Longtime readers know that I’m usually a glass half full guy. Cautious optimism is my default setting, except when it comes to the Roberts Court. That wasn’t always the case before the Court’s horrific Immunity Impunity ruling. There wasn’t a lawyer in the country who wasn’t stunned by the sweep of Roberts’ opinion. That’s when I stopped cutting the Supremes any slack.

I expected this ruling because the law and Constitution are clear on the matter of tariffs. Congress has the hammer on what are called duties in Article 1. Roberts, however, resorted to some trickery in his opinion by using the major questions doctrine, which was rejected by Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson. Quite correctly, they believe that good old fashioned statutory interpretation was the way to analyze the case.

I’m more concerned with the three dissenting justices. This case was a no-brainer but Kavanaugh, Thomas, and Alito are so besotted by Trump and the pernicious unitary executive theory that they ate their own brains so to speak. Does that make them judicial zombies? Discuss amongst yourselves.

Speaking of zombies, the Insult Comedian’s reaction to the ruling was OTT even for him. The only disgrace here is his use of tariffs to extort and punish other countries. A sensible and sensate POTUS would have taken the loss and moved on from their economically disastrous policy. Trump, however, believes that “tariff is the most beautiful word in the language.” It’s the political hill he’s chosen to die on. So be it.

I expect the Kaiser of Chaos to pitch another tariff tantrum tonight during the SOTU. Like Robert Reich, I won’t be watching. I have better things to do like change the litter box: Claire and Perry like a clean box.

Now that I’ve addressed the ruling, let’s move on to the post title. I’m usually tolerant of people spiking the ball when something goes against Team MAGA, but not with SCOTUS. There’s a well-established pattern of the Supremes ruling in Trump’s favor even when it makes no sense legally. Too many people celebrated the tariff ruling as if it were the beginning of the end of Trump’s grubby power grab: Check out this headline on a NYT column by never Trumper David French, Is This The Most Important Supreme Court Case Of The Century?

In a word: No.

There will be more terrible rulings to come. Just wait until Chief Justice Roberts takes an axe to the Voting Rights Act in the redistricting case out of the Gret Stet of Louisiana. Roberts’ judicial mission in life is to eviscerate the VRA, which he thinks has outlived its shelf life. The only thing that’s spoiled is the Chief’s logic: the racism the VRA was created to combat has gotten a second wind since the advent of MAGA. It’s more necessary than ever but Roberts disagrees.

Shorter Adrastos: Don’t get too high or low when pondering Trump 2.0. And don’t spike the ball. The resistance is a marathon, not a sprint. Mood swinging with the Supremes is a mug’s game. Don’t be one.

The last word goes to the Finn Brothers: