“A Penalty is not a Pig.” It is not a Tax Either!
-Pig in a Poke-
An Analysis of the Antonin Scalia Interview
by Scott Rohter, August 2012
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said something in his recent television interview on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace that was very interesting. In fact it reminded me of something that Sarah Palin once said during the 2008 Presidential campaign. Justice Scalia noted that the interpretation of the Affordable Care Act can only be stretched as far as the language will bear. He then remarked that, “the penalty in the Affordable Care Act was not a pig, and it could never be a pig!” This actually reminded me of something that Sarah Palin said in her very first speech on the national stage. She said, “You can put lipstick on a pig, but it is still a pig.”
By the way, the penalty in the Affordable Care Act is not a tax!.. It is not a pig, and it is not a tax either! Perhaps just calling it a tax is like calling it a pig to the longest serving member of the United States Supreme Court. Maybe that was what Justice Scalia meant. Perhaps calling it a tax is just like calling it a pig! Either way, the government mandated fine for not buying health insurance is a penalty, no matter what Chief Justice, “E-Tu John Roberts” chooses to call it. It is still a penalty no matter what they call it in Washington D.C. It is not a tax! It was never represented by its proponents as a tax, and it can never be a tax. You can put lipstick on a pig, but it is still a pig!
As Justice Scalia observed, the language of the Affordable Care Act will not support that interpretation of the law. It does not matter how hard they try to twist it. It does not matter how the penalty is enforced, or who collects it, whether it is the Department of Homeland Security, or the I.R.S. The language doesn’t support that kind of interpretation of the law. Just because the I.R.S. collects the money does not make it a tax the way the prevailing “Beltway logic” goes. It is still a penalty just the way it always was!
If it were collected by the D.H.S. that would not make the penalty in the health care bill an illegal alien! The fact that five members of the United States Supreme Court were willing to call it a tax in order to achieve their overreaching goals does not change reality! It does not make it so! It does not make up, down or right, left! It is still a penalty for failing to purchase government mandated health insurance. It merely illustrates just how far they will to go in order to achieve their goals! It only illustrates the depths of the depravity to which Democrats and certain Republicans are willing to stoop in order to accomplish their questionable purposes…
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