The assumption of obedience to a corrupt court persists

Christopher Armitage of the Daily Kos community wrote about the Supreme Court and asks: “When should you stop following a court's rulings?” At least three justices have accepted bribes – those gifts from billionaires with cases before the court. They didn’t disclose – which is fraud. But no one will try to hold them accountable and even though they’ve lost legitimacy the assumption of obedience persists.

The Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in Shelby County v. Holder. That ruling made it easier to suppress votes in ways that benefit Republicans. The Court blessed partisan gerrymandering in Rucho v. Common Cause, making it easier to rig maps in ways that benefit Republicans. The Court unleashed unlimited dark money in Citizens United v. FEC, making it easier to buy elections in ways that benefit Republicans. The Court granted sweeping presidential immunity in Trump v. United States, shielding election interference that benefits Republicans. Call it what it is: a pattern. Every ruling expands the power of the faction that controls the Court while shrinking the ability of anyone else to challenge that control. ... So when someone says “just win the next election and expand the Court,” what they’re actually proposing is this: Win an election the Court has made easier to rig. Overcome maps the Court has made easier to gerrymander. Outspend dark money the Court has made unlimited. Then use that victory to reform an institution that will rule your reform unconstitutional the moment you try it.

A court is legitimate through two things: process and substance. Process legitimacy is when the members are properly appointed, it follows its own precedents, and acts neutrally. Substance legitimacy means rulings are grounded in law, and show sound reasoning instead of ideologically desired outcomes. Here are reasons to declare illegitimacy: The court doesn’t follow rules or changes the rules to protect its misconduct. It legalizes violations after they occur and when caught. The court is corrupt in that it receives benefits from those with cases before it. The court blocks ethics reform, rules in its own favor, and creates its own immunity. There can be no external accountability. Then it shields the corrupt person who helped capture the court. They discipline lower courts but not themselves. Because the Senate is also captured they are beyond democratic reform and replacements will continue the pattern. They sit beyond electoral reach (originally thought to be a good thing). So why do we insist compliance to their rulings remains the right choice? Of course, the people who benefit from their corrupt rulings declare compliance is best. But not for the rest of us. Those who insist on compliance say not complying is worse – we would get chaos, institutional breakdown, and Constitutional crisis. But what if compliance is causing those things?

Consider what continued compliance produces. Elections become progressively less fair as voter suppression and gerrymandering compound. Dark money becomes progressively more dominant as disclosure requirements weaken. Executive power becomes progressively less accountable as immunity doctrines expand. And the institution blessing all of this becomes progressively less reformable as it rules every reform unconstitutional. That trajectory produces crisis in slow motion. Rights erode, dark money floods in, executive power escapes accountability, and nobody panics because it happens gradually enough for the captors to consolidate. The people telling us to work within the system call this stability. Following the rulings of a captured Court doesn’t prevent the breakdown. It paces the breakdown in a way that benefits the people breaking it.

We can’t wait for this system to fix itself, because it is working exactly as intended. So what to do? The states can assert their own sovereignty. Pass laws to protect residents from federal corruption. Enforce laws in ways that don’t need federal cooperation. Establish their own financing to avoid federal restrictions. Work with like-minded states. Yes, this is legal. Yes, the courts will rule against it. Yes, it will force a Constitutional confrontation. But that’s coming anyway so states should act while they still have leverage in the face of rising autocracy. A court’s authority depends of people agreeing to be bound by its decisions, which is earned and not automatic. Courts earn authority by acting legitimately. This court is daring someone to do something about their corruption. At some point states will. We need to be ready. I thought a bit about states establishing their own financing. Many, perhaps most, states led by Democrats, send more to Washington in taxes than they receive back in government benefits. That’s definitely true of California. Most states, perhaps all, led by Republicans receive more in federal benefits than they pay in taxes. One obvious source of financing is for a state to say the federal government is corrupt so send all your federal taxes to the state treasury. That will definitely bring the confrontation Armitage describes. Which is why it might be worth trying. Well, look at that: A week ago an Associated Press article posted on Kos reported the Supremes refused to allow the nasty guy to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago. The decision was 6-3 with Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch dissenting. This is not a final ruling. Yet, before it is finalized it can affect other lawsuits challenging attempts to deploy the Guard to other Democratic-led cities. Do not take this one ruling as a contradiction of all of Armitage’s discussion above. Another AP article on Kos discusses the “epidemic of loneliness” in America. We’re less likely to join groups, either civic, union, or church, less likely to hang out in bars and coffee shops. We have fewer friends and trust others less. So no surprise we feel lonely and isolated. Loneliness has health risks, including dementia, depression, and early death. It also increases political polarization. Destructive business schedules and excessive social media both cause loneliness and are an effect of loneliness. Those with lower education, usually meaning lower income, tend to be more lonely. Many people now mistrust the social organizations, the civic, union, and church groups, because they have been betrayed. These groups can be harsh on dissenters. Many people now prize personal autonomy, but that doesn’t make for happiness and creates lots of social problems. People and groups are starting to do something about it. Formal programs and less structured events like potluck suppers are appearing. The Weave: Social Fabric Project connects community builders and trains people in building skills. People in every community have decided to take this on. In today’s pundit roundup for Kos Chitown Kev quoted Amanda Marcotte of Salon:

But Trump’s most loyal voters, the MAGA base, have developed elaborate mythologies to deny the truth about the president. In their imaginations, he’s not a pathetic genital-grabbing predator but a knightly hero, sent by God to wage war on pedophiles and rapists. Not the real ones, of course, who Trump is more likely to defend; MAGA prefers to fear imaginary pedophiles and rapists. They project their own sins onto innocent people — often LGBTQ+ people or Democratic figures — and avoid thinking too hard about their lavish support for a man whose vile predilections haven’t been hidden. [...] The MAGA base convinced themselves the Epstein files would expose their opponents. But Trump knows that the Epstein files are a mirror that reflects what his supporters actually voted for: a world where men like Trump and his friends can get away with decades of sexual violence.

Thomas Edsall of the New York Times noted the nasty guy is getting away with corruption that would have been a disaster for any previous president, both Republican and Democrat. Then he gets into why.

The lack of guilt felt by Trump. Enforcement of and obedience to norms in a democracy require recognition of the importance of those norms. Trump shrugs those norms off. In most but not all of these cases, he is unapologetic and transparent about what he is doing, enabling him to avoid the trap that ensnared Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton, both of whom discovered that the cover-up is often worse than the crime. [...] Structural frailty. American democracy and the Constitution are not equipped to deal in an effective and timely manner with a president who aggressively and willfully tramples the law. [...]

In the comments exlrrp posted a meme with the author’s name redacted.

My uncle said he wouldn’t discuss Trump with me unless I said one good thing he’s done so I said he’s normalizing makeup for men and it didn’t go as I planned.

Afra Kroon posted a cartoon by Ivan Ehlers showing two men in MAGA caps. One says, “I don’t care what the Epstein files say... I’d rather have a pedophile rapist grifting the country than admit I was ever wrong.” A tweet from Brian Allen:

JD Vance just said the quiet part out loud. On camera, he admitted that Jared Kushner – Trump’s son-in-law, with no official government role – is the “investor” in the Middle East “peace” talks. Read that again. U.S. foreign policy outsourced to a family business deal.

Just below that is a meme:

The left says corrupt billionaires are the problem. The right says corrupt government is the problem. And I’m here like, you do realize corrupt billionaires are running the corrupt government, right?