Litman: Aileen Cannon’s ruling isn’t just legally flawed. It has nothing to do with the law
Politics tamfitronics The initial impulse on reading Judge Aileen Cannon’s pseudo-scholarly 93-page dismissal of the classified documents case against Donald Trump is to list the legal errors and overreaches that demonstrate its brazenness and likelihood of being reversed. The opinion, which throws out the case on the dubious premise that special counsel Jack Smith was not properly appointed, could serve as target practice for any first-year law student who has learned about statutory construction and precedent, principles that Cannon mangles as she strains to make the case go away.But such conventional criticism isn’t really suited to Cannon’s unconventional and embarrassing work. To analyze the case in terms of the nuances of the special counsel law or Cannon’s disregard of United States vs. Nixon is to miss what’s in front of one’s face.It’s...