Weekend reader comments

April 27, 2024

Hi, everyone!

I have intermittent access to the internet at our cabin in Sequoia National Park. We expected clear weather and were surprised by 6-inches of snow after our arrival! So, consider this newsletter an invitation to ‘talk amongst yourselves’ in the Comments section. As always, please be respectful!

Many readers responded positively to yesterday’s column criticizing the Supreme Court’s hearing on presidential immunity. However, a handful of readers thought I was intemperate in my criticisms of the Court. Those criticisms came from readers whose judgment I respect. In this case, I disagree with their judgment.

We are entering uncharted territory. The Supreme Court will conjure a non-existent presidential immunity to protect the only president to attempt a coup. Even if the Court grants Trump partial immunity only, that is more than he (or any president) deserves. No person is above the law—and there is nothing in the Constitution that says otherwise. But to grant immunity to Trump on the facts alleged in the indictment is lawless and corrupt.

Josh Marshall’s comments in his Friday Editor’s Blog reflect my sentiments. See Peering into the Corrupt Court’s Pretensions and Corruption. (Accessible to all, although normally behind a paywall for members):

The display we saw yesterday was a vivid illustration of how the Court has gone thoroughly rogue, cutting itself off from even the appearances of the processes that give it legitimacy. That is the core of the current Court’s corruption.

If we assume that there might be some limited ways that official acts can’t be reinterpreted as crimes, it seems to go without saying that refusing to honor the results of an election can’t be one of them. Trying to overthrow the government can’t be one of those official acts. [¶]

It’s a rogue court, a thoroughly corrupt one, one that is so far gone in its corruption that it feels free even from the practical obligation to clothe its corruption for the sake of appearances.

Or, as Professor Laurence Tribe said on MSNBC, the Trump immunity case will “hurt the Supreme Court even more than Bush v. Gore.”

We cannot pretend that this is normal or acceptable. Indeed, the MAGA extremists are depending on Democrats to be temperate, refined, and reserved in the face of corruption. The time for presumptions of goodwill and deference to the Court has passed. It abused our trust and refused to regulate itself. We must do so before it is too late.

Talk to you on Monday!

[A view from our cabin front deck on Friday, April 26—my birthday!]