Benedict Roberts
There, I’ve said it, though I will be damned for it. The problem we have had in the Republican party comes to surface at times like this, and I’m not going to participate in the reckless concealment. There are those of political motives, who care not for the disaster that is the Supreme Court decision upholding the Affordable Care Act(a.k.a “Obama-care”) because it serves their political ends. Within some circles of the elite Republican establishment – that thing George Will assures us does not exist while telling us this ruling is really a ‘victory’ – there are those who are absolutely giddy with anticipation in the wake of this ruling, though they must presently conceal it. It comes down to two things: Some of them are purely fifth-column statists, who actually want this law, and others are motivated solely by the opportunity they see in the political sphere. After all, what better way to unite wayward Republicans and conservatives then to hit them with a true disaster? If you’re a Republican party hack driven by purely political considerations and motives, this ruling is a gift from on high that will help drive the vote.
Sure, it does horrendous damage to the body of case-law. Yes, it does gut the constitutional limits on Congressional power. Absolutely, it permits Congress to tax in any way it likes so long as some moron in a black robe can dismiss its unconstitutional aspects as irrelevant or insignificant. True, it really has no manner of a silver lining if you’re an actual conservative, but so what? At least it will help Mitt Romney get elected by driving the herd! It will permit the Republican establishment to foist their own version of it upon us, tinkered-with and massaged as it will be, but still the heart of the bill will remain intact, and the Beltway crowd can be ecstatic that they will have finally killed the meaning of the constitution, the rule of law, and the entire notion of American self-reliance and self-determination. Nevertheless, it also offers the chance to the GOP establishment to round up the herd, and get them all running in the same direction. That it had been an establishment Republican who sabotaged this ruling should be the dead giveaway.
I would ask my conservative brethren to consider the evidence. Even a flimsy, often obtuse Anthony Kennedy ruled our way, so absurd is this law. A man who is able to imagine that Arizona has not the authority to protect its own citizens from foreign invaders, as in Arizona v. United States was not able to imagine the Affordable Care Act as constitutionally permissible. Think of that! This law is so preposterous, and the arguments of the administration so bizarre and absurd that Anthony Kennedy could not sustain them, but John Roberts, Bush appointee, did. Do we think John Roberts is truly the idiot that his ruling implies? Do we believe John Roberts is so intellectually vacuous that he could not see the absurdity of his ruling? If we believe this, why are we not demanding Boehner and the beltway boys impeach this man as an incompetent? Why? I’ll tell you why: Because Boehner and his toadies would never do it anyway.
We are being herded. We are being driven. We are being run through the political squeeze-chutes of the GOP establishment. These people are worse than our open enemy, the leftists. They are using subterfuge and stealth to reorganize our society into their global vision of statism, a nanny-state version in which you have little freedom to choose, and even less money or property with which to exercise that choice. We are descending into a death of one-thousand cuts, and we have Republican party bosses who are gleeful that we are angry, because they intend to use that as the fuel to recapture power, not for conservatism or freedom, but for the aggrandizement of their own statist vision, complete with open borders and vast social programs to which we are all enslaved, but as a bonus, with our votes, too!
How else does one explain the servile pronouncements by some conservative commentators that the ACA ruling had been a victory? How else does one discount the accurate assessments of stalwarts like Mark Levin, who sees this monstrosity clearly? How in the name of most unholy Hell does one derive the notion that this is anything but a national tragedy? In some respects, I place this ruling above Pearl Harbor Day. In terms of the long-term damage it will do to America, I place it above 9/11. I place it as the greatest attack on the United States and her people since before its current constitution had been adopted. It will certainly lead to the death of more Americans. It was certainly a plot hatched against us. The delivery of the fatal blow was no less a shock. I must go all the way back to General Benedict Arnold to find an apt analog for the sort of sabotage this infamy represents, and all brought to you by a bi-partisan Washington DC establishment that seeks to rule over you.
Remember, when some conservatives reflexively screamed at the notion of the appointment of Harriet Miers, many felt relief when George Bush put up John Roberts, who was seen as more reliably conservative and eminently more qualified, as was my pet goat. That was the sham in all of this. Roberts is no conservative, and his ruling in this case makes that plain, lest there be any confusion. Harriet Miers was a throw-away nomination, and Roberts was the goal all along. This is how politics is done. I was astonished at the speed at which the reaction to the Miers controversy was brought to a head, and more astonished still at how quickly they dropped the ostensibly reliable Roberts on us. Do you remember who screamed first and loudest at the Miers nomination? I do. Odd how that critic is now a rabid Romney-bot these days, isn’t it? I hate conspiracy theories, but I always thought it odd how that whole situation turned out, with Rehnquist retiring just in time to re-nominate Roberts for the Chief Justice position.
Ladies and gentlemen, the truth is that the GOP establishment exists to keep us in check, to keep us to a dull roar as the statists reorganize our nation into their vision of global, social, welfare-statism. The GOP establishment advances the ball(never spiking it, of course,) and we permit them to manage us like puppets. If you accept their talking points these last three days, you’re playing directly into their hands, and you had better believe that they see this as a victory, because for their agenda, it is. They will be immune to Obama-care. They won’t worry about death panels. They won’t worry about government-enforced rationing. They won’t be waiting in the endless lines. They won’t have any need to concern themselves with the entirety of the system they’re building, because they are above it, after all.
The same people who tried at every turn(and often succeeded) to blunt the conservative Reagan revolution are once again making political hay over this decision, as they now know you have no alternative. They engineered it that way. Feel free to believe what you want, of course, but for me, the matter is clear. I have seen suppositions that somehow, Obama bullied Roberts into this decision, but I find that unlikely. Roberts was placed in this position to uphold Obama-care. There are those who will become apoplectic at the mere suggestion, but for me, the matter is now painfully obvious: If we do anything short of replacing the Republican Party, this nation will be damned. I’ll not be kept in line any longer. The Republican Party must rip this law out from the roots, or we must make a new party.
Some are still convinced that there exists a win in all of this. They offer as evidence that we are still free, this moment, and that this affords to us a chance, somehow. This is akin to saying that as the last breath escapes your lips, the hooligans choking the last of your life from you, there is still some chance. Technically? Sure. Practically? No. Violence is being done to us, and the best we get from most Republicans indicate that many of them don’t mind, in fact, although there are a few notable exceptions. On the 11th of July, we will have a pointless exercise of repeal in the House of Representatives, a tale told and believed only by idiots, that for all its sound and fury, will signify nothing. The GOP establishment loves a charade, and too many of us likewise adore one.
