Some on the anti-Trump left have lost their ever lovin’ minds. They have been reduced to promoting farfetched scenarios that aren’t even remotely credible or realistic, scenarios that if conservatives were touting them in reaction to a Hillary victory these same people would be rightly scoffing at.
Now that their always absurd Electoral College coup strategy has failed miserably as all reasonable and informed people knew it would, the latest scenario seems to be that the Supreme Court can save us from Trump. Yeah, whatever.
Bill Palmer, Editor of the cleverly named Palmer Report, breathlessly declares that the Supreme Court can stop Trump from taking office. He even cites our old friend Harvard Law Professor Larry Lessig. One presumes that ol’ Larry was liberal when he first took the job at Harvard, but not cuckoo. The election of Trump has obviously pushed him down the track into crazy town, because he is peddling scenarios that would normally be confined to shortwave radio. I bet Harvard wishes he would just shut up.
Palmer also links to a Brookings Institution article by, among others, Harvard Law Professor Laurence Tribe. What’s up with all the crazy Larrys at Harvard? Larry Number Two loses me in the first paragraph when he invokes the Founders. I’m sorry Larry II, but when you are one of the, if not the, foremost living exponents of “a living and breathing Constitution,” you don’t get to invoke the Founders. Tribe et al base their case in part on the #fakenews story of alleged interference from the big meanie Russians. So Tribe is not only peddling outlandish scenarios that would make Alex Jones blush, he’s also dangerously Red Baiting. I thought liberals objected to Red Baiting. Remember, “Alger Hiss did nothing wrong.”
Also, Tribe et al don’t even argue that SCOTUS can intervene to stop Trump, so it’s not totally clear to me why Palmer cites them anyway. What they argue is that Trump’s vast international business dealings are an inherent conflict of interests from the moment he swears in. As an originalist I’m all for stickler interpretations of the Constitution, unlike generally “living and breathing” Larry, but this argument could potentially preemptively rule out all business leaders. Would this not also have applied to Ross Perot? Steve Forbes? The potential conflicts of interest are admittedly a tricky business, but I don’t think the Founders, who feared a professional political class, intended the Emoluments Clause to inherently exclude successful businessmen. The Emoluments Clause was intended to prevent office holders from accepting “any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State,” not rule out an entire class of people beforehand.
In support of his “case,” bloviating Bill Palmer lets loose with this gem: “Constitutionally, the Supreme Court can do essentially anything it wants – ”
Ummm… no it can’t. Article III of the Constitution which establishes the Judicial Branch is actually quite short, and certainly does not grant such discretion to the Supreme Court. This is truly delusional stuff. What could possibly be the point of liberal thought leaders like Palmer stringing all of their gullible readers along like this? It strikes me as cruel. Does Palmer actually even believe his own scenario? Is this just about the website hits? Is it just to keep the butthurt anti-Trumpers stirred up?
Sorry boys, but the Supreme Court ain’t gonna overturn the election and block Trump from assuming the Presidency of the United States. Get used to choking on those words. What do Bill and Larry I think the end game is here anyway? If the Supreme Court did “disqualify” Trump it would be inviting violence and chaos and illegitimacy. There is nothing that Trump can do in the next four years that would be worse for their cause than the pushback that would result from such a naked display of power. And if the SCOTUS could act so arbitrarily, why couldn’t the Administration just chose to ignore them? Who’s going to enforce their verdict? The Court’s army?
Up next on Coast to Coast AM, Bill Palmer and Larry Lessig discuss the Supreme Court disqualifying Donald Trump, with special guest Laurence Tribe discussing why Trump is impeachable from day one. Is the faculty at Yale Law also this nuts?
Tags: Donald Trump Supreme Court
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