So, what are the possible outcomes of all this? Place your bets! 1. Law upheld in entirety with up to four dissenting opinions.
2. Portion of law found unconstitutional, remainder left standing, multiple decisions and multiple opinions.
3. Entire law thrown out. I think this unlikely but made possible by the failure of Congress to provide for the possibility that a portion of the bill could be found unconstitutional but the remainder could be left standing.
4. Judicial activism. Portions of law found unconstitutional ordered rewritten by SCOTUS into a constitutional framework as guided. And the country spends the next 100 years contending with the previously failed government option, ie. we end up with a one provider system within ten years as private enterprise removes itself from the medical insurance business.
Yeah, right. I don't really consider this much of a probability, mainly because counsel for the administration did such an abysmal job on the brocolli issue, which I think was plainly not equitable in the analogy but the point really wasn't made in arguments.
5. Decision defered and returned to lower courts for bickering. BWUAAA-HAHAHAHAHAAAAAAA!
Seriously, four years ago I never would have thought the Swiss version of universal coverage, mandating that everyone buy thier own health insurance, would have been the option approved by Congress. Any Congress regardless of its composition. On the other hand I never would have predicted then that the Pubs would be such universal stick in the muds that they would almost universally refuse to participate in the process of crafting a healthcare reform law, and they don't deserve any rewards for being such do-nothings. They don't like what was passed, well screw 'em they didn't participate in trying to make things better anyway.
6. Other (explain).
I am here not out to predict what SCOTUS will decide, though I do think there will be multiple decisions resulting in one majority opinion and various dissenting opinions both right and left, which will confuse the course of things for many years to come.
In the end my philosophy of government descends not to what is constitutional but to what is right and good in terms of a "more perfect union." I admit that freely, in my opinion government is and should be working for the people. We are a progressive nation always seeking what is better than before. Improving towards perfection yet unattained.