Posts Tagged → branches
Back to basics, America
We have a Republican Party crisis here in Pennsylvania, and in Dauphin County, and this blog will be addressing these problem children soon. However, the real friction happening between lawless, rogue judges and the Trump Administration is the most defining issue of the day.
As most politically interested and involved readers already know, a real contest of wills is developing betwen the Trump Administration on the one hand, and politically radical / rogue/ lawless politically activist judges on the other hand. This contest may seem alarming to some people, but it is a perfectly natural and healthy aspect of how our Constitutional republican form of government is designed to operate.
With three separate but co-equal branches of government forming an equilateral triangle, but made of living, breathing people, and usually the most aggressive, power hungry, conniving people at that, American government is designed to have friction. That friction results in constant contest, and a constant creative renewal, as all three branches naturally seek to exert as much dominance as they can get away with over the other two branches. Or as much outright control of the decision process as the other branches will concede.
So when grotesquely overreaching politically corrupt activist judges, like James Boasberg, “order” the executive branch to turn around planes carrying lawfully deported violent gang members to foreign destinations, and return said violent deportees to American soil for the judge’s evaluation, we can expect some friction to result. The executive branch, and its chief executive/ military commander in chief (the president), is well within its rights and within its sole discretionary function when it engages in illegal alien deportation, as defined by the US Constitution.
The Trump Administration is under no duty or obligation to do whatever some judge tells them to do. Judicial Tyranny might be a goal for some Americans, but it is not something anticipated or accepted by the Founders and writers of the Constitution.
Not every situation or question or policy is justiciable, meaning that not every question can be resolved in a court of law. Some things, like deportations and war and a host of other subjects and government functions, are the sole purview of the executive branch. Neither the legislative branch nor the judicial branch have anything to say about it. It is not their “lane.”
Or, the judicial and legislative branches can try to say something about a given policy, but the best way to force the executive branch to follow is to pass a law requiring it.
In this particular case, President Trump blasted Boasberg’s unconstitutional overreach, and called for his impeachment, which is built right into the Constitution. Then US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts in turn criticized the President for his calls to impeach said America-hating radical, James Boasberg. While Roberts personally dislikes Trump, he is defending his judicial branch more than anything, and trying to take power away from the executive branch.
This is all normal stuff, even if America has not seen this kind of constitutional friction in a long time. To my mind, this activity just shows that the various parts of the government machine are working properly. It took a Donald J. Trump to actually test run the American machinery for the first time in about seventy years. What is scary is how aggressive the judicial branch has been about hogging power over the past fifty years, and how little pushback the executive branch did until now. Presidents and Congress alike keep conceding judicial review as though the judicial branch is some sort of hallowed gathering of super smart and pure minded arbiters of fairness. Ha! Judges are just politicians in black robes, as one of my Penn State professors used to say.
Don’t worry, America has been down this path before in recent times. The Obama Administration, especially, engaged in a ton of simply ignoring judicial holdings and decisions and demands and orders; Obama DOJ lawyers were repeatedly held in contempt by a number of judges over the tenure of that administration. Not one judge got up out of his or her chamber to go enforce their order in person…nor could they.
And that’s the rub here: Crazy judges and even crazier Justices who allow some members of the judiciary to run wild, without restraint, can expect constraint by the branches they impact. Especially the executive branch.
Judicial review is not sacrosanct, it is not wide-open, nor can judges simply demand obedience to whatever or wherever their egos or political interests take them (or in the case of corrupt Judge James Boasberg, where his family’s wallet takes him on policy questions). Judges’ credibility depends upon the dignity and caution with which they discharge their duties.
When judges like Boasberg run bloody roughshod over America’s Constitutional geometry, and when justices like John Roberts do nothing to rein Boasberg in, but rather defend the indefensible, then they pretty much deserve what they have coming: Impeachment by the US House of Representatives, and being simply ignored by the Chief Executive and Commander in Chief as he does what his job requires him to do.
As one US president said in a similar moment of great friction, “Let the judge come and enforce his order himself.”
