Everything doesn't fall apart, not every time. Sometimes the center holds.
Mere anarchy is not unleashed.
In the era of Trump, the smart bet was to assume that no audacity was too extreme, no lie too outlandish, and there was no limit whatever on shamelessness.
Trump is an amazing political actor--with "amazing" intended both to mean Trump has extraordinary skills as a political communicator, but also that Trump has an extraordinary ability to focus attention on himself, to amaze. It makes him not just the center of attention but a center of influence.
Republicans do not dare be outside of the circle of grace, those getting the affirmation and support of Trump himself. The word was out that he took names and paid attention to who was on the team and who held back. Officeholders saw what happened to Senators Jeff Flake and Bob Corker, and to Congressmen Mark Sanford and Justin Amash. They criticized Trump and were destroyed. Georgia Republicans, Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger ran an election Trump lost narrowly, and now face his wrath. They should not have let that happen, he said. Georgia U.S. Senate candidates call for the resignation of the Georgia Secretary of State. Crowds chant disapproval of them.
 |
| Yesterday's post: Needless concern. |
Courts, an attorney in my household told me, deal with facts and reason. She said the Supreme Court would not agree to Trump's demand. People fearing that underestimated the independence and determination of the justice system to locate truth. Trump was spinning conspiratorial lies, she said, and courts would demand evidence, not speculation.
My blog post yesterday posited that the Supreme Court just might agree with Trump. It turned out that it didn't.
College classmate John Shutkin sent me a brief explanation of what happened yesterday. John is an attorney with a practice that included serving as General Counsel to large law and accounting firms.
John Shutkin:
 |
| John Shutkin |
"The court denied the petition 7-2 on the grounds of "standing." In other words, it did not have to reach the merits because the petitioners failed to establish that they constituted a group legally aggrieved by the defendants' actions, whether the actions were right or wrong. And this was clearly the right decision. How could the rules that, say, Wisconsin established for voting solely by Wisconsin residents have an effect on Texas voters? OK; the Wisconsin voters helped to defeat the candidate that Texas voters wanted elected, but that is simply too tenuous a connection to constitute legal "standing." It is not as though the Wisconsin rules somehow prevented the Texans from voting as they chose.
The "dissent" by Thomas and Alito, ironically, might actually be a stronger repudiation of the petitioners. They stated that, because SCOTUS had "original jurisdiction" over the case -- in other words, it did not arrive after appeal from lower courts -- it should have at least considered the case on its merits. But then the dissenters said that they rejected all the other grounds raised by the petitioners. Although they did not specify those grounds, one could infer that, unlike the majority, they were addressing the merits of the case and would have dismissed the case on the merits. The majority, by contrast, dismissed without having to reach the merits."
I asked Shutkin why Thomas and Alito, of all people, were the two who signaled the most resistance to Trump, when based on their judicial records, they might be thought to be the most agreeable.
Shutkin responded:
"I can’t explain the dissent really. Maybe they just didn’t like the standing argument in the context of an original case. Or maybe they felt the need to underscore their independence from Trump’s clumsy attempt at political pressure. Judges of all stripes strongly resent that, particularly as you go up the judicial food chain."
3 comments:
Yes, truth is in there somewhere.
The SCOTUS ruling was reassuring. However, the rebuke lays bare the corruption of the Republican party and it's willingness to trash democracy. Why? To cynically pander to the mouth-breathing base, egged on by Trump and wing nut media, for money.
You mention shamelessness, and certainly Trump must be ecstatic that his increasingly deranged rants are so effective at raking in the cash, but the side effect is that it's emboldened at least 128 other Republican MOC to join in, unable to resist.
They joined the suit knowing that President Elect Biden won, and the election was clean.
This fact cannot be emphasized enough. This was only done for fundraising in the face of a pandemic that's killing an American every minute. I only hope the Court was offended at the attempt to drag it down into the sewer with them.
When we have a party so willing to trade in outrageous lies and conspiracies in order to raise money, it's clear that campaign finance reform is urgently needed.
On the other hand, we get to see Sarah Palin again, winking and wiggling her way down in Georgia. Trump cut her out of the picture the last 4 years but, like a fungus, she oozed her way back in. In a way they are alike. Both have a lot of appeal as showmen, but little substance behind them. When Trump had a chance to show real leadership when the pandemic first hit, he failed. I think people saw that, which is why they voted overwhelmingly to boot him. He'll never figure that out.
Anyway, Happy Days are here again. For a while, at least.
To cynically pander to the mouth-breathing base...
Exactly the kind of elite contempt for the “deplorables“ that will continue the polarization and lead to more Trump-style politics.
Post a Comment