In a rare statement, Chief Justice John Roberts called judicial impeachment "not an appropriate response" to disagreeing with a judge's decision.
He made the comments after Trump called for the impeachment of a federal judge who blocked the administration's deportation flights. to.pbs.org/43RBatE— PBS News (@pbsnews.org) March 18, 2025 at 2:10 PM
Roberts goes to extraordinary lengths to shepherd his unruly fellow revanchists into producing the most exquisitely crafted artisan cut-glass excuses for Our Unitary Executive to do exactly as he wishes. And in return the Vulgar Talking Yam and his subliterate minions write LOL BCUZ WE CAN on the Constitution in… well, it’s yellow, let’s say they used a gold Sharpie. To the fainting couches!…
getting increasingly irate as these judges say i can’t do the illegal things i want to do
i don’t think they understand that i really, really want to do them tho— not an art thief (@famousartthief.bsky.social) March 18, 2025 at 8:46 PM
The stock-photo pickers got to enjoy themselves, at least.
BREAKING: Chief Justice John Roberts rebukes President Trump's call for a judge to be impeached for ruling against the administration.
www.nbcnews.com/politics/sup…— MSNBC (@msnbc.com) March 18, 2025 at 1:21 PM
Gettin' so hyped on huffing my own farts that I'm going to alienate my pet justices to the point where even they rule against me.
— Schnorkles O'Bork (@schnorkles.bsky.social) March 18, 2025 at 12:05 PM
Maybe a bit of pushback from Roberts. Maybe he is worried about his legacy. Hint sir, too late there but we appreciate this effort.
— Tony Negron (@tnite02.bsky.social) March 18, 2025 at 8:52 PM
NEW VIDEO: Chief Justice John Roberts rebuked Turmp's call to impeach a federal judge who ruled against the administration. @marcelias.bsky.social explains how Trump's threat is the latest move to intimidate the judiciary into compliance.
Watch the full video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=71o2…— Democracy Docket (@democracydocket.com) March 18, 2025 at 8:39 PM
Friendly reminder that the monster criticized by Chief Justice Roberts was created by Chief Justice Roberts.
— Andrea Junker (@strandjunker.com) March 18, 2025 at 2:10 PM
And the "James Comey Wait What Have I Done I Am Not Responsible For This Oh Yes The Fuck You Are" award goes to John Roberts:
www.nytimes.com/2025/03/18/u…— Cake or Death (@johngcole.bsky.social) March 18, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Here’s a link to the original document, if that’s the sort of reading you enjoy:
NEW: DOJ asks Judge Boasberg to vacate his TROs against the gov't, calling them "an affront to the President’s broad constitutional and statutory authority to protect the United States from dangerous aliens who pose grave threats to the American people." storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us…
— Joshua J. Friedman (@joshuajfriedman.com) March 18, 2025 at 12:12 AM
Don’t think they’re gonna be able to blame this one on Elon, not while the Project 2025 architects are fondling themselves in public over their ‘win’…
if you think about it from Roberts or Leo's perspective they had this extremely successful long game of rigging the judiciary to make it possible to pursue reactionary policy without electoral backlash and then Elon gloms onto their senile figurehead out of *nowhere* and starts wrecking shit loudly
— the abbot of unreason (an archaeologist) (@merovingians.bsky.social) March 18, 2025 at 9:02 PM
I’m a true believer in the Roberts Rudeness Index
There’s something very Sandra Day O’Connor about it — jurisprudence guided by a generalized aversion to things that seem rude, distasteful, or uncouth— Anna Bower (@annabower.bsky.social) March 18, 2025 at 12:55 PM
War for Ukraine Day 1,118: Hanging on the Telephone
piratedan
golly gee whiz Justice Roberts, who could have possibly known that destroying the underpinning of the rule of law in favor of the moneyed elite would have been hijacked by uncouth nazis? If only there had been a precedent that could have served as a cautionary example that could have predicted that these uncouth hooligans would have known their place and bowed to their betters. Alas, go the dreams of a genteel silent racism that they could plausibly deny, while maintaining control.
prostratedragon
It’d be hard for Roberts to sing through that clenched jaw.
