Alina Habba: the Law Is What She and Pam Bondi Say It Is

Wow. This is sure something. I wonder if Alina Habba remembers the holding in the seminal constitutional law case, Marbury v. Madison? In that case it was determined that the Supreme Court has the power of judicial review, which allows it to declare laws unconstitutional. This power gives the Supreme Court the ability to check the power of Congress and the executive branch. Now granted, nowadays our Supreme Court is corrupt as hell, just like everything else in government has become. But it’s a lonnnng stretch to go from the Supreme Court determining the law of the land and the White House counsel and Attorney General deciding what is what. Marbury v. Madison has not been overturned, not matter what this bimbo says.

Wow. This is sure something. I wonder if Alina Habba remembers the holding in the seminal constitutional law case, Marbury v. Madison? In that case it was determined that the Supreme Court has the power of judicial review, which allows it to declare laws unconstitutional. This power gives the Supreme Court the ability to check the power of Congress and the executive branch. 

Now granted, nowadays our Supreme Court is corrupt as hell, just like everything else in government has become. But it’s a lonnnng stretch to go from the Supreme Court determining the law of the land and the White House counsel and Attorney General deciding what is what. Marbury v. Madison has not been overturned, not matter what this bimbo says.

The United States is now a reality TV show, which the rest of the world is watching with horror. And if you think Habba is strange, you should have been at Karoline Leavitt’s first press conference today. Dana Milbank has an hilarious take on it.

President Donald Trump threw the nation into chaos once again on Monday night with his order declaring a “pause” of indefinite length on $3 trillion in federal grants and loans. Among the government programs facing an immediate cutoff: Meals on Wheels, Head Start, school lunches, child-care help, student loans, disaster relief, crime-fighting assistance and Medicaid, which provides health care to 82 million Americans.

This is, at any rate, what people think is happening, because no one has any idea — including the Trump administration.

The day after Trump’s bombshell, and just four hours before the funding was set to cease, Karoline Leavitt, the 27-year-old White House press secretary, strode onto the podium to give her first briefing. It quickly became apparent that she had no clue about the crisis her boss had created.

“There’s no uncertainty in this building,” she informed the Associated Press’s Zeke Miller, blaming the chaos in the nation on the news media, which had “confused” people. She promised Americans that Social Security and other “assistance that is going directly to individuals will not be impacted” — small reassurance, because most such federal assistance goes through states.

How long would the cutoff be? Leavitt could only say that it was “temporary” and that Russell Vought, Trump’s nominee to run the Office of Management and Budget, “told me to tell all of you that the line to his office is open for other federal agencies.” So the guy directing this cataclysmic “pause” is an unconfirmed nominee who doesn’t even work for the federal government? (Later on Tuesday, a federal judge delayed the freeze until at least Feb. 3.)

Leavitt was asked why charities and service providers weren’t given more warning. “There was notice,” Leavitt said. Yep — about 20 hours.

They are flying blind and they don’t know it. Either that, or they do know it and they don’t give a damn, because this is all smoke and mirrors. Trump is out playing golf, Stephen Miller is drafting executive orders right and left, Steve Bannon is fighting with Elon Musk, and chaos is the watchword of the day. But that doesn’t prevent the paid shills from going on Fox News and telling the world how great it all is.

“Are you guaranteeing here,” asked David Sanger of the New York Times, “that no individual now on Medicaid would see a cutoff because of the pause?”

Replied the press secretary: “I’ll check back on that and get back to you.”

In just eight days on the job, Trump has taken a wrecking ball to the federal government, and he and his aides apparently couldn’t be bothered to give any thought to the damage and chaos that would ensue. It’s not just the spending freeze. It’s the willy-nilly, and probably illegal, firing of federal employees, the federal hiring freeze, the moratorium on foreign aid, the threats and bullying unleashed on allies, and the moves to muzzle government agencies to eliminate accountability. The sheer volume of executive orders and actions stunned critics into silence. But, as the scene in the briefing room illustrated on Tuesday, reality is already beginning to catch up with Trump.

Trump doesn’t do reality very well. He does reality TV. That’s what he does. But actual reality, actual governance? Fuggedaboutit. The egg prices are soaring. Soon you might as well start collecting golden eggs, they’ll be about the same price. Faberge eggs, maybe, why not?

Leavitt went on to defend Trump’s fiction of “sending the military to California to turn on the water.” When a reporter asked about that — you know, those reporters that get it all wrong and confuse everybody? — Leavitt replied that the water in California was turned on because of Trump’s “pressure campaign” on state officials. Total hooey. But they double down on Trump’s fantasies because that’s what they’re paid to do.

The medium is the message. You remember that from decades back? A media analyst named Marshall McLuhan said it? We’re living that premise. Trump is pumping out smoke and mirrors. Image is everything. There is no depth or substance to anything, only the appearance of same.

That’s what television is. A dimension of sight, a dimension of sound, a dimension of mind, as Rod Serling put it. You create something that looks real and POOF! In Trump world it is real. Pete Hegseth is an all American hero because he looks like one, never mind that he’s a black out drunk and a philanderer, who’s screwed up the few small non profits that he’s handled. Of what account is that? The only important thing is that he can look and sound like he’s competent.

As actress Heather Thomas said: “So Kristi Noem got her face puffed up with filler and Botox, underwent hours of hair extension attachments, hired professional make-up and hair, strapped on her customized bulletproof vest, and filmed herself arresting your maid.”