When I read articles like James Taranto’s trying to divine how Chief Justice Roberts will decide in King v. Burwell, I always find them amusing. While I am fully confident that the Chief Justice will decide according to sound legal principles and the merits of the case, I also remember Mr. Dooley’s century-old wisecrack that even the justices of the Supreme Court read the election returns.
Is he willing to give the White House a mulligan on the PPACA? How strong a case do they need to have? Will his voting in support of another strained argument support his previous decision on the PPACA or discredit it and the Supreme Court along with it? There are a lot of moving parts here.
I think it is odd that the legal blogosphere sifts the chicken bones to make these sorts of predictions. Does anybody remember the outrage reported when Scalia appeared to find no problem strip-searching a student for advil during oral argument? And then he ended up siding against the strip search in the actual decision. If I were willing to play, I would ask which lawyer got raked over the coals more in oral argument, and predict that he will win.
This USA Today piece, simplifies the current PPACA challenge being pondered before the SCOTUS.
Any other interpretation leading to a ruling for the government, IMO, would be an unfortunate stretch of language exercised by what should be an impartial court.