Note: I wrote this column just days before the attempt on presidential candidate Donald Trump’s life. While I do not agree with Trump, never have and never will, I deplore that act of vicious violence. All Americans must learn it’s time for ballots – not BULLETS!
What a grim irony that the outrageous 6-3 U.S. Supreme Court decision on presidential immunity was announced just before Fourth of July, our celebration of this nation’s independence from Great Britain and its King George III.
That bleak decision is a sucker-punch to our Democracy and its Rule of Law. It gives a green-light go for any U.S. presidents (if they are ruthless) to do just about anything they please. In fact, that dangerous anti-American ruling makes presidents virtual kings/despots/dictators.
That fatal decision sparked a nightmare in my mind. In 2024 Trump wins the election. He’ll swagger down the red carpet at the inauguration to take the oath administered by Chief Justice John Roberts, the very man who wrote the court decision making The Donald’s kingship possible.
Trump, his jaw jutting out with smug-defiant satisfaction, will then plop his butt down on the royal throne as a crown is placed upon his head.
“I now declare you King of these United States,” a grinning Roberts will say as he kisses the royal ring.
Later that week, after a celebration in the Mar-a-Lago royal palace, some reporter will ask Trump, “King Donald, was the Nov. 5 election free and fair?”
“Of course it was!” he’d roar like a royal lion. “I won it!”
“But what if you hadn’t won it?”
Adjusting his crown, a snorting King Donald would shout in capital letters and exclamation points: “Well, then it would have been a RIGGED election! A STOLEN election!”
He’d shout to his servants: “Hey, you guys, toss this bum out of my palace! He dared to question my kingship – I mean presidency.”
No doubt when he was young, little Donny Trump had fantasies of someday becoming King of the World. Time and again, as president, he spoke with fawning admiration (still does) for the likes of Vladimir Putin and Kim Jung-Un, referring to them as “strong leaders,” by which he means that like kings and dictators they can do whatever the hell they want and get away with it.
Trump has vowed when he is elected this time around that he will trash parts of the U.S. Constitution, that he will seek retribution against those who tried to make him accountable. Already the “Heritage Foundation” and hanger-on MAGA cultists have written a 920-page “blueprint” called “Project 2025.” It includes hundreds of diehard Trump loyalists who are lining up, eager and willing to be named as civil servants to replace the massive firings Trump has promised. He intends to staff the Justice Department with flunkies to do his bidding and to prosecute his “enemies.” Donald Trump, the King of Liars, claims to know nothing about “Project 2025.” LOL.
We are rapidly hurtling toward a new Dark Age where so much we cherish and take for granted will be under constant threat, if not erased completely.
The extremist majority on the Supreme Court (at least two of them Trumpites to the core) paved the way for an imperial presidency, authoritarianism, a virtual kingship in which ONE man (a president) IS above the law. In the Dark Ages of Yore, it was called the “Divine Right of Kings.”
Those scheming justices/jesters tried so hard to make their decision sound reasonable. They cautiously used qualifying words and phrases like “limited immunity” or “immunity only for acts done in an official capacity.” They resorted to pseudo-legal contortions and a tortuous twisting and stretching of the Constitution to justify one conclusion. That conclusion is this: President (King) Trump and any other presidents will be able to do (and get away with) just about anything their royal hearts desire.
Popular support for this Supreme Court is at an all-time low, as well it should be. The day of that sinister decision was a dark day in American history; it will cast a doom-dark shadow on this nation for a very long time.
Those extremist justices will serve on that court for life. They ought to be serving life – behind bars, as traitors to Democracy!