“Tiger by the Tail”
gVOR10
In Robert’s calculus this one act of symbolic opposition to Trump allows him to make three absurd rulings in Trump’s favor to achieve balance.
hitchhiker
Another day ends with me trying to decide which of them I loathe the most.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
Gee, apparently the leopard likes the taste of Mister Roberts’s face.
YY_Sima Qian
Neither SCOTUS nor Congress command the men w/ guns. There is only checks & balances when all of the parties agree to play by the rules, & the same rules at that.
Phylllis
Looking at the photos of Roberts I’m reminded of that old saw that after 40 you get the face you deserve.
Suzanne
“Legal world erupts” has got to be the most overblown way to describe this non-statement.
different-church-lady
Fuckin’ dipshit… We have a fuckin’ dipshit as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court….
different-church-lady
@Phylllis: The face of a man being eaten by a leopard?
different-church-lady
Just like mainstream journalists: it’s all fun and games until one of their own is attacked. Only then is cause for outrage.
Aussie Sheila
@YY_Sima Qian:
Indeed. I’m thinking this isn’t going to end well. Four years is far too long for any person or thing to restrain this demented crim. I fear there will be very bad violence before the end of this farce which has turned into tragedy faster than anyone could imagine.
different-church-lady
@Aussie Sheila:
Speak for yourself.
Martin
Boy, it’s almost as though telling the President that so long as he was acting in an official capacity – which, to be clear, he IS doing – gives him immunity, that might create a sort of moral hazard.
Dumb motherfuckers cannot understand a consequence that most 4 year olds have fully sorted out.
Aussie Sheila
@different-church-lady:
Well I thought I did, and I always do so. I thought it would be bad, but I calculated it would take six months or so to really go fetid. But I was wrong.
It wouldn’t be the first time and probably won’t be the last.
prostratedragon
In a more productive tone, any actual or wouldbe luthiers out there? Hack off several decades and I might give it a go.
prostratedragon
@prostratedragon:
News feature story from 2022 about violinist Anne Harris and luthier Amanda Ewing.
Geminid
“Politics Ain’t Beanbag,” Turkish edition. From Middle East Eye Istanbul bureau chief Ragip Soylu:
Soylu showed a 56-second videa clip of Imamoglu talking as he puts on his tie, ready to grab his suitcoat for a trip to the police station. He’s calm, and at the end he points at the viewer and gives a modest first bump.
Soylu also reported:
Geminid
@Geminid: Ragip Soylu commented yesterday about the Trump-Putin call:
Aussie Sheila
@Geminid:
I am making plans to visit Turkey later this year. Looks like it might be …problematic.
Ramalama
Roberts promised calling balls and strikes, ends up in a game of Calvinball.
What is Latin for “no bueno?”
Geminid
@Aussie Sheila: My friend Joan also hopes to visit Turkiye this year. I’m not sure Imamoglu’s arrest signals a time of instability; it’s not even that exceptional for post-WWII Turkiye. Since tourism in Turkiye is widely reported on you’ll be able to find out if there are negative impacts on foreign travellers.
I’ll be interested in whether these latest events affect the rapprochement between the PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan plus the Kurdish-based DEM party and Erdogan’s governing coalition. That seems to be proceeding as planned but I think it involves action by Turkiye’s National Assembly. Imamoglu’s CHP party is the second largest in the Assembly and they’ll have a say on any constitutional amendments proposed.
Nukular Biskits
Good early mornin’, y’all.
Can’t say it any better than what was said at the top: Republicans are entirely responsible for the state of affairs.
But her emails …
WTFGhost
Wow. For more than 2 centuries, we haven’t immunized former Presidents for wrongdoing either, but gee, Roberts, you and Frankie Boy have really forgotten your roots, haven’t you? Pope Franky thinks it’s okay to elevate a murderer (by Pope Franky’s terms); you think it’s okay to elevate a criminal insurrectionist who uses the Constitution as a cum-towel.
Man. All poor Franky had to do was remember that he was Francis, not Frankenstein, and remember that the Catholic Church considers the death penalty murder.
You, though, Bobbie boy – oh, “Roberts” is your last name, so confusing you with Bobbie Brady is bad? – you, though, Bobby boy, *you* completely ignored the rule of law, and for the rest of your time on earth, are going to learn just how foul and destructive one human being can be, without literally exploding and spraying blood and crap everywhere.
My humble opinion anyway.
