A federal judge ruled today that the constitution does not allow the government to require people to purchase health insurance. It should surprise nobody that this particular judge was appointed by Bush (to whom all appointments were political), and note also that two other judges have ruled that this requirement is constitutional, so it is not clear how this will eventually turn out.

But uncertainty didn’t stop Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) from issuing a statement saying “Today is a great day for liberty. Congress must obey the Constitution rather than make it up as we go along. Liberty requires limits on government, and today those limits have been upheld.” His website also claims “Hatch was the first Senator to publicly argue that the individual insurance mandate is unconstitutional.”

The only problem with this, as NPR points out, is that Hatch was the one of the people who came up with the idea for the “individual mandate” (one could say he helped “hatch” it), which requires people to buy health insurance. In fact, back in 1993, he was a co-sponsor of a bill to require individuals to purchase health insurance.

Was he just “making it up as he went along” back then? Or now?

How long will it take the American people to wise up that the Republicans will be against anything Obama proposes, even if it was their idea in the first place?

UPDATE: The judge who ruled the individual mandate unconstitutional owns a significant chunk of a GOP political consulting firm that worked against health care reform, and from which he receives income in the form of dividends.