Greetings and Salutations;

A little while ago, the Supreme Court ruled that a president has complete immunity for any actions taken as an official Act when in office. Now, there are a lot of problems with this and I’m going to touch on some of them here.

1. With this ruling, the Supreme Court has essentially removed the presidency from a public service office and made it into a king, an emperor – a Ruler that is free to do anything it wants to without fear of penalties or consequences. This, as anyone who has studied history understands, is a complete abrogation of the intent of the founding fathers. They moved to separate the United States from the status of a colony of England, to be an independent nation, specifically because they were totally against being a subject of a king. As this article discusses, they specifically did not want to give the president the immunity of royalty.
2. This action also unleashes a tremendous amount of power on the part of the executive branch. Now, the executive branch has always been kind of a danger to democracy in the first place because of the power it had. That one reason why our founding fathers set up the three state government that we have lived under for nearly 250 years. Their picture reality was that the Congress would be the Legislative branch which would produce laws, the Executive branch would execute those laws, and the Supreme Court would deal with any conflicts. Now, unfortunately, over the past 40 years or so those distinctions and separations of power have become eroded and fuzzy. This is, I believe, a major factor in how we have ended up in this situation.
3. Another serious issue that I have with the Supreme Court’s decision is that they also did not Define what an Official Act is. They kicked the can down the road by saying well, “we’ll decide whether it is an official act or not”. This reminds me of the arguments over Pornography held decades ago, where Justice Potter Stewart, said “I know it when I see it”. There are problems with this attitude, of course. Among others, this turns every decision into a subjective opinion. Working with that model one never knows what the Supreme Court is going to do. If we could be guaranteed that a Supreme Court would be truly an objective body that represented all of facets of American society, perhaps, perhaps, there would be some validity to it. However, today’s Supreme Court is a truly partisan and agenda driven body which is untrustworthy and lacks honor and ethics. So, in essence, I believe their rulings would be “if a Republican does it, it is an official Act. If a Democrat does it, it is an unofficial act and he should be suffer consequences”. A big chunk of my concern over this is that during the argument that #45s lawyers presented to the Supreme Court to motivate them use their decision, is that, in answer to a Justice’s question “if the president supported a Insurrection to overthrow the government would it be an official act” was YES, and none of the Right-Wing Justices spoke up against this. This lack of pushback certainly indicates that in their opinion, the president invoking an insurrection would be and “official act”. That is such an insane point of view, it boggles the mind that any jurist could possibly Express it. The Supreme Court, as with all other governmental officials is under an oath to defend and protect the Constitution. By definition, and insurrection overthrows and destroys the Constitution, so they are oath Breakers.

The problem I believe we have now is what do we do to move away from this problem. I do not believe it can be fixed quickly. I suggest that, starting with the coming elections, the voters work together to vote out as many Republicans as is possible. Turn the federal government BLUE. Once that is done, the Democrats will have enough power to be able Implement some common sense regulations and rules about this. More on this to follow.
I, for example, did not know that the Supreme Court has no code of ethics at this point in time. They have imposed a code of ethics on lower courts, but for themselves, they are so full of hubris and arrogance that they believe that they do not need it. I strongly disagree with this point of view. I would like to see legislation passed which implements a strong code of ethics with distinct consequences for failing to live up to that code.
Although I have not in the past, been a fan of term limits, I’ve come to believe that the Supreme Court should have term limits for its members. I’ve heard various and Sundry suggestions, I think that the only one I really am comfortable with is a 20-year limit on their sitting on the court. There have been some that have urged an implementation of an age limit. I am reluctant to do that because age today is not what it was 50 years ago. President Biden for example, is still a very wise man who makes good decisions. His performance over the past three and a half years and his performance currently, demonstrate this. Yet he is 80 some odd years old.
I would like to see the makeup of the Supreme Court be changed. First off, I think that the justices on the Supreme Court should reflect the demographics of the United States. For example, equal numbers of men and women, a variety of ethnic groups, and the like. I also believe that there should be more than one Justice who has experience as a defense lawyer on the court. I was shocked to find out that Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, was the first defense lawyer who an appointed to the court. Not having criminal defense lawyers on the Court is a problem, as this article points out.
Finally, I want to see laws in place that control the way a Supreme Court Justice is appointed. For example, the Republicans in the past couple of Administrations have been roadblocks to allowing democratic presidents President Obama and Biden, to appoint justices. With President Obama, they not only said that he couldn’t appoint someone because it was during the end part of his administration and it would be unfair to the people, which was a lie, but they dragged out and refused to even consider Merrick Garland who he did appoint. Instead, the Republicans allowed a clearly unqualified Republican cultist to be slapped into his place. I suggest that a president should nominate a Supreme Court justice, and the requirement will be that the Congress must either confirm or deny within 120 days. If the Congress does nothing, then the he automatically becomes a part of the Court.

In closing, I want to mention that I find it fascinating that the Republicans found it necessary to get this ruling in place. For the almost 250 years the country has existed, presidents of various parties have held office. Not ONE of them has suffered the consequences of political prosecution after or during their Administration. It was only once #45 came in to office that this became an issue. And all of a sudden the Republicans seem to believe that now every president who takes office is going to be subject to the other party Prosecuting them upon leaving office. It says a lot about Republicans unfortunately, and very little about reality. The reality is that the only time presidents have come up for prosecution or when they have been involved in actual crimes. Nixon was the first one, for his actions in Watergate. He only escaped prosecution because Gerald Ford pardoned him. #45 has been prosecuted and is now a convicted felon because he has engaged in many criminal Acts not only before, but during and after he took office as president. In spite of the “Chicken Little” attitudes of the Republicans, I do not see this changing…at least from the Democratic side. Now, I will say that with what the Republican party has become today, I am sure they will be ready to do this at the drop of a hat. I point out the multiple attempts over the past three years to get a bill of Impeachment filed against President Biden.
The office of President should never be a get out of jail free card. The standard in America is that no person, is above the law. To say that the president is above the law spits in the face of the founding fathers and pisses on the Constitution. We cannot, as a society, allow this to happen.

God help Us All

Stay Safe, mask (covid is rising), wash hands and social distance.

Bee Man Dave