Friday, June 29, 2012
An attempt at Cartesian Logic
The Constitution requires tax increases to originate in the House of Representatives. See Art. I, §7, cl. 1. That is to say, they must originate in the legislative body most accountable to the people, where legislators must weigh the need for the tax against the terrible price they might pay at their next election, which is never more than two years off. The Federalist No. 58 “defend[ed] the decision to give the origination power to the House on the ground that the Chamber that is more accountable to the people should have the primary role in raising revenue.” We have no doubt that Congress knew precisely what it was doing when it rejected an earlier version of this legislation that imposed a tax instead of a requirement-with-penalty. Imposing a tax through judicial legislation inverts the constitutional scheme, and places the power to tax in the branch of government least accountable to the citizenry.
Article $n$, Section $m$ does not apply...
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9 comments:
Open and shut case, it sounds to me. BTW, your tautological label could be of use on many of your posts as well.
For instance in those posts of yours asserting that Marie Louise Coanda invented the Pythagorean theorem and/or proved first the jet engine.
Ah, mais non, mais non. As you clearly indicate, my premise does not start with "not A", but simply with "A did something". You can't challenge such an assertion on logical grounds -- you may simply dispute its accuracy, but that's another can of fish.
What Roberts did was to postulate an equality: "penalty =tax", though by definition (explicitly in the Constitution, and abundantly clear in constitutional law), the two concepts are different. In other words, he said A=B, although A\not\subset B and B \not\subset A. If that's not a fallacy (in anything except Pepean Logick), I don't know what is.
In (the Nicomachean Ethics), Aristotle argues that the correct approach in studying such controversial subjects as Ethics or Politics, which involve discussing what is true about what is beautiful or just, is to start with what would be roughly agreed to be true by people of good up-bringing and experience in life, and to work from there to a higher understanding.
We'll keep it low, Ari-babe.
No more Phronēsis, eh?
Aristotle weeps:
"General Verrilli, today you are arguing that the penalty is not a tax," Alito said. "Tomorrow you are going to be back, and you will be arguing that the penalty is a tax. Has the court ever held that something that is a tax for the purposes of the taxing power under the Constitution is not a tax under the Anti-Injunction Act?"
"No," answered Verrilli.
[..]
On Thursday, Chief Justice John Roberts, rejecting the Commerce Clause argument, agreed with Verrilli that the mandate simultaneously was and was not a tax, and that therefore Obamacare would stand.
We need a new label: A intersect (not A) is never empty. Or at least sometimes it is non-empty. It all depends on what the definition of is is.
Roberts' sleight of hand drove his conservative colleagues nuts. "The government and those who support its position on this point make the remarkable argument that [the mandate] is not a tax for purposes of the Anti-Injunction Act, but is a tax for constitutional purposes," wrote dissenters Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. "That carries verbal wizardry too far, deep into the forbidden land of the sophists."
Of course, sophistry is at the heart of non-Archimedean logic.
archimedes \neq aristotle, duh.
Whereas young people become accomplished in geometry and mathematics, and wise within these limits, prudent young people do not seem to be found. The reason is that prudence is concerned with particulars as well as universals, and particulars become known from experience, but a young person lacks experience, since some length of time is needed to produce it (Nicomachean Ethics 1142 a).
Robts seems to use the situational over the general ethics. Some guy at nro that you linked (but I repeat myself, who else with a brain cares about wfb?) argued that all was hunky-dory because this would force on the (missing, yes) electorate a clear decision to the govt that we're not ready to go the way of Austria and the Neths and to accept socialism.
Archimedes, Aristotle: Minsk, Pinsk. Or, to be hip: penalty, tax.
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