underpants
underpants's Journal"Obamacare" will be upheld 6-3. Why? Scalia (+Thomas). Great short read
Why Obamacare will survive in the Supreme Court
By: RICHARD J. BONNIE, ANDREW J. PEACH | Times-Dispatch
Published: March 06, 2011 Updated: March 06, 2011 - 12:00 AM
http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/2011/mar/06/tdcomm02-why-obamacare-will-survive-in-the-supreme-ar-884246/
However, most constitutional experts do not expect this to be a close case.
The majority of at least six justices will include both Kennedy and one of the court's most predictably conservative votes, Antonin Scalia.
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(Gonzales v. Raich) The court rejected the constitutional challenge in a 6-3 decision; the majority included both Kennedy and Scalia. In his concurring opinion, Scalia noted the commerce clause empowers Congress to regulate not only the "channels" and "instrumentalities" of interstate commerce but also intrastate activities that "substantially affect" interstate commerce, and that the constitution authorizes Congress to enact measures that are "necessary and proper" to effectuate its objectives when exercising authority under the commerce clause or any other enumerated power.
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But if Scalia remains faithful to his analysis in Raich , the issue for him will not come down to whether the commerce clause itself extends to inactivity. The question will be whether the individual mandate is a permissible exercise of Congress' power under the necessary and proper clause, and based on his opinion in Raich, it is difficult to see how he could find the mandate unconstitutional.
In the final analysis, Obamacare's individual mandate may be imprudent, a product of haste, partisanship and political miscalculation, and a novel and expansive exercise of federal power. But however vociferous the objections may be, it is well within Congress' constitutional authority as understood by a firm majority of the Supreme Court, including Scalia.
Richard Bonnie is the Harrison Foundation Professor of Medicine and Law, and Professor of Public Policy at the University of Virginia, where he directs the Institute of Law, Psychiatry and Public Policy.
Justice Clarence Thomas compares the Health Care decision to shooting freethrows (NY Times)
WASHINGTON — Justice Clarence Thomas likens all the outside political pressure that the Supreme Court is facing over its review of the Obama administration’s sweeping health care law to the distraction faced by a free-throw shooter confronted with fans waving wildly behind the basket. Neither, in his view, has much impact in the end.
“Why do you think they’re never distracted? They’re focusing on the rim, right?” Justice Thomas said when asked at a forum two weeks ago about the pressures of the health care case. “That’s the same thing here. You stay focused on what you’re supposed to do. All that other stuff is just noise.”
“All that other background noise, I never — I don’t listen to all this stuff,” he said. “I don’t read the papers, I don’t watch the evening news.” If justices let outside pressures distract them, he said, “in my opinion, you have no business in the job.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/us/politics/lobby-groups-blanket-supreme-court-on-obama-health-care-plan.html?_r=1&hp#
"noise"? that is the American people voicing their opinion 
This article is dominated by the rightwing's opinion including the US Chamber of Commerce "hosting moot court sessions to prepare lawyers involved in the case" and, of course, "
the Montana Shooting Sports Association, which filed a 26-page brief opposing the law as a breach of states’ rights"
Page 2 provides discussion of Justice Kagan's lack of impartiality 
January Jones wants all moms to eat their own placenta
related links
■Placenta pizza?
January Jones has a secret weapon to fight the exhaustion of shooting Mad Men and keeping up with her newborn son, Xander. Jones takes capsules filled with her own dehydrated placenta. You know, the stuff that looks like sausages covered in strawberry jam that comes out when you give birth? "It's not witchcrafty or anything! I suggest it to all moms!" Jones told People. Apparently the processed afterbirth pills rejuvenate January when she's tired. There's been a recent rise in the companies and midwife services that offer "placenta encapsulation" to new moms
http://now.msn.com/entertainment/0324-jones-eats-placenta.aspx
Christian sex shop offers wholesome dildos
Christian sex shop offers wholesome dildos
Christians who want to do the nasty without getting too nasty may want to visit the "Love Garden." Marc Angenent, a Dutch priest turned sex therapist, launched the Liefdestuin online store for "Christians who want to shop for sex toys but don't want to be inundated with pornographic images and crude language." The site's in Dutch, so we're taking After Dark LA's word that the not-so-angelic inventory includes dildos, penis-enhancing sprays and other sex-essories -- without the usual smutty pictures. The virtuous vibrators come in discreet packaging so only you and God (not the mailman) will know about your righteous raunchiness.
http://now.msn.com/living/0324-christian-sex-toy-shop.aspx
Today in the mind of Fox News website - No Trayvon, No Reason Rally
http://www.foxnews.com/The only mention that I can find of Trayvon Martin is on the Videos tab and that is only concerning the media's role in the story.
Correction - there is an opinion piece on the rally
David Niose: Reason Rally is a coming out party for the secular movement
Dick Cheney receives heart transplant
Source: CBS News
Former Vice President Dick Cheney received a heart transplant on Saturday, his office announced.
A statement from the former vice president's office said the 71-year-old is now recovering in the intensive care unit of Inova Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church, Va., outside Washington.
The statement said Cheney had been on the transplant list for 20 months and did not know the identity of the donor.
"Although the former vice president and his family do not know the identity of the donor, they will be forever grateful for this lifesaving gift," the statement read.
Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57403969-503544/dick-cheney-receives-heart-transplant/
So we now know that he has one
Look I am not big on secessionist talk but we might want to consider casting Florida off
From the 2000 non-election to Terry Schiavo (yes that actually happened on my TV) to Casey Anthony to the Sanford FLA PD we just might be better off without them.
Point! - we need to keep Key West that is about the most American place you can find. Make it the seat of power at least.
Fidel ain't gonna live forever maybe we can bring Cuba in if only to keep the flag looking the same.
Now talk of secession and South Carolina is a teetering china pot (and understand that that is a lot of real estate to give up what with the Appalachian trail going all the way to Argentina) but they need to be on the whiteboard discussion as well.
Arizona - the only apparent purpose for it seems to be the Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon..... for that we can keep them.
House Republicans Accidentally Accept The Constitutionality Of The Affordable Care Act
Source: Think Progress
That language, included in H.R. 5, a bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act’s Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), read:
Congress finds that the health care and insurance industries are industries affecting interstate commerce and the health care liability litigation systems existing throughout the United States are activities that affect interstate commerce by contributing to the high costs of health care and premiums for health care liability insurance purchased by health care system providers.
H.R. 5 passed the House on Thursday, but even with the last minute change, the final version of the bill still includes language that resembles the administration’s claim that Congress can regulate the purchase of health care under the Constitution’s Commerce and Necessary and Proper clauses:
SEC. 303. CONSTITUTIONAL AUTHORITY.
The constitutional authority upon which this title rests is the power of the Congress to provide for the general welfare, to regulate commerce, and to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution Federal powers, as enumerated in section 8 of article I of the Constitution of the United States.
Read more: http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/03/23/450627/house-republicans-accidentally-accept-the-constitutionality-of-the-affordable-care-act/
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