And no, that judge did not attempt to personally force the executive branch machinery to bend to his will. He astutely stood down and granted to the Chief Executive that which was his, and which still remains his. If Justice John Roberts wants Americans to respect his office and his decisions, then he must act similarly. We have to get back to the basics of running American government.
Judge, Jury, and Executioner…Judge, Congress, and President
Federal Judge Watson from Haw’aii has demonstrated a passion for power far beyond his designated duties, but similar to the recent approach of the Venezuelan court.
How?
First he ignored US law and the US Constitution, and ruled against an executive order over which he had zero jurisdiction.
Then he actually stipulated details in his holding, as if he had written a law passed by Congress and signed by the president.
Then, after the US Supreme Court overturned his holding, he immediately accepted a new, repeat appeal of the same executive order that the US Supreme Court had just upheld, and then overturned the holding of the US Supreme Court, actually once again throwing in new requirements as if he had just written a law.
Judge Watson is behaving exactly the opposite of how a federal judge is supposed to behave, and he is also directly challenging the authority of the the entire US government, and most worrying, the US Supreme Court, to whom you would think he had some shred of loyalty.
Judge Watson wants to be judge, jury and executioner. Or in these exact conditions, he wants to be judiciary, congress, and president. And he is acting just as he wants to be, despite our nation’s law and Constitution clearly prohibiting his actions.
Judge Watson wants to rule by fiat, by declaration.
Judge Watson wants to be a law unto himself, unaccountable even to his fellow judiciary.
Judge Watson is a rogue political actor, abusing the legal process clearly defined by our laws and Constitution, for the narrow purpose of advancing his political agenda.
Making Watson’s actions worse is the cheering section he has among millions of Americans, who care only for process when it suits their goals and caring for it not at all when it gets in the way of their goals.
This cheering section also cares not for abiding by laws they disagree with, and they will therefore use any source of power or authority they can find to contradict the laws that have passed through the procedure by which we all agree to live.
So they cheer on Judge Watson the anarchist judge.
That this is the most elementary anarchy and not just corrosive but destructive of America’s foundations seems not to deter the cheering section. It is the end of the rule of law.
“Win at any cost and in any way” is their motto.
How anyone can live harmoniously with this shattered approach to governance is anyone’s guess. This is exactly how the American Civil War began in 1860, and it may well lead to another civil war in 2017.
Making this situation worse is a president and a congress who believe in not only playing by the rules, but excusing every rule infraction of their opponents, with the silly notion that somehow their opponents (the cheering section for anarchist Judge Watson) will eventually come around and accept the fact that they lost an election and are not, therefore, able to consolidate power and control through yet more abuse of the system as they had planned.
Our current president could take a lesson from prior presidents, who, having had quite enough of over-reaching judges, simply encouraged those judges to go ahead and enforce their unconstitutional holdings in the face of a lawful president doing what he was elected to do, enabled by law and Constitution.
Lacking the means of enforcement, those overreaching judges were forced to simply watch events pass them by, having undermined their own authority by their own hand.
Our current Congress could take a lesson from past congresses, stop being such limp di#ks, and act out their Constitutional authority, such as impeaching and removing from the judicial bench those rogue judges who threaten to tear down the very society they are sworn to uphold and protect. Like anarchist Judge Watson.
Friends, none of us has an idea of how this is going to work out.
About a third of the nation is in open, violent rebellion in the streets, and in the few halls of power they still control, against established laws and against the Constitution.
About a third of the country is itching for a fight to get the first third back in line, because we cannot afford the high cost of these illegal antics.
And another third of the country is drinking beer, eating hamburgers, going to summertime baseball games, and wondering aloud when the other citizens are going to get this all worked out.
America is equally divided into thirds, perhaps in the potential roles as judges, juries, and executioners, or as judges, elected representatives, and chief executives.
We are very close to working this all out peacefully, if we all agree to just stay within those established roles, because then we will have restored the balance of power among the three co-equal branches of government that has always defined American government.
Now everyone line up into three lines, pick one line, and stay there. Then vote, and stick with the result like adults.