Pete Spiliakos

I remember watching Obama in 2008.  He was asked about an issue on which he had changed his mind.  Obama answered that he had opposed the 1996 welfare reform law (with its time limits and work requirements) because he though it would hurt families, but the actual experience of dropping . . . . Continue Reading »

Not good I think.   Hopefully not true - like most VP rumours. . . . . Continue Reading »

Like John Presnall, I have Sirius XM radio in my car.  So I was driving home yesterday and I heard William Kristol on the 4:00 PM FOX News show.  Kristol was touting (though not entirely endorsing) Condoleezza Rice for Vice President.  Romney choosing Rice would be a serious . . . . Continue Reading »

1.  Okay, I’m a Jindal shill, but even apart from that, this Politico story about Jindal’s appearance on ABC’s This Week is interesting for what it says about media dynamics.  On one level, the debate between Jindal and Maryland governor Martin O’Malley is deeply . . . . Continue Reading »

So Real Clear Politics says that Romney’s short list for Vice President is down to Paul Ryan, Rob Portman, Tim Pawlenty, and Bobby Jindal.  I’ll focus on Pawlenty and Jindal fora moment. First, let’s remember that Romney’s real running mate is the Bureau of Labor . . . . Continue Reading »

So I agree with both James Ceaser and Peter Lawler.  Dr. Ceaser is right that the question of whether the mandate is constitutional has not at all been settled by the Supreme Court.  You have four Justices who think that the Obamacare scheme of mandate and penalty is . . . . Continue Reading »

1.  When looking at the Obamacare case, many wondered if the individual insurance purchase mandate was severable from the rest of Obamacare.  According to the Chief Justice, the mandate is severable from itself.  You take (what he admits to be) an unconstitutional scheme of mandate . . . . Continue Reading »

This is an expansion of something I wrote in a thread: If Roberts really thinks that the federal insurance purchase mandate is constitutional, then he he ought to sleep well. If Roberts ruled in favor of the mandate as some kind of act of judicial statesmanship (well . . . maybe it will get . . . . Continue Reading »

isn’t necessarily the Chief Justice John Roberts-written opinion - or rather it is necessarily going to be the Roberts-written opinion for very long.  In his majority opinion, Roberts wrote that the interstate commerce clause does not give Congress the power to mandate that individuals . . . . Continue Reading »

This is a great day for President Obama.  The argument against Obamacare from constitutional norms has been fatally wounded to the extent of winning over persuadables.  To the extent that pesuadables (especially fairly low information persuadables), feel in-their-bones that the government . . . . Continue Reading »