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mellowtigger) wrote2024-07-08 06:21 pm
Moody Monday: Calvinball in the USA
If you haven't seen the actual ruling (pdf document) by the U.S. Supreme Court yet, then I recommend keeping that link ready. It's worthwhile to double-check the interpretations that I'll share today. And if you don't know what Calvinball is, then two comic strips (#1 and #2, from the 1990s) will teach you quickly. Basically, you make up the rules as you go.
Read more, or watch the Legal Eagle video at the end...
I reiterate my earlier point that this ruling is not some potential controversy for the future. It is now. The U.S. Supreme Court reinterpreted the U.S. Constitution, creating new policy whole cloth from nowhere. They made irrelevant the childhood lessons I learned in school about balance of powers. The only legal remedy for their action is A) if the U.S. states ratify a new constitutional amendment to establish some different standard or B) if the Supreme Court itself relitigates the issue and reaches a different conclusion. That's it in a nutshell. There is nothing that the legislative or executive branches of government can do on their own to change the meaning of the Constitution. Only the states can ratify any change to that document. Which is why the Supreme Court ruling is just as radical as I (and others) say it is.
One of the, um, "interesting" things about the ruling is that the Supreme Court declined to provide any firm definition of the President's actions that are allowed or prohibited. They deferred that decision to the future court to arbitrate as needed. So... they created a new interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, and they left themselves as final arbiters of its meaning, whatever it means to them at that time. Maybe presidents they like can do no wrong, while presidents they dislike somehow manage to break the law. Such a curious coincidence would be entirely legal by their definition of our current "law".
It's not cheating if you make up the rules as you go. That's why this Calvinball reference is so delicious.
"The second reason they don’t worry is that if a Democratic president did commit crimes, the Supreme Court would handle it. This Calvinball Court would find an exception, a loophole, a heretofore hidden penumbra that allows them to clothe in the language of legal authority the real rule: Our side gets to do what it wants, and your side doesn’t."
https://paulwaldman.substack.com/p/the-attack-on-democracy-is-already
A different writer goes further in this article, and I tend to agree with much of it. Biden entered office and created a commission to examine the Supreme Court and propose how to fix its ethical problems. They created a very thorough report. Jump to chapter 2 (court membership and size), section III (court expansion), because that part is relevant to Solution B mentioned above, if we added more justices and they decided to relitigate to reach a different decision.
"As we noted at the outset of this Part, there is profound disagreement among Commissioners over whether adding Justices to the Supreme Court at this moment in time would be wise. As a Commission we have endeavored to articulate the contours of that debate as best as we understand them, without purporting to judge the weight of any of the arguments offered in favor or against calls to increase the size of the Court."
- https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/SCOTUS-Report-Final.pdf
Although the group as a whole didn't make a recommendation for packing the court, individual members sometimes changed their mind in favor of it over time, as they watched this court move so far to the right that it doesn't even bother defining its own rules any more. It's like that time Republicans said they couldn't appoint a U.S. Supreme Court justice so close to the election, then they approved a U.S. Supreme Court justice even closer to the election. Remember how that happened? Good times.
If you've read this far, then you might enjoy the Legal Eagle's video on this topic (YouTube, 1.8 million views and counting). The speaking is very fast in this one, and it's still 25 minutes long. As usual, the channel makes solid legal points. That video includes the quote from Sotomayor calling attention to the fact that the Founding Fathers knew about immunity and granted it to others, but they specifically did not grant it to the President. The hypocrisy is obvious in this ruling from justices (especially the 3 liars) appointed by the "law and order" political party. Their law, their order, at their whim.
Calvinball is such an appropriate metaphor. I'll leave you with this comic from 1995 September 12. Stay within the perimeter of wisdom. It reminds me a lot of Colbert's famous quote that "reality has a well-known liberal bias."
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