Ben Smith thinks that the recent legal challenges to the Affordable Care Act stand to help Mitt Romney and take of the weight of his healthcare anchor. Smith writes:
Romney's argument is now much stronger. Because the main objection to ObamaCare, as its critics call it, is no longer a matter of policy nuance. Now critics primarily make the case that it's an unconstitutional expansion of specifically federal power. And on that turf, the similar structure of the plans doesn't matter. Romney enacted his at a state level, and states have -- conservatives argue -- more power to regulate the insurance industry, as they do with car insurance.First, let's not buy into the notion that the two recent decisions by federal district court judges which ruled the individual mandate unconstitutional are any more valid or important than previous district court rulings which upheld the law as constitutional.
But more politically important is that Smith is taking a huge leap when he assumes that both Republican primary opponents and Republican primary voters are going to think there is a world of difference between when the federal government mandates you buy health insurance from private insurers and when the state of Massachusetts mandates you buy health insurance from a private insurer. My guess is that both Romney's opponents and Republican primary voters think a mandate is a mandate, regardless of who is imposing it. Obviously Mitt Romney is putting his money on voters drawing the distinction he wants them to make when he refuses to back away from the healthcare reform he passed in Massachusetts. Time will tell how that works, but I can't imagine his opponents are so incompetent as to not make sure voters continue to think that a mandate is a mandate, regardless of whether it is at the federal or state level.