March 5, 2024

A Tough Day for TDS in 9-0 SCOTUS Case

In a resounding slapdown of Colorado, the Supreme Court said that states can’t simply kick a guy off the ballot because they don’t like his politics.

Nine-zip. Nine-zilch. Nine-nada.

It’s said that 9-0 rulings aren’t all that rare when it comes to Supreme Court decisions. The “fact-checkers” at PolitiFact tell us that they’ve usually accounted for a plurality of rulings, and that they’ve never fallen below 36% of all rulings since 2008.

And that may be true — we have no reason to doubt it — but it seems that such resounding rulings almost always come in little-watched cases, like when the justices are registering their collective disgust at the heavy-handed legal tactics of an obscure hack like Trump special persecutor Jack Smith. Indeed, rarely do 9-0 decisions accompany such high-profile and heavily watched cases as yesterday’s Colorado ballot case — a case of TDS, a case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.

And yet.

The Trump-hating Democrats (but we repeat ourselves) who’d prefer to keep the former president off the 2024 ballot were dealt a seemingly mortal blow late yesterday morning as the John Roberts court ruled unanimously that Colorado could not kick Donald Trump off its 2024 presidential primary ballot.

As Fox News reports: “All nine justices ruled in favor of Trump in the case, which will impact the status of efforts in several other states to remove the likely GOP nominee from their respective ballots. The court considered for the first time the meaning and reach of Article 3 of the 14th Amendment, which bars former officeholders who ‘engaged in insurrection’ from holding public office again. Challenges have been filed to remove Trump from the 2024 ballot in over 30 states.”

As to whether the hopes of all those other Trump-banning states are still alive, still able to keep him off their ballots, constitutional law professor Jonathan Turley seemed — shall we say? — rather dubious. “I think they’re all dead as Dillinger,” he said. “When you read this opinion, there is no dissent that the states cannot enforce the 14th Amendment provision.” That Civil War-era provision, according to assorted lefties in high places across certain states, allows them to ban The Insurrectionist Trump™ from their presidential ballots.

A few weeks ago, we suggested that the Colorado Supreme Court’s December 19 decision — a 4-3 decision by an all-Democrat court — was Trump-deranged hogwash, and we wondered whether the Supreme Court would make a statement by ruling unanimously in declaring it so. And sure enough, they have, in what can only be called a great victory for Chief Justice John Roberts. “The only disagreement,” Turley added, “is whether the court should’ve gone even further to close off future arguments or challenges without an action from Congress.”

It seems like only a few weeks ago that Trump-deranged former federal judge and short-list Bush Supreme Court candidate Michael Luttig said: “Yesterday’s decision by the Colorado Supreme Court was, uh, masterful. Uh, it, it, was brilliant. Uh, and, uh, it is an unassailable, uh, interpretation, uh, of the 14th Amendment.”

So much for “uh, masterful.”

“I want to start by thanking the Supreme Court for its unanimous decision today,” said the former and perhaps future president, Donald Trump. “It was a very important decision, [was] very well crafted, and I think it will go a long way toward bringing our country together, which our country needs. And they worked long, they worked hard, and frankly, they worked very quickly on something that will be spoken about 100 years from now and 200 years from now. Extremely important.”

Trump added: “The voters can take the person out of the race very quickly. But a court shouldn’t be doing that. And the Supreme Court saw that very well. And I really do believe that will be a unifying factor because while most states were thrilled to have me, there were some that didn’t, and they didn’t want that for political reasons.”

And so, as The Babylon Bee quipped, “In Major Blow To Democracy, Supreme Court Rules Voters Can Vote For Favorite Candidate.” As Justice Amy Coney Barrett said in her concurrence: “The Court has settled a politically charged issue in the volatile season of a Presidential election. Particularly in this circumstance, writings on the Court should turn the national temperature down, not up. For present purposes, our differences are far less important than our unanimity: All nine Justices agree on the outcome of this case. That is the message Americans should take home.”

Indeed, that is the message that all Americans should take home, but Trump derangement being what it is, we expect the Left’s caterwauling about the Supreme Court’s “illegitimacy” will only grow louder and more grating — ironically, even in the face of a 9-0 smackdown. And sure enough, it has.

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold looked to be on the verge of tears as she stared wide-eyed into the teleprompter and reacted to the repudiation of her state’s errant decision: “My larger reaction is disappointment,” she said. “I do believe that states should be able, under our Constitution, to bar oath-breaking insurrectionists. … Ultimately, it will be up to the American voters to save our democracy in November. … Regardless of this decision, American democracy still remains very much under attack, and that threat, in this upcoming election, will be crucial for democracy’s survival in the United States.”

When someone says it’s not about the money, you can be sure it’s about the money. Similarly, when a lefty says it’s about preserving our democracy, you can be sure it has nothing to do with preserving our republican democracy. As for Griswold, how hilariously obtuse that she’s worried that voters must “save our democracy.” That’s kind of the point, isn’t it?

Anyone who thought congressional Democrats would respect the ruling of the third coequal branch of government and simply slink away is gravely mistaken. As Axios reported yesterday, Maryland Democrat Jamie Raskin, the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee and a former member of the rigged January 6 Committee, said he’s already working on federal legislation that would force Trump off the ballot.

“Congress will have to try and act,” said Raskin, and we have no doubt that they will. Unfortunately for him and his ilk, such legislation has zero chance of passing so long as Republicans run the House, which will be the case until at least early January when the 119th Congress is seated.

In a Politico article titled “Level of Freak Out Remains High,” authors Ryan Lizza, Rachael Bade, and Eugen Daniels wrote: “This has the feel of a slow motion car crash. … If you’re not a bedwetter now, you’re not paying attention.”

And speaking of nocturnal enuresis, we bring you the perennially unhinged Keith Olbermann. When a random social media antagonist chided Olby for crying about the Supreme Court’s decision, he responded: “Those aren’t tears, Fascist. They’re urine. I’m sure you enjoy being bathed in it.”

Urine? What does this even mean? And why is it that all the creepy nutjobs are on the Left?

“You can’t save a people from themselves,” lamented University of Virginia law professor Larry Sabato, who seems to be leaning further left with age. “If they’re determined to reelect him after he organized that insurrection — arguably our first coup d'état — then there’s nothing to stop the people from doing that.”

Whoa, Larry. Isn’t that “democracy”? He’s also wrong about that coup d'état, which was actually attempted by the deep state against President Trump.

As the far-more-sensible Turley put it last night: “The real winner here is not Donald Trump, but rather it’s the United States Supreme Court and ultimately the American people. The court was designed for this moment. This is what the Framers hoped would happen. They want a court to be able to transcend the politics of the moment; to be able to rise above that, and to point citizens to a horizon, a constitutional horizon that unites them all. And they did that.”

That they did, Professor Turley. That they did.

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