What Mr. Biden Should Do About the Supreme Court

by Rabbi Arthur Waskow

Dear companions,

I am imagining a scenario I don’t want to happen, but it could make a huge difference to the public’s understanding of Presidential power and maybe to their understanding of Mr. Biden.
 
Imagine that tomorrow morning Mr. Biden, with five or six members of the Secret Service dedicated to his protection, knocks on the doors of Mr. Injustice Clarence Thomas and Mr. Injustice Samuel Alito. He wakes them up early in the morning and says, “All my evidence is that you’ve been taking bribes from extremely rich people to write decisions not only expanding my power but destroying the power of any administration to prevent the poisoning and burning of all Earth. So if your decision is really law, I am here to arrest you.
 
“It would be a crime for me to act this way, but you declared that a crime committed as an official act by the President cannot be punished or regulated in any way. So if I were acting as if your perverted interpretation of the Constitution were truthful, making the President much more than a king — a tyrant, a despot, a dictator — if I were really acting according to your perverted decision, I would be ordering the Secret Service to take you to prison. That would be an official act and nobody could hold me accountable for it.
 
“But I think your decision was contemptible and a lie. For you are free to go back to your bed and think about whether you might reverse the decision that would have made it possible for me to drag you to jail.”

Mr. Biden goes back to the White House, Mr. Injustice Alito and Mr. Injustice Thomas go back to their beds, perhaps to dream of an America that refused a king and is still prepared to refuse one.
 
Blessings of shalom,  
Arthur

US Secret Service agent with Presidential motorcade. (US government photo)