Jed Lewison's excellent piece today focuses on the apparent lack of standing of Boehner and his Republican House colleagues to sue Obama for his delay of the employer mandate.
http://www.dailykos.com/... But the argument for recognizing Republican standing here is actually much weaker than Lewison and other pundits have recognized. In fact, it is a joke - - but the reason why has not been widely discussed.
Boehner's explicit argument is that courts should confer standing on House Republicans to sue the President (in contravention of all prior precedent) because no private party conceivably could be injured by Obama's delay of the "employer mandate" to have ordinary standing. (Conversely, and admittedly, if private parties did suffer an injury from the "employer mandate" delay, they would have standing and there would be no need to even contemplate creating this new rule of "Republican House standing.") Or, as Boehner himself explained in a memo to House colleagues, the Obama lawsuit is supposedly unique because "there is no one else who could challenge the president's failure." http://www.nytimes.com/...
But there is an obvious injured private plaintiff with standing - - it is an employee of a covered business who did not get his or her health insurance as a result of the "employer mandate" delay. It is the exact parallel to the private employer who had standing to bring the Supreme Court lawsuit overturning Obama's NLRB recess appointments. Or the private power plant owner who will inevitably challenge Obama's EPA regulations, etc.
But here is the gem that people are missing. Republicans didn't overlook or fail to appreciate that such employees should have standing. Their absurd premise is that no one - including employees - could be hurt by losing their evil, destructive Obamacare. Rather, those employees would benefit by not having such health insurance. As the Republican legal architects explain, Obama's delay of the "employer mandate" was entirely "benevolent" and helpful to all:
But no other plaintiffs possess standing to challenge several of President Obama’s recent acts. This is because they are “benevolent” suspensions, in which the president exempts certain classes of people from the operation of law. . . . Indeed, these actions have helped affected individuals, rather than harmed them, even while shredding the rule of law. In such situations, courts should permit congressional standing as a last resort to enforce the basic constitutional architecture. http://www.politico.com/...
Get it? No one could be injured (to have standing) by the delay of the "employer mandate" because the Republican position to delay or repeal Obamacare actually benefits everyone! In other words, to even begin discussing the merits of Boehner's challenge to Obama's use of executive orders, one first has to enter the "Republican bubble" and accept as an established fact that Obamacare injures everyone. Keep in mind: that assertion is not something the lawsuit intends to establish; it is a jurisdictional fact that the courts supposedly should take judicial notice of.
Umm, this is not just frivolous, it is juvenile. It doesn't deserve serious discussion.
If journalists and pundits want to inform, and shorten, this debate, they should stick to this core defect and keep asking Boehner to explain: why haven't covered employees been injured by the delay of the "employer mandate"? Make Boehner explain their position that people are benefitted by not having health insurance. Then let him explain why he is suing to take away that supposed benefit . . . and to take it away much quicker. Let the multiple absurdities speak for themselves.
It all falls apart on this one point . . . as it should.