(Also, my opinion wants you to know it could beat Mike Tyson in his prime, or even a young Cassius Clay, except it’s attached to this boring body of some piss-poor asshole who could watch his parents murdered before his eyes, without ever becoming Batman. It’s really not humble at all, but for me.)
WTFGhost
@Ramalama: I think the Latin for no is “no” but the Latin for “bueno…”? It’s all Greek to me.
BWAHAHAHAHAHA! See what I did there? See, the Greeks, they… (WTFGhost is quickly exorcised by a pun-despising Abrahamic who doesn’t want to hear about the Greeks any longer.)
@prostratedragon: No Sax? I won’t watch unless there’s both Sax and Violins on TV.
@YY_Sima Qian: See, we need to give them saxophones, and… okay, bad joke, since I’m going through comments backward.
@Phylllis: Are you TRULY suggesting he belongs in the Saw movies, as soon as a Democrat names his replacement? I’m not exactly arguing, mind you….
@gVOR10: Ah, so he’ll be Trump’s whore for a while, now. Trump is Putin’s cock-holster, Roberts is Trump’s. Man, Roberts, didn’t you know putting a man’s entire dick in your mouth violated Catholic principles? (What? No, not *my* principles, I’m an ex-Catholic, but (ahem) I don’t like disgusting, venal, lawless men like *you*, Roberts! So it’s not Catholic principles, it’s that you’re a disgusting maggot that hasn’t been hit with boiling water, metaphorically speaking.)
@piratedan: Hey, Roberts? That’s the same shit I’m calling you out for, but done real pretty, like (expletive deleted)s like you like it!
p.a.
Roberts, “out, damned orange makeup spot!”
prostratedragon
Take off that gloomy mask of tragedy; it’s not your style. 🎶
TBone
Morning mood music classic
🎶
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zw-2CTx4YgY
MagdaInBlack
Ah, the best part of waking up: wondering wtf.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@different-church-lady: Well at least he’s he’s not one of the “skipping around” dipshits.
TBone
Funky mood get going music, is it day drinking time again yet? 🤘
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MYCRIykylOc
MagdaInBlack
Further adventures in wtf: elno was on Hannity all butt-hurt and confused as to why people are upset at Tesla. He’s “never done anything harmful.” He thinks there are larger conspiratorial forces at work…..
(p.s. oy at pre-coffee typing)
Shalimar
Roberts is seriously misjudging MAGA. You give them the circus of impeaching judges who will never get the 2/3rds vote in the Senate for removal. That way they can blame those judges remaining on the bench on Democrats. Because the alternative is building so much anti-judicial anger among the common clay that they start shooting at you with the firearms you have allowed to proliferate everywhere.
Shalimar
@MagdaInBlack: Half of his tweets are bragging about everything he does and wants to do to hurt people. I’m sure he really feels aggrieved that people blame him for what he has done, but he’s now at the gaslighting his victims stage of assholishness.
YY_Sima Qian
@Geminid: What is the stated justification of the arrests? I didn’t catch it from the reporting I saw earlier.
Shalimar
@TBone: It’s always happy hour somewhere in the world. All you have to do is get drunk enough to convince yourself you’re there.
Baud
@YY_Sima Qian:
“I am Erdogan.”
Same with Trump here.
MagdaInBlack
@Shalimar: That’s what abusers do…
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: Trump has taken to calling any action he doesn’t like, or that opposes him in any way, “illegal”. Presumably that’s the play here.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
It’s going to be embarrassing seeing all the liberals cheer Trump on when he locks up Schumer.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: Remember when Trump fired James Comey for trying to investigate crimes in his first administration, and not just he but everyone in the White House seemed to think that liberals would actually welcome the firing, because we all hated James Comey?
I don’t think the authoritarian mindset can even conceive of what it means to have actual principles, instead of judging actions on the basis of personalities–who did them and who it helps or hurts.
When Trump says a protest is illegal because it’s a protest against him, that makes perfect sense to them because that’s the only basis they can really viscerally imagine for legality. All this business about autopens or moon-logic interpretations of clauses in the Constitution is just an obvious pretext, and that’s how they imagine this stuff always works.
