I read a NYTimes op-ed article this morning: Gorsuch Must Condemn Trump’s Attack on a Judge, and am thinking about what this implies. Eric Posner writes the following, to start this article:
Judge Neil Gorsuch, President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, must publicly condemn the president’s attack on the judge who blocked his immigration order. Judge Gorsuch’s sterling credentials notwithstanding, his supporters in the legal community should withdraw their backing for his nomination if he fails to do so.
In a normal administration this would probably never happen. This president just referred to someone who ruled against him as a “so-called judge”. This is not the first time Trump has challenged the integrity of a judge — you remember Judge Curiel and Trump U.
But here’s the thing — Gorsuch is not living in a vacuum; he must be aware of TrumpWorld. The effect of this would seem to be, anyone willing to take a position of power and responsibility in TrumpWorld, has to at the very least “look the other way”.
Which segues to Catch-22, defined as “A requirement that cannot be met until a prerequisite requirement is met, however, the prerequisite cannot be obtained until the original requirement is met.”
And here are a couple quotes from 1984:
- The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power.
- In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it.
So what we are faced with is the very problematic issue of anyone signing on with the Trump Administration. The mere fact of acquiescence to Trump’s world view, by rights, should destroy that person’s credibility. Judge Gorsuch, if he’s as sterling as his supporters say he is, should turn down the SCOTUS offer by this dictatorial miscreant of a president. If he does not, he is not worthy of holding a position on the Supreme Court.