Chief Justice John Roberts ruled Thursday that Barack Obama used
“magic words” to characterize a multi-billion dollar tax increase on
middle and low income earners as a “penalty.”
“‘Magic words or labels’ should not ‘disable an otherwise constitutional levy,’” he wrote, citing a 1992 sales tax case. “This process yields the essential feature of any tax: it produces at least some revenue for the Government … $4 billion per year by 2017.”
The 5-4 ruling upholding Obama’s chief legislative achievement undermines the president’s claim that he would never raise taxes on Americans making less than $250,000 per year.
Obama attempted to sell the unpopular law to the country on the grounds that the individual mandate represented a penalty rather than a tax, and accused his critics of twisting words.
“For us to say that you’ve got to take a responsibility to get health insurance is absolutely not a tax increase,” he told George Stephanopoulos of ABC news.
When the newsman and former Democratic official pressed Obama on the question and cited a dictionary definition of the term “tax,” the president interrupted him.
“No, but—but, George, you—you can’t just make up that language and decide that that’s called a tax increase,” he said, adding “the fact that you looked up Merriam’s Dictionary, the definition of tax increase, indicates to me that you’re stretching a little bit right now.”
Chief Justice John Roberts and the liberal bloc of the Supreme Court cited the Constitution, as well as the law’s empowerment of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), to conclude that Obama had passed one of the largest tax increases in history.
Read more: http://freebeacon.com/a-tax-unlike-any-other/
“‘Magic words or labels’ should not ‘disable an otherwise constitutional levy,’” he wrote, citing a 1992 sales tax case. “This process yields the essential feature of any tax: it produces at least some revenue for the Government … $4 billion per year by 2017.”
The 5-4 ruling upholding Obama’s chief legislative achievement undermines the president’s claim that he would never raise taxes on Americans making less than $250,000 per year.
Obama attempted to sell the unpopular law to the country on the grounds that the individual mandate represented a penalty rather than a tax, and accused his critics of twisting words.
“For us to say that you’ve got to take a responsibility to get health insurance is absolutely not a tax increase,” he told George Stephanopoulos of ABC news.
When the newsman and former Democratic official pressed Obama on the question and cited a dictionary definition of the term “tax,” the president interrupted him.
“No, but—but, George, you—you can’t just make up that language and decide that that’s called a tax increase,” he said, adding “the fact that you looked up Merriam’s Dictionary, the definition of tax increase, indicates to me that you’re stretching a little bit right now.”
Chief Justice John Roberts and the liberal bloc of the Supreme Court cited the Constitution, as well as the law’s empowerment of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), to conclude that Obama had passed one of the largest tax increases in history.
Read more: http://freebeacon.com/a-tax-unlike-any-other/
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