Trivia Man
@YY_Sima Qian: a second front – i read the university retroactively rescinded his degree. On a completely unrelated note, only college graduates are eligible to run for president of Türkiye.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Yes. Their completely tribal and their world centers around their chief.
And apologies to actual tribes, who have more principles and ethics than Republicans.
Baud
comrade scotts agenda of rage
The Angel Hernandez of Justices.
lowtechcyclist
@WTFGhost:
Linky? Some of us are having a hard time keeping up with what’s happening here, let alone with news from the Holy See.
NotMax
@Baud
“Hey, Flipper. Did you know they now come in a can?”
Glory b
@YY_Sima Qian: You are correct and this is one of the first things taught (and retaught) in the first semester of law school.
Our system is remarkable in that, up until very recently, judges decisions were unquestionably enforced by the executive.
I remember that you asked for a source from a conversation days ago. Sorry for the delay, I had a hospitalized relative to deal with.
https://www.semafor.com/article/02/13/2025/democrats-want-a-more-moderate-party-new-gallup-survey
lowtechcyclist
@prostratedragon:
Thanks for sharing that! I clicked through mostly because I was wondering “what the hell is a luthier?” but reading about Ewing and her craft was more than worth it. And yeah, the history of so many Black accomplishments has been either stolen or buried, and her field is clearly an example of that.
Professor Bigfoot
@TBone: Baby, every day since November 5 has been good for day drinking.
I wish I could drink anymore, but all I have to do is open a beer and I fall directly asleep.
Glory b
@Martin: Are you also referring to the “Uncommitted” people?
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: Now what I find less understandable, and more tragic, are the old-school conservatives like Roberts, or Comey himself, who do seem to have some kind of norms of gentlemanly behavior but seem to think that giving the Maximum Leader a free hand will result in them being followed, by some dawning of mystic patriarchal intuition. When it doesn’t happen they are sorely disappointed. The real hardcore duckspeakers aren’t bothered– they just revise their notion of right and wrong according to what comes out of the Big Man’s mouth each hour.
Professor Bigfoot
@prostratedragon: Thank you.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
There’s always been a class of conservatives who are more genteel in their approach to maintaining their status over others.
Professor Bigfoot
Like Bill Maher, like Jon Stewart, John Roberts is just a bog standard white man, who will defend white male privilege with his last breath.
Call me a bigot, call me a racist, but the plain fact is that it’s white men who are responsible for all the horror that we’re experiencing. White men in general should be distrusted until and unless they prove they’re not “bog standard.”
Until they put their humanity before their privileges.
Baud
@Professor Bigfoot:
Suzanne put up a stat in the morning thread about that that you’ll love.
Matt McIrvin
@MagdaInBlack: How can a man who has 400 billion dollars and absolute power over the government be so easily upset? It’s amazing. These guys don’t even confine themselves to laughing and saying “ha ha suck it libs” when they break things. They demand to be loved!
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Not loving them is the easiest form of resistance in the world.
Geminid
@YY_Sima Qian: According to Ragip Soylu:
The “extortion” count may involve municipal contracts. The “conspiracy” with the PKK might relate to get-out-the-vote efforts directed at Istanbul’s sizeable Kurdish population.
Soylu wrote this story up for Middle East Eye:
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/turkey-detains-erdogan-rival-imamoglu-dawn-raid
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: Yeah, Coach Walz is definitely a good ‘un.
And now I’m pissed off again.
Professor Bigfoot
@Matt McIrvin:
Abraham Lincoln, “The Cooper Union Address.”
They haven’t changed, they will not change since their ideological forefathers seceded from the United States of America in order to maintain their wealth in slaves.
Layer8Problem
Another Scott
The fact that Roberts felt the need to say anything at all is an illustration of how out of control 47 and his enablers are. Of course, much of the press coverage is both-sidesing it, because, who knows, 47 may have a point after all, amirite?
And, ultimately, Roberts figures he and 4-5 of his unelected, unaccountable buddies, can tell everyone that they’re doing it rong and only the SCOTUS gets to decide anything at all these days. A few years after Melon and his minions have wrecked the systems that we all depend on…
USCourts.gov:
[ rofl ]
[ snort ]
Stop! Yer killing me!!
Grr…
Best wishes,
Scott.
Another Scott
@Trivia Man: It’s interesting that authoritarians always seem to find rules that they are able to enforce against their opponents. Strange how that happens.
