Obamacare court decision: Twitter on fire, Facebook rather muted

Today's U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding nationwide tax subsidies for Obamacare enrollees generated a fascinating, distinct reaction online between Facebook and Twitter.
I realize these are two different online animals but Twitter quickly exploded with news and commentary about the far-reaching, widely anticipated 6-3 decision in King v Burwell. But the reaction on Facebook was slow and – on the right side of the aisle – rather glum.

Among the Facebook antagonists and trolls, I was expecting an avalanche of responses declaring Chief Justice John Roberts (who wrote the majority opinion) a traitor – and much worse. I anticipated commentary like the hyperbole instantly offered on Twitter by Ben Shapiro, editor of Britebart, who offered this declaration:

“This is the greatest destruction of individual liberty since Dred Scott. This is the end of America as we know it. No exaggeration.”

Of course, that reaction is just silly. But it’s interesting that the Facebook blowback has been so reserved, if not a surrender to realities. Just yesterday I heard conservative Republicans on Facebook confidently declaring that the high court would rule against Obama.

It reminded me of the emotional response on the right – pre- and post-election – in 2012 regarding Mitt Romney’s presidential defeat. Anyone concentrating on evidence-based information, rather than partisan cheerleading, should have known that Romney was going to lose. Similarly, the fact that lawmakers and key aides on Capitol Hill had acknowledged in advance that King v Burwell had little merit – based on the legal standard of legislative intent – should have dampened the enthusiasm prior to the court ruling.

Meanwhile, the folks at Vox are asserting that many congressional Republicans are quietly relieved that the ruling went against the GOP.

First, the fight over whether and how to repair the Affordable Care Act could have been a disaster for the GOP. A CBS News/New York Times poll released this week found that 70 percent of respondents wanted the court to keep the subsidies and 64 percent wanted Congress to replace them if the court had struck them down. But Republicans, who control both chambers of Congress, had not coalesced around a viable plan to help the millions of Americans who risked losing their insurance if the court swung against the law, according to Vox.

Clearly, congressional Republicans are miffed about the ruling, especially after they (in the House) had voted more than 50 times to repeal Obamacare. The GOP strategists on Capitol Hill even went so far as to shut down the federal government in 2013 to make their stand against the ACA.

However, Vox, knowing that a repeal with no replacement could have been a political disaster for GOP stalwarts, digs deeper to expose the political realities:

“… A lot of them weren't looking forward to spending the rest of this Congress talking about how to put Obama's law back together. It would have been a messy process, with no guarantee that they could get a plan through either or both chambers. And, of course, there's little chance that they could have found common ground with Obama to sign their fix.

“That is, they were facing a whole lot of work with little likelihood of having anything to show for it at the end of the process -- other than yet another highly charged political battle over the same law.
“‘To a person, we think it's terrible for the country, and we want to see it gone,' said one senior GOP aide who nonetheless acknowledged feeling ‘some relief on the tactical level.’"