Amateurs Juggling Knives Blindfolded

Last week, I wrote here about the inexplicable problem Trump was causing for himself with a Supreme Court whose majority has shown it will bend far-over backwards to allow him to do most anything, including having the right to order Navy Seals to kill a political opponent.  (Well...“almost” inexplicable, because with Trump nearly everything is inexplicable, thereby making it pretty much normal.  And that's the explnation.)
 
“Why on earth,” I wrote, “would you do anything to alienate the Supreme Court and put that monumental support at risk????!!  And while nobody likes to be ignored and seen as insignificant – I have to believe the Justices of the Supreme Court are high on the list of those who not only don’t see themselves as 'nobody,' but as insignificant.  Either SCOTUS Justices see themselves as protectors of the U.S. Constitution or as arrogant upholders of their personal views on the law, politics and everything – for which are not only right, but always right, one of just nine people in the United who can decide what the law is, and not be contradicted for life.”
 
These are the six people in your pocket who you really don’t want to alienate, I added.  Especially when you can only afford to lose the support of just two.
 
Of course, that was all a guess on my part, as is pretty much everything I write.  (Though that’s also largely the case with most any political analysis, by anyone -- although the best is done with an abundance of expertise to back it up.)  A guess, but one based on what I hoped was common sense and an awareness of reality.

And then, within the past few days, that "abundance of expertise" from others began to flow in.

To start with, on Friday, there was a commentary written by Mark Joseph Stern, the legal analyst of Slate, who touched on the same subject, suggesting that these six conservative Justices on the Supreme Court, who give Trump his very safe majority, seem angry with Trump still trying to deport immigrants without due process, on which they’ve ruled.  He wrote --

"I think the majority that lifted [Judge] Boasberg’s restraining order truly believed Trump would heed its warning about due process and pause further AEA renditions until SCOTUS ruled on their legality. Instead Trump tried to sneak out migrants before courts could act. And now I think SCOTUS is pissed."

Stern continued:  "It is SO unusual for the Supreme Court to issue an order this late at night and honestly incredible only Thomas and Alito noted their dissents," and later added – and reiterated his earlier point -- "Also fascinating that SCOTUS rushed out the order before Alito could finish writing his dissent. That basically never happens! Again—majority seems pissed."
 
And Stern’s analysis was followed the next day, on Saturday, by a commentary from former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance, an MSNBC legal analyst.  In her Substack article, she touched on the same subject and wrote --
 
"Trump is trying to break the government. To control all its levers, he needs a complicit judiciary to go along with a complacent Congress. The Supreme Court seems to have an inkling of the fix they’ve put themselves in, with Trump trying to accumulate power at the courts’ expense."
 
She described the actions that the Trump administration is taking get around the courts’ rulings – including the Supreme Court – all in an effort “to undercut the ability of the courts to act as a check on the executive branch and make it easier for Trump to range beyond the authority the Constitution affords to the president."
 
All of which gets to her point:  the Supreme Court sees this , and sees the attempt to undermine the authority of the courts.  Which explains, she wrote, why SCOTUS acted in such an unprecedented way the other day, to re-establish its authority, by a solid 7-2 vote.
 
"That’s how we got a middle-of-the-night ruling from the Supreme Court, with ACLU lawyers racing to the Court for emergency protection for their clients, which the Supreme Court ultimately granted.”
 
(And I especially liked her follow-up comment – not just for the point she made, but the barely-contained snark. “I’m tempted to point out that the Supreme Court brought this upon itself,” she added, “…but that would be petty on my part.")
 
Anyway, it was good to see these observations from such notable legal analysts.  It seemed clear to me that Trump’s actions risked, in Mr. Stern’ far-more pointed words than mine, “pissing off” the Supreme Court seemed phenomenally counter-productive, when you have not only that SCOTUS majority safely in your hip pocket, but also a majority that is there for life, and no amount of Trump retribution or Executive Orders can get them removed.  But when people who actually know what they’re talking about see and say the same thing, it means (hopefully) that as hellish as Trump’s actions are when attacking the court system, it risks coming at a very heavy price to him.
 
Which happily brings us back to -- “Why on earth would you do anything to alienate the Supreme Court and put that monumental support at risk????!!