“Something something protects but does not bind something something.”
Grr…
Best wishes,
Scott.
Another Scott
@lowtechcyclist: I think WTFG is referring to Francis’s comments before the election saying that both 47 and the Democrats were very, very bad, but people had to vote for the lesser evil (without saying which one was the lesser evil).
Could be wrong though!
Best wishes,
Scott.
YY_Sima Qian
@Geminid: Thanks for the link. Reads like blatant persecution of political opposition, but that goes w/ being an illiberal democracy. I suppose Trump & the rest of the American reactionaries are taking notes.
Soylu posted on X that it was foolish of Imamoglu of announce his intention of running for the Presidency 3 years out from the next election. I would have hoped that he would comment on whether such blatant persecution of political opposition is justified or good for Türkiye. Of course, at the end of the day it is up to the Turks to decide the kind of polity they want, & they will vote by ballot or by bullet, or by their inaction.
YY_Sima Qian
@Glory b: Sorry to hear about your relative. You had actually shared the link in the very thread where I had posed the question. My issue is “moderate” is not defined. Is it “moderation” (or “centrism”?) on economic issues (where “centrism” typically means reduced deficits/taxes/regulations), social issues (where “centrism” typically means not vocally defending marginalized minorities to avoid offending the sensibilities of the White patriarchy, while also not actively persecuting such minorities), or foreign policy (where “centrism” typically means staunch defense of the “natsec state” & US primacy, but more lip service to “liberalism” & less militarism)?
I don’t think that is the direction Dem Party should go, & such attempts in the past have not paid much electoral dividends (at least not since 2010 or so), & have only served to legitimize & enable worse policies from the Repubs.
Geminid
@YY_Sima Qian: Soylu’s comment was made yesterday, before this morning’s arrest. It was in connection with Istanbul University rescinding Imamoglu’s college degree:
Imamoglu was expected to be the CHP candidate in the 2028 presidential election.
Soylu’scommented:
Imamoglu’s CHP party was founded by Kemal Ataturk and has evolved into a liberal opposition party, with the second largest National Assembly representation after Erdogan’s AK Party.. It’s presidential candidate, Mr. Kiliricdoglu, lost to Erdogan by 5 points in both the first round and runoff of the May, 2023 election.
Mayor Imamoglu won reelection last year with 52.21%. The AK Party candidate was runner-up.
WTFGhost
@lowtechcyclist: @Another_Scott had it correctly.
The very Catholic SCOTUS immunized Trump. The Pontiff conveniently forgot to mention that Trump was a murderer. (NB: forgiven, or not, does not matter – his actions were murder, so, this can’t, e.g., violate the confessional seal. Which I now envision as a sea mammal, curse the luck.)
(I’m sorry – I read Revelations too young, got confused about heads saying things, when *seals* were broken, so I imagined seal heads… I did not have a normal childhood.)
Trump didn’t merely execute criminals. I heard him bragging that he sent his thugs to execute a BLMer who claimed self defense, and, he ordered a hit on an Iraqi general – let me guess, the general somehow fits under “just war”? (Lemme answer that real quick: nope. No incipient threat was averted, therefore killing could not be justified.)
Trump refused to succor the sick, and the needy, when Covid-19 ravaged the land, and instead sowed violence against those who would do so.
Now, maybe Trump is some great and mighty prophet, but another prophet – Jesus, called Christ, remember – had advice for spotting a good ‘un from a bad ‘un. Look at what happens around them. Are they helping the needy? Are the sick and imprisoned comforted? Hell, does this Trumphet allow visitors to those he’s imprisoned, the strangers in our lands?
I mean, I’d say EFF me, but nowadays, I feel like I’m failing to piss on the home team when they deserve if it I don’t say “but there’s too many in and around the papacy who might take that as an invitation!”
I piss on the home team, because they are on fire, and… damn it, they were the HOME TEAM, goddamnitall! And what, you think I have tears left to cry for them? Not enough to matter.
Gloria DryGarden
@TBone: just dont drink alone… so they say.
my mamma told me that, before I knew my dad was a functioning alcoholic. It kept me from starting any new addictions.
just saying, don’t harm yourself any extra, there’s harm enough going around.. ( just in case a serious answer was warranted in the middle of a joke. )