The Wire Still Holds
Why Refusal, Not Spectacle, Holds the Republic Together
Two plus two equals four. There are twenty-four hours in a day. And somewhere in the tangle of power and performance that Washington has become, a thread of coherence remains.
Watch what happened today. Not the spectacle or the outrage—the stillness beneath it. Seven justices, with a few strokes of the pen, reminded us what refusal looks like in an age of submission.
It wasn't theatrical. It was precise.
The administration expected deference. After all, they had invoked those magic words—”national security,” “terrorist threat,” “executive authority.” The usual incantations that make constitutional guardrails dissolve.
Instead, they got coherence.
Read between the lines of that per curiam opinion. The Court doesn't rage. It doesn't match the administration's urgency. It breaks it. With clarity. With the quiet insistence that some principles aren't negotiable. The usual performance stumbles. The narrative falters. Because somewhere in Washington, someone still remembers how to say the word: no.
This moment matters.
Not because of the specific case, though lives hang in the balance. Not because of partisan alignments—this isn't about red or blue. It matters because what those seven justices embodied is something rare in our current moment: the refusal to treat constitutional principles as optional features, as inconvenient obstacles to be cleared for the sake of efficiency or fear.
They didn't perform resistance. They didn't seek compromise with constitutional violation. They simply held the center.
And power, which has grown accustomed to institutional genuflection, found itself contained by something it cannot dissolve with a tweet or dismiss with a shrug.
This shouldn't feel extraordinary. But we live in an age where capitulation is marketed as realism. Where principle is dismissed as naivety. Where too many believe that the only way to win is to mirror the very forces you claim to oppose—thinking, somehow, that if you adopt enough of their methods, you might redirect their aims.
But yesterday proved otherwise. You don't preserve a constitutional order by abandoning its foundations. You preserve it by standing on them. By meeting pressure not with surrender or escalation—but with stillness.
As for the dissenters—Thomas and Alito have made their choice with crystalline clarity. They serve not the Constitution but power itself. Their dissent isn't judicial disagreement; it's the abandonment of judicial function. They would strip courts of their most essential purpose: to ensure that no one, not even a president, stands above the law.
Their vision of America isn't a constitutional republic but an elected monarchy, where presidential whim trumps constitutional constraint. Their legal reasoning isn't conservative—it's monarchical. They offer not jurisprudence but genuflection.
But they lost. The center held. Not because of partisan alignment, but because enough justices remembered their oath.
This wire still holds—not because it's unassailable, but because enough people remember how to walk it. Because enough institutions remember their purpose. Because truth, however threatened, continues to matter.
Others should take notes.
Mike Brock, as usual, writes not only eloquently, but with his continued high batting average of sharing reality. The commentary title, "The Wire Still Holds," brings to mind a relevant and thought-provoking quote.
"Yet I do always to be walking a tightrope over a cesspool" — George Orwell, Such, Such Were the Joys" (1950), page 50 of the hardback edition.
Yes, the "wire" or our Democratic "tightrope" is holding. But there are politicians now in office who have abused power, allowed morality to slide down the drain, and are following Animal Farm rules of "law" that maintain our DIRE STRAITS position.
Our situation reminds me somewhat of what I felt in treating a young woman with acute myelogenous leukemia. I had to be aggressive with chemotherapy to wipe out the leukemic cells in her bone marrow It was touch and go until I tests confirmed that she was "coming back" with a healthy cell population. At this moment, we have a malignancy running and ruining our country. And that twisted and pathologic "oak" has seeded his cabinet with similarly twisted and pathologic acorns. We are still on the wire or a tightrope. It is holding. But the issue is that those in political office (GOP) and those non-politicians (MAGA) are doing what they can to push this Democracy and democratic-minded citizens off the tightrope.
Yesterday, a neighbor I like shared his thoughts about Trump, tariffs, religion, the 747 gift from Qatar, due process, MS13, and Abrego Garcia. I was shocked. His arguments were loaded with statements he pulled out of God knows where. Interestingly, I took a few of his "truths" and asked Gemini, a Google AI, to discuss, confirm and/or refute. Gemini negated all of what he said. I sent him the text, and to my surprise, he started questioning his opinion. Maybe other readers might wish to try this. Gemini, Perplexity, and other AIs are free. You can ask for specific references and receive them.
Even the conservative SC clan finally recognised the monster they have assisted in creating. We can only hope that today's small, yet significant victory serves as a precedent for the upcoming legal battles.