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b_b  ·  123 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: June 26, 2024

    The mistake everyone is making is the assumption that the Roberts court is attempting to set precedent.

I'm not as sure as you are about that for two reasons. Firstly, they could have decided the case narrowly to simply say that Trump is immune. They didn't. They said The President is immune for any official act, then went on to define "official" so broadly as to make almost anything official in some conceivable way. And secondly, this dumb fucking "unitary executive" hypothesis has been kicking around for decades. Nixon himself wasn't the one who first opined that when the president does it, it's not illegal.

Largely, however, I agree with you that Roberts has gone out of his way to try to twist himself in knots to sound intellectual while basically holding the party line to the greatest extent possible. I think he'll go down as a great villain of 21 c. America. You expect that out of the other lackeys, but he tries to position himself as above the fray, and he's not fooling many people.