It won’t look like decay to many. John Roberts will be the toast of the political class for years to come. He’ll attend all the prettiest events with the prettiest people. Barbara Streisand will have him out to her massively carbon-releasing Hollywood mansion. The Washington Post intelligentsia will place his bust in its pantheon of The Evolved. He might even golf with Bill and Obama.
But beneath the black robe grows a dark stain on his soul. Day by day, decision by decision, the stain metastasizes.
He’ll look at his grand kids and wonder how they’ll react when they learn that their grandpa betrayed his conscience and his country to avoid scorn from the political class. What will his great-grandchildren’s textbooks say about him?
And what of his country? Will his moral collapse speed America’s descent into totalitarianism? Maybe the government’s textbook writers will treat him with favor.
Or will his old team prevail? The team of rugged individualism and the power of principle. Will America somehow rally and recover its former greatness? And if so, how will our future history books represent the Supreme Court Chief Justice who couldn’t take the heat of Chicago politics in Washington? How will our side describe the justice who caved?
We know now that Roberts switched his vote under intense pressure from the White House and from the press. He sold out the more than 60% of Americans who oppose socialize medicine in order to win favor with the 8% known as the “political class.”
CBS News reports the extent of Roberts’ ostracization from the court’s conservatives:
The fact that the joint dissent doesn’t mention Roberts' majority was not a sign of sloppiness, the sources said, but instead was a signal the conservatives no longer wished to engage in debate with him. [emphasis added]
Roberts is now a man without a country, without a cause, and without a confederate. The liberals don’t need him, and the conservatives can’t trust him.
I suspect history will be very unkind to John Roberts, no matter how America ends. History is unkind to cowards.
UPDATE: Michael Patrick Leahy calls for lawsuit over Obamacare’s failure to adhere to origination clause.
P.S. Sick of getting kicked in the gut? Join The After Party the 3rd Thursday each month. Next meeting is July 19th at 7 p.m. at Yacovelli’s Restaurant at 407 Dunn Rd., Florissant, MO 63031. Free buttons!