THE SUPREME COURT FOLLOWS THE ELECTION RETURNS, AND SOMETIMES VICE VERSA

I'm not convinced that the Obama administration is going to lose, or lose completely, when the Supreme Court deals with the Obamacare contraceptive mandate.

A decision is expected in June 2014, a few months before the midterms. I continue to think that John Roberts is as much a Republican operative as he is a jurist. If he's the swing vote, as he was on the main Obamacare ruling before the 2012 election, will he anticipate that a pro-right-wing 5-4 ruling will drive Democratic turnout at the polls? He'll probably be mindful of how important the votes of women and unmarried voters were to Terry McAuliffe in the Virginia governor's race; he'll also be thinking about Albuquerque's rejection of a 20-week abortion ban. So he may not want a ruling that gives corporations, or at least publicly held ones, religious rights heretofore reserved to individuals. This may change if he gets buy-in from one of the Democratic appointees, but I'm guessing he won't.

I think he'd rather have his own side's voters angry at the Court and ready to express their wrath at the polls. He tried that in 2012; it didn't work, but midterm elections are much more likely to be won by the side tht turns out its base. I'm predicting he won't give his side the big win, because he's fighting a long war.