We ae being manipulated by taxes all the time...

This, from Sean Trende, Roberts Didn't Expand Government's Taxing Power, is the same argument AOG made in a recent comment...

...Second, that Congress would have the power to pass the mandate pursuant to its power to tax makes eminent sense. John Yoo wrote in last week's Wall Street Journal: "Congress may not be able to directly force us to buy electric cars, eat organic kale, or replace oil heaters with solar panels. But if it enforces the mandates with a financial penalty, then suddenly, thanks to Justice Roberts's tortured reasoning in Sebelius, the mandate is transformed into a constitutional exercise of Congress's power to tax."

This is odd, given that Congress already does provide a tax penalty for not buying electric cars. Consider the following hypothetical scenarios:

(a) Two people make $100,000. There is a 25 percent flat tax imposed, with one exception: a $7,500 credit is allowed for buying a Chevy Volt. A buys a Volt, B does not. A therefore pays $17,500 in taxes, while B pays $25,000 in taxes.

(b) Two people make $100,000. There is a 17.5 percent flat tax imposed, with one exception: a $7,500 surtax is imposed for not buying a Chevy Volt. A buys a volt, B does not. A therefore pays $17,500 in taxes, while B pays $25,000 in taxes.

I honestly may be missing something here, but I can't see how option (a) -- an oversimplified statement of present law -- is acceptable, but (b) offends either the conscience or the Constitution. The simple fact is that almost all of us pay higher taxes each year than we otherwise would on the basis of things we forgo: whether it is not buying an electric car, not installing energy-efficient windows in our house, or not having that third kid. There's no new ground being broken here....