KIND OF A SAD SURPRISE...:

In a surprise, D.C. appeals court upholds healthcare law (Noam N. Levey, November 8, 2011, LA Times)

The suit was dismissed by a federal judge earlier this year. But many believed the three-judge panel of the D.C. circuit, which included two Republican appointees, would reverse the lower court and uphold the challenge to the law.

One of the GOP appointees--Judge Laurence H.  Silberman--was appointed to the bench by President Reagan and is considered a  conservative intellectual leader on the court. He won plaudits from gun rights groups recently for writing an opinion that the District of Columbia's handgun ban was unconstitutional.

But in a concise majority opinion in the healthcare case, Silberman categorically rejected the central critique Republican attack on the healthcare law's expansion of federal regulation of healthcare.

"The right to be free from federal regulation is not absolute and yields to the imperative that Congress be free to forge national solutions to national problems," Silberman wrote.

...when people are taken off-guard by a judge following the law instead of ideology.

Posted by oj at November 8, 2011 5:52 PM
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