Anyone who knows me knows that I've never believed that Trump will be punished for anything he's done. Even as case after case is decided against him, nothing seems to touch him.
He's guilty of rape. That's what the judge said. That the judgement against him for defamation against E Jean Carroll meant that yeah, he raped her. And it was a hefty judgement against him (he had to pay for the defamation, he will never go to jail for the rape). But he hasn't paid her a dime.
He is now appealing the judgement against him in the election finance fraud case (it wasn't about sleeping with Stormy Daniels or even paying her off to be quiet about it, it was always about hiding the payments) because the Supreme Court said he can do whatever he wants. Even though this case is about something he did before he was president and it's a state case. But okay...
The guilty verdicts keep rolling in, but nothing ever happens to him.
And now the Supreme Court, and I keep making a face every time I type that because they are more like the Burrito Supreme Court as in you can buy them if you want to. Just call it a gratuity and you'll be fine. Anyway...that court has said that he has absolute immunity for anything he did as president, as long as he believes, and they agree, that he thought it was official duties he could have. So he will be untouchable for everything else. If he thought he could officially take the documents, then he could take the documents. If he thought he could lead an insurrection then he could lead an insurrection. It makes mockery of the fact that we all knew when Nixon said if a president does it then it's not illegal that that was wrong. What Nixon did was still illegal. But apparently not according to this court.
Nothing's changed. I mean. Not really. Not the big picture as far as what we need to do, and that's vote in November but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't more and more worried about it. I don't think he will win. I think he'll lose the vote. But I'm not sure he won't be installed as president anyway. You saw dry runs of vote manipulation during the primaries. People testing the waters to see if they could delay or deny the votes were legitimate. And we've seen a Supreme Court decide the presidency before, and they were only slightly corrupt compared to this court.
And because the court has been busy this term setting themselves up so tidily it might not really matter. The past few weeks they've gutted regulatorily agencies and said that it's up to the courts to decide on matters of regulation. With the Supreme Court being that highest opinion. They've said that it's okay to bribe elected officials, as long as you don't call it a bribe and it comes after the decisions are made, so they've blessed the over 4 million and counting Thomas has received from the Nazi memorabilia collector. They've said that a president has absolute immunity over any official acts and that THEY GET TO DECIDE what is official. So yeah, they've set themselves up pretty well.
We're screwed.
It's been a slow rolling plan and they executed it about as well as you could. They've taken over the courts. They've taken over local governments at all levels. They've instilled these weird ideas in a lot of people's heads about what the real problems in America are. Not the rich getting richer, not the loss of actual freedoms, but who is doing what in the privacy of their own bedrooms with other consenting adults. THAT'S the problem. And where people pee! And who is running next to you on the track! OH MY GOD THAT'S THE PROBLEM! Now empty your wallets, hand over your right to protest, and don't mind the brown water coming out of your tap the court says it's fine.
I'll still vote in November. Like I said, that's all we can do right now. Vote and vote in large numbers and hope that there is still a shred of actual decency in the court system that believes we should have a democracy for at least a little while longer. And, no, I don't give a fuck that Biden is old. I knew he was old before. I trust Harris to be a good president if he doesn't make it another four years. I trust the people he has around him right now to run the country in a way that is closer to my own values than anyone on the other side of the aisle would. I'm not entertaining should haves and if onlys, I'm dealing with what we have and this is reality.
And the reality is we need majorities in the House, in the Senate and a Democrat in the White House. And then we need to undo some of the damage this court has done, and oh by the way, do some court reform as well. There isn't anything in the Constitution that says we have to have 9 justices, and there isn't anything that says they have to serve for life. They could either add 4 to make it the same number as there are appellate courts, or limit the number of years a justice could serve to make it less likely that you get a court that does not move with the population.
So if you went with a time limited court let's say, twenty year terms. That's a significant amount of time. The justices we have now could start to be replaced in two years until we were on cycle with justices serving 20 years. Say, two justices replaced in 2027. That would be Thomas and Roberts, their replacements would serve until 2047. Then Alito and Sotomayor would be replaced in 2029 with their replacements serving until 2049. Next would be Kagan and Gorsuch in 2031 with their replacements serving until 2051. Kavanaugh would stand alone at replacement in 2033 with his replacement serving until 2053. Coney Barrett would serve a twenty year term leaving in 2040 and Jackson would end her 20 year term in 2042. And then the two justices that replaced Thomas and Roberts would be up for replacement in 2047. The court would always be in play during elections. You would know exactly how many justices were up for replacement during a presidential term instead of playing WHO DIES NEXT? Of course if a justice did die, or decided to retire then there would have to be determination if a new justice served out their term or if it started a new 20 year clock on whoever was confirmed.
I'm sure there are better ways to do it but that's the one I came up with earlier.
The courts made a mockery of our whole nobody is above the law belief system yesterday. But it wasn't all bad, Bannon, one of the people responsible for the undermining of America did go to jail yesterday. I have no idea how bad it will be for him, a lot of guards are MAGAts. But at least it's something.
That's what we have to hold on to now. At least it's something.
Vote in November.
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