Forecasting the Supreme Court Vote on “Obamacare”

[usregimechange]

The Supreme Court has reinserted itself in the heart of domestic politics by agreeing to review the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). How is the Court likely to rule? Consider two scenarios...

Applying this technique to the PPACA we can estimate probability that each justice would vote to overturn the law if ideology were the only factor. Based on preferences alone, 5 justices, including the “swing” justice Anthony Kennedy, are predicted to vote to overturn the PPACA —as depicted in the top graph below... The most likely scenario is a 5-4 decision overturning the PPACA. Under this scenario, the Court would be a lock to overturn. Goodbye Obamacare...

Kennedy’s predicted behavior shifts dramatically, going from a certain vote to overturn the PPACA in the ideology-only model to only a 46% likelihood of voting to overturn when we factor in precedent. Roberts and Alito also shift, although not so markedly. In the second graph, the probability of overturning the law is therefore much lower (30%)...

That said, here is ours: 6-3 or 7-2 to uphold the law.

http://themonkeycage.org/blog/2011/11/21/forecasting-the-supreme-court-vote-on-obamacare/

[n2doc]

1. No way Roberts votes to uphold

Precedent is just something to be used when convenient for this court.