"On the other hand, there is the issue of the setting, the circumstances and the decorum. The image of having the members of one branch of government standing up, literally surrounding the Supreme Court, cheering and hollering while the court -- according to the requirements of protocol -- has to sit there expressionless, I think is very troubling."
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, repeating almost word for word what Obama said in his address, shot back: "What is troubling is that this decision opened the floodgates for corporations and special interests to pour money into elections -- drowning out the voices of average Americans." But Obama went further in his remarks on the case to milk every political drop he could from the issue. The ruling, he said, "will open the floodgates for special interests, including foreign corporations, to spend without limit in our elections" (A point that Gibbs noticeably chose not to repeat.)
That's when Alito shook his head and mouthed "not true," because it isn't. In fact, the court stated in the case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, it did not deal with election spending by foreign corporations because the law they overturned did not differentiate between United States and foreign companies.
Indeed, the Washington Post's Supreme Court reporter Robert Barnes further pointed out that "there are restrictions on foreign participation in U.S. elections that were not part of this case," facts that the president's speechwriters should have known, or, maybe, just chose to leave out.
But the president was treading on thin ice when he attacked the court's freedom-of-speech decision by saying, "I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests ..." What part of the First Amendment's "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech" doesn't he understand?
Obama and his well-connected corporate bundlers, who raised more money for him than anyone else in U.S. history, know a thing or two about opening the floodgates of campaign money. They raked in $750 million for his 2008 presidential campaign. Much of it came from those same special interests he was talking about.
Like wealthy trial lawyers who win huge sums of money from medical-liability lawsuits. The checks they collected for his campaign were worth every million they gave him. His healthcare-reform plan dutifully left out any mention of tort reform to rein in jury awards that have sent medical costs through the roof.
Meantime, we may not be seeing any justices at Obama's future State of the Union addresses -- or at least not the ones whose votes displease him.
"To the extent the State of the Union has degenerated into a political pep rally, I'm not sure why we're there," Roberts said.