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Three Mile Island nuclear plant notifies regulators of intent to close

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Life Deconstructed: The free time argument is as old as mankind itself

<p>The story line is that President Donald Trump has no respect for the judiciary and the separation of powers, but lately the reverse has been more nearly the case. Some in the judiciary have seemed to think they can boss the executive and legislative branches around no matter what the law says.</p><p>Ah, but here comes a unanimous Supreme Court saying a bunch of lower courts went absolutely too far in their snarling pursuit of this president who has no end of anti-democratic forces on his trail. What we are talking about, of course, is Trump&#8217;s varied executive orders seeking a temporary ban on trips to the United States by citizens of terrorist-ridden countries with disorderly vetting processes.</p><p>These six Middle East countries had been identified by the Obama administration as especially troubling and, despite Trumpian fumbles of various sorts in the way this was handled, a case can be made for what he wants. While there have been stories to the contrary, some bad customers have made their way here from those shores, terrorism is hardly taking a nap right now and checking out visitors more thoroughly hardly seems stupid.</p><p>Some have argued the changes could surely be made while the hustle and bustle is going on, but there&#8217;s an old saying that would seem to apply: You can&#8217;t fix a train while it&#8217;s running. John Kelly, an experienced and honorable military man now serving as secretary of homeland security, has said that slowing things down is necessary in order to arrive at something that works better than what we now have.</p><p>But whether the revision succeeds or not, the executive order was crystal clear about objectives and methods, the president has indisputable powers within the Constitution to do this thing, and lower courts said nothing doing. A primary methodology was to read Trump&#8217;s mind and guess at real motives that would not matter legally even if the guesses were right.</p><p>Because Trump had talked about a Muslim ban during his campaign and these were Muslim-majority countries, the judges figured this was religious discrimination even though it applied to everyone in those countries and hundreds of millions of Muslims are not affected.</p><p>Imagine for a moment that courts generally behaved in this fashion, judging whether you broke the law or not based not on what the law says but on something you once said. Justice that is not. Of course, it is nothing new to see activist courts essentially writing new laws to fit their political druthers. Even the Supreme Court has done it, and it is a betrayal of our founding principles.</p><p>In this case, the Supreme Court did not deal with all aspects of the decisions of the past courts. Until it could hold a full hearing, it decided not to ban travelers who have connections in the United States and have already been going back and forth. What it said was those coming here for the first time were going to have to wait a bit in accordance with the order. Three of the judges wanted to act now on a temporary ban for everyone, saying America&#8217;s safety was more important than any of the other issues raised in the appellate courts.</p><p>The lower court judges meanwhile think they are more important than the law. Whatever Trump&#8217;s faults, the unending conspiracy theories about him, the slurs, the barbaric jokes about an assassination, the impeachment preachments and activist judges add up to a threat not only to him. But to all of us. It did not happen overnight, this incredible country we have, and these people would tear it apart.</p><p>Trump has already done one mighty thing to change all that. He got Neil Gorsuch on the Supreme Court. He was one of the three who voted to include all travelers in the temporary ban.</p><style>
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<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>Jay Ambrose</p><p>Guest Columnist</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Jay Ambrose is an op-ed columnist for Tribune News Service. Readers may email him at <a href="mailto:speaktojay@aol.com">speaktojay@aol.com</a>.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Their view: To get Trump, anything goes