I DON'T THINK THIS IS AN IDLE THREAT

I really hope the health care law is upheld (though I don't expect that to happen), and yet I'm sure that wouldn't be the end of the fight by any means. I think, once they're back in power, right-wingers really would try to do what Louie Gohmert predicts:

Liberals should be concerned about what a future "redneck president" could impose on them if the Supreme Court upholds the healthcare reform law's mandate that everyone have insurance, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) said Monday.

"Let's say you want to follow this administration's idea of greatest good for the greatest number of people," Gohmert said. "It ought to scare liberals to come run and join conservatives, because what it means is when this president's out of the White House and you get a conservative in there, if this president has the authority under ObamaCare ... to trample on religious rights, then some redneck president's got the right to say, 'you know what, there's some practices that go on in your house that cost people too much money and healthcare, so we're going to have the right to rule over those as well.' "

Now, when Gohmert talks about "practices that go on in your house that cost people too much money and healthcare" I don't think he's referring to, say, eating too much greasy takeout food and washing it down with half a dozen Bud tallboys and/or crystal meth and never getting more exercise than the amount you get walking from the TV chair to the driver's seat of the pickup truck. I know exactly what he means -- he means gay sex, because thoroughly discredited right-wing pseudo-science, which is believed by a large percentage of the right, including right-wingers who claim to be sophisticated, tells us that gay men and lesbians have shockingly brief lifespans and die sooner than straight people from all sorts of causes, including accidents. Oh, and I'm sure he's also referring to abortion, which all right-wingers "know" causes breast cancer, even though that assertion has been thoroughly debunked. And I almost forgot the supposed link between having an abortion and depression, even though that's also been debunked.

Right-wingers never admit defeat, so if they somehow manage to lose at the Supreme Court on the mandate issue, they absolutely will take advantage of it the next time they control the entire federal government. And if you think they won't try to use pseudo-science in legislation, obviously you haven't been paying attention to the climate change debate in America.

Now, it's not at all clear that they can actually succeed in these efforts. But they'll certainly be more than happy to waste everyone's time trying, because payback is their idea of good governance.

(X-posted at Booman Tribune.)