Apparently, No Limiting Principle

Obviously it is early, and analysis of today's Supreme Court ruling on the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) has just begun. But my first blush reaction is simply this:

The Court has ruled that Government can impose upon its citizens anything it wants - there is, apparently, no such thing as a limiting principle.

By limiting principle, I simply mean that line that limits what an elected government can do, the limits of its power. In the issue at hand, as long as a thing purports to be for the "common good" or "general welfare", then Congress has the power to create laws that force people into choices they would otherwise not make, eliminating at least in part their freedom to choose. Should any discriminatory group (think special interest groups) decide that a certain entitlement is a "right", then with enough votes in Congress and a willing President and a bureaucratic army of regulatory enforcers - what they say goes. Individuals will not have the right to "opt out" of these so-called mandates. Every individual must now, by law, be insured, and if not, must pay a penalty - a tax. It will be the insurance industry, in cooperation with the Government, that imposes that tax. By establishing this precedent, there truly is nothing to stop any other Government-subsidized industry from wanting to push for their own brand of universal entitlements to promote the "general welfare." All it will take is willing participants in the halls of power.

You know what other forms of government purport to uphold and impose solutions for the common good? Socialist forms of government do that. By act of Congress, signature of the President, and judgment of the Supreme Court, the social compact of our nation has gone from one that upholds as primary the ideal of liberty to one that seeks to engineer a better society "for the common good."

If this is our future, so be it. Elections have consequences, as they say. But whatever you do, don't try to pawn this off as a victory for liberty and representative democracy.

Because it is not.

Update: Knee jerk reactions are often just that, and I admit the above probably should be characterized as such. Reading more on the ruling seems to imply that the Commerce Clause (under which the mandate was first argued), cannot be used to prop up the law. Therefore, the only way to allow the mandate to stand is to specifically characterize it as a tax that must be implemented like any other tax. Congress has the power to tax. Of course, citizens have the right to express their opinions on such taxes through the ballot box. I still don't like the ruling, but it will be interesting to watch this play out over time.