll have to wait for the full story on that, but my question is:  don't these people proof-read their opinions!?  Do they know about "Ctrl-F"??  They've had months to work on this stuff... I don't get it.




Oh, and this was pretty great:

Not the best day for CNN, heheh. (or Fox)