Oscar Wilde wrote that “there are only two tragedies in life. One is not getting what you want. And the other is getting it.”
Republicans must be feeling that way about the Affordable Care Act and same-sex marriage right now. In both cases the U.S. Supreme Court saved them from themselves.
While the GOP allegedly wanted Obamacare to crumble and for the states to be allowed to continue to discriminate against same-sex couples, neither result would have helped them.
Sure, the court ruling to save the ACA handed President Barack Obama and the Democrats an historic victory that should rival Social Security and Medicare. But if the court struck down federal subsidies in states without their own exchanges, millions of Americans would have lost health care that they could only afford thanks to Obamacare, and it would have been very clear who was to blame.
Polls show that Americans hate the thing called “Obamacare,” while they love virtually every aspect of the law itself. Thanks to the court ruling, the GOP can continue to go on calling for repeal… and something else, without ever having to specify what that something else would be exactly. Had the program been sent into a death spiral by the court, Americans would understand what it is they lost and exactly who was responsible for them losing it.
Yes, the court’s ruling in favor of marriage equality hands the GOP a huge defeat in the culture wars. But public opinion is moving rapidly against the party on that issue and being forced to continue to make ugly noises to mollify their hard right base was hurting the Republicans among general election voters. Now they can blame the “judicial activists” on the Supreme Court – while ignoring that most of the court is conservative – and move on.
These two historic rulings – and a third not as historic but very significant on fair housing laws – might remake this “conservative court” as one that will be remembered as one of the most liberal in American history.
A nation dominated in Congress, in governor’s offices and in state legislatures by a hard right party that adamantly opposes the ACA, gay marriage and fair housing laws now finds an allegedly conservative court handing that party stinging defeats. These defeats are, strangely, at odds with our dominant conservative political environment yet consistent with where most Americans are at on the issues.
Had the court gone the other way there would have been growing frustration among the strong majority of Americans who see nothing wrong with same-sex marriage and who see a lot right with Obamacare. This is not a particularly conservative country, yet our politics are dominated by the far right. Court rulings that would have been so far from what most of us wanted would have added immensely to the sense that our system just isn’t working to deliver the policies that fit modern America. We’re a purple nation trending blue yet governed in a very red sort of way. In these rulings the court got the color just right.
So, in that sense the Roberts court may have saved not only the Republicans from their worst tendences, but the country itself. The pressure valve was released. Our system worked.
It’s a good week to be an American.
