So just to be clear, your take here is that the president violating the constitution isn't bad as long as the president feels that the ends justify the means?

The "rules" - the constitution, the law - must apply to everyone equally, otherwise it loses legitimacy.

If Trump believes that the means of deporting US citizens to CECOT without a trial (unconstitutional) is justified by his end goals, does that make him right to circumvent the judicial system, violating the laws established by the legislature in the process?

The system of checks and balances exists for a reason. It sets a dangerous precedent when any president treads astray of those constitutional guardrails, no matter what party, no matter what policy, because it empowers future presidents to do the same.

Maybe if more people did sympathize with these values, we wouldn't have the president shipping American citizens to prisons overseas without trial.

try telling Sojourner Truth or Harriet Tubman that the constitution and rule of law applied to everyone equally.

Trump is making things worse by instituting oppression - Lincoln was making things better by dismantling institutionalized oppression. Trump is committing acts of racism, Lincoln was preventing acts of racism. It’s not the same thing.

The president - and any moral person - is absolutely honor-bound to break the rules, when the rules themselves are unethical, when the rules enforce mistreating others, and protect the perpetrators of injustice.

Human rights are always worth having a war over.

I'm not making any moral claims. I'm just saying how history works.

"Law" is a silly word to describe the regulation a legislative body puts to paper, in my opinion we should stop using it like that.

Here's some laws:

In an isolated system, entropy increases.

Energy cannot be created or destroyed, only converted.

An object at rest remains at rest unless it's acted upon by outside forces.

Law is a great word to describe these things. They're immutable facts of the universe.

Now here's some things humans call "laws":

> Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

> No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Well that's just orders of magnitude difference in scope! How can we use the same word to describe immutable facts of the universe as we do to describe how we think people should behave in order to create the kind of society we believe we want to live in? We can't even say for certain that perfect adherence to those "laws" would create that society we want to live in nor can we agree what that society should look like!

Not to mention these "laws" are easily violated, and sometimes it's good to do so, as when Lincoln did so in his fight against slavery and to maintain the State.

I think it's silly to pretend human law is law. Step into any courtroom and watch your law and due process at work - the overwhelmed court system plays so fast and loose and the results of any given case are so dependent upon the judge and their mood at the moment you'll be sick!

Trump violates due process, yes indeed, but due process barely ever existed in America. The same country that secretly infected black soldiers with veneral diseases, bombed its own citizens, threw Asian Americans indiscriminately into concentration camps, that country has "due process?" The same country where cops gun down unarmed civilians, or if you're lucky merely extrajudicially beat the shit out of you, that country has due process?

It's the same in every State throughout all of history. Laws are never laws, they're regulations applied when convenient to serve the needs of the State or those in power. When a law doesn't serve the needs of the State or its bureaucrats, even if its enforcement would benefit the people, the law is ignored or "temporarily suspended." Trump just does this quiet thing out loud.

The word "law" is used to trick people into thinking that these rules are as immutable as the first law of thermodynamics, when in reality the ones who write the laws and ostensibly enforce them flaunt them at every turn. I've just read a story about a USA politician who modified an age of consent "law" when it was being used to convict his cousin who was on trial for raping a child. Now the cousin gets off with time served and community service. Now that's a "law" alright!