# I pit all conservatives who have bought into the Halbig/King ACA trutherism nonsense **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 19, 2014, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625 "2014-12-19T00:04:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/41 "2014-12-20T03:44:59Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > It’s sleazy because they are using extra legislative process to do it. It passed–that means it’s the will of the people. It is the will of the people that same sex marriages should not be allowed. Are you against the courts dismantling these laws and amendments? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/42 "2014-12-20T03:55:05Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > But then I would argue you are attempting to apply it where it doesn’t apply. We’re not dealing with arbitrary desires of a ruling class. We are dealing with considering the consequences in order to determine the legitimate application of a law. Rule of law does not necessarily mean pharisaical devotion to the text of the law. > > My argument is that, if there is a valid interpretation that does not require the Court to alter a law, then the Court should not alter a law. The Court should assume that the legislative process is valid. > > . What if legislative intent was to attempt to coerce states into doing exchanges by threatening to deny them subsidies if they didn’t comply? We have two analysts, one who actually helped write the law, saying this was the intent. The IRS initially wrote its regulation denying subsidies to federal exchanges. It actually clearly was the intent of the Medicaid expansion to deny funds. I have seen no statements prior to the law passing that said there was not a similar intent with regards to the exchanges. If Congress did indeed intend to coerce the states, and it is very much a standard Democratic practice to regularly attempt to do so, then Congress should be held to the text, and intent, of the law they passed. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/43 "2014-12-20T04:05:53Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > It is the will of the people that same sex marriages should not be allowed. . . . Polls seem to say otherwise. Also, “We’re a Republic, not a Democracy.” And “Equal Justice under the law.” And other high-sounding slogans you sometimes seem to disagree with. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/44 "2014-12-20T04:12:40Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Polls seem to say otherwise. In the post I was responding to, “the will of the people” was measured by legislation, apparently. But, again apparently, very selectively. But if you want to go by polls, ACA is consistently opposed, in polls. Is it still “the will of the people”? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/45 "2014-12-20T04:22:55Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > … and it is very much a standard Democratic practice to regularly attempt to do so… A sturdy support for your argument, a truth so widely understood and acknowledged that it doesn’t require any substantiation. Since everybody knows it. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/46 "2014-12-20T04:55:22Z")
In ACA they actually did try, which is enough to establish legislative intent to coerce states. It’s actually interesting that SCOTUS may have saved Medicaid by ruling as they did. If a few states had decided to call the feds’ bluff and refused to expand, we’d have Democrats tripping over themselves to say that the program could continue in states that refused to expand Medicaid, even though the law clearly states that states that didn’t expand would have lost ALL their Medicaid funding. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/47 "2014-12-20T05:22:56Z")
I feel as though you are quoting to me from an opinion page of a publication I would read only under threat of violence. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/48 "2014-12-20T06:44:06Z")
The ACA said that states had to expand Medicaid or lose all Medicaid funding. Do you dispute that this was intended to force all states to expand Medicaid? ---
**Author:** ![AVIDREX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8491ac/32.png) [@AVIDREX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AVIDREX)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/49 "2014-12-20T06:53:14Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > What if legislative intent was to attempt to coerce states into doing exchanges by threatening to deny them subsidies if they didn’t comply? We have two analysts, one who actually helped write the law, saying this was the intent. Wouldn’t a claim like that require a finding of fact by a trial court? If that was offered up as evidence in oral arguments before the Supreme Court some judges would probably rip the plaintiffs a new one. > [@adaher](#): > > It actually clearly was the intent of the Medicaid expansion to deny funds. I have seen no statements prior to the law passing that said there was not a similar intent with regards to the exchanges. If Congress did indeed intend to coerce the states, and it is very much a standard Democratic practice to regularly attempt to do so, then Congress should be held to the text, and intent, of the law they passed. No, if Congress did indeed intend to coerce the states, as the plaintiffs claim, then there is the distinct possibility it would be unconstitutional. Congress _explicitly_ threatened that states with Medicaid and that was struck down, why on earth would the Court think it just fine and dandy that Congress tried to conceal an implied threat in a bill only to surprise the states later? ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/50 "2014-12-20T07:03:00Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > . . . But if you want to go by polls . . . No, actually, I don’t. I like the legislative process…and I also like the limits on it the courts impose in the name of constitutionality. This “will of the people” thing is a bad thing to invoke. We show our will when we vote. Mao and his communists seized power by playing to the “will of the people,” setting up “people’s courts” that always returned highly popular verdicts. The peasant farmers rejoiced when their landlords were hanged…until the communists showed that the peasants weren’t immune from hanging either. The will of the people is dangerously susceptible to manipulation by rabble-rousers and demagogues. Direct Democracy might work reasonably well at the level of small towns, but not for cities, counties, states, or a large nation. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/51 "2014-12-20T17:06:36Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > This “will of the people” thing is a bad thing to invoke. Tell that to **BigT**. He’s the one that invoked it. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/52 "2014-12-20T17:11:52Z")
Has anyone seen the OP lately? Seems like he’s one taco short of a combo meal in the arguments department. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2014, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/53 "2014-12-20T17:19:06Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The ACA said that states had to expand Medicaid or lose all Medicaid funding. Do you dispute that this was intended to force all states to expand Medicaid? You tend to present arguments that are based on presumptions that you assume your audience shares, as they are established facts that you need not support. I cannot detect any clear center or viewpoint, they appear to be opinions from anyone with clear _boney fidos_ as being opposed to Obama. In this instance, you salt your arguments with libertarian buzzwords like “force” and “coerce”. Indeed, the Federal government has coerced the states, most dramatically in the years between 1861 and 1865. And again with the Civil Rights acts, when the states were dragged kicking and screaming into the 20th Century. Am I obliged to view this “coercion”, this “force” with horror and dismay, is that a given? I’m not so sure, but you seem to assume that I simply must. I understand that Obama has some smattering of knowledge about Constitutional law, might even have taught a course or two on it at a community college out on Route 9. Are we given to understand that he pressed forward with a set of legislation that simply _could not_ pass Constitutional muster, and \*that \*is a settled fact? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/54 "2014-12-21T03:25:59Z")
