Conservatives were mostly encouraged by this week's oral arguments at the Supreme Court over the president's health care laws – particularly the fight over the constitutionality of the individual mandate.
Ed Whelan is president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and is a former clerk for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.
Whelan tells WND why the oral arguments seemed to help Obamacare opponents and why it's never a good idea to predict a ruling based on oral arguments. He explains why expectations that Justice Scalia would be sympathetic to the government on the Commerce Clause were really overblown.
"The government failed, time after time, to identify any meaningful limiting principle on congressional authority and that failure troubled a number of the justices," Whelan told WND.
Whelan also explains what happens next, from justices taking preliminary votes as early as Friday, putting together opinions and justices having the freedom to change their minds until just before the rulings are revealed.