SCOTUS ruled 7-2 that the Medicaid expansion was coercive and thus illegal. Congress, and the President, should have known better. It wasn’t hard for half of the court’s liberal justices to figure out. The federal government does have coercive power over the states in a few areas of law, most notably civil rights. But in any case, it’s not about whether it’s right to coerce the states to do the federal government’s bidding. It’s about whether they used that technique in ACA, and whether they intended to use that technique to force states to set up their own exchanges. We have Gruber and Cohn on record before it became an issue saying that this was the intent. We have the IRS initially writing the rules to deny subsidies to federal exchanges. We have exactly zero people saying otherwise until after it became a “thing”. ---
**Author:** ![AVIDREX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8491ac/32.png) [@AVIDREX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AVIDREX)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/55 "2014-12-21T04:12:10Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > SCOTUS ruled 7-2 that the Medicaid expansion was coercive and thus illegal. Congress, and the President, should have known better. It wasn’t hard for half of the court’s liberal justices to figure out. > > The federal government does have coercive power over the states in a few areas of law, most notably civil rights. > > But in any case, it’s not about whether it’s right to coerce the states to do the federal government’s bidding. It’s about whether they used that technique in ACA, and whether they intended to use that technique to force states to set up their own exchanges. We have Gruber and Cohn on record before it became an issue saying that this was the intent. We have the IRS initially writing the rules to deny subsidies to federal exchanges. We have exactly zero people saying otherwise until after it became a “thing”. Ignoring the fact that it was the HHS’s job on implementing the law and not the IRS’s, and ignoring that Gruber was hired to do economic modeling for the government (and not help write legislation as so many are delusioning - Gruber included apparently), and ignoring the fact that Gruber made such comments 6 months AFTER the HHS had issued policy determining both federal and state exchanges would get tax credits (May 2012 vs Nov 2011), and ignoring the fact that as early as 2010 it was generally accepted that both types of exchanges would get subsidies ([http://housedocs.house.gov/energycommerce/EXCHANGE.pdf](http://housedocs.house.gov/energycommerce/EXCHANGE.pdf)), and ignoring the fact that even CATO’s slick lawyers pushing these cases initially thought the statute was a ‘glitch’, then yeah your comments are pretty much right. What you’re unintentionally doing is making the perfect argument to John Roberts that this should be a case more about states’ rights vs statutory interpretation. If the court concludes Congress was coercing the states there is case precedence for this, and the language used in the bill is very likely not strong enough to have given the states fair warning that they wouldn’t get tax credits if they didn’t establish their own exchanges. He wouldn’t even need to get overly gummed up in an argument over ambiguity and Chevron deference, he could just say if the law is read the way the plaintiffs insist it be read it would be unconstitutional. Next case please. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/56 "2014-12-21T04:33:49Z")
It would not be. States are not entitled to federal funds. All the court did in the first ACA case was say that the feds couldn’t threaten to take away already received funds if they didn’t do something new the feds wanted. ---
**Author:** ![AVIDREX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8491ac/32.png) [@AVIDREX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AVIDREX)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 8:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/57 "2014-12-21T08:54:48Z")
Doh, I have to correct an error, I assumed the HHS had issued the proposed regulations in Nov 2011 when it was actually the IRS that first proposed them in the Federal Register of November 2011. Sorry about that, it only starts on page 50,931(!). As far as federal funds, states _were_ entitled to them in order to establish their exchanges. In reality, many states didn’t do it because of the complexity, others just wanted to give the middle finger to the feds. But there is no evidence that states who didn’t take the money were clearly informed their citizens wouldn’t get tax credits if they failed to do so. It’s case precedence that when federal funds are offered to states the federal government is obligated to make clear any conditions it intends to impose on them. By failing to notify the states of that one little teeny tiny matter (which just happens to affect, oh, several million people nationwide involving several billion dollars) they screwed the pooch if it really was their intent to deny credits on federal exchanges (which does anyone\* really\* believe was the case?). Someone mentioned the Strangelove analogy - what’s the point of making a threat if you keep it a secret? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/58 "2014-12-21T10:31:01Z")
That’s probably the best argument for the administration’s position that I’ve heard. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/59 "2014-12-23T22:20:14Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > If they succeed at their purpose, many thousands of our fellow citizens will suffer, in degrees from a chronic pain easily remedied through the spectrum of ill health including death. In devotion to the Dollar Almighty they will inflict misery on people who cannot effectively resist. > > And the horse upon in which they rode. I think you mean “the pale horse”. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2014, 7:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625/60 "2014-12-24T07:43:38Z")
These days, they travel by limo. (Picture the airport, some guy standing in a chauffeur’s monkey suit holding a cardboard placard that says “Pestilence”.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-all-conservatives-who-have-bought-into-the-halbig-king-aca-trutherism-nonsense/707625.md?page=4)