justices like to right rules so that lower courts can apply them to cases and then many cases will be handled similarly and reasonably consistently, and people have a better understanding of how the courts decide cases so that they can better comply with the law.
so we have judicial "rules" such as proof beyond a reasonable doubt for a criminal conviction and by a preponderance of evidence in a civil case. or the "reasonable person" standard.
all well and good.
where i think gorsuch and the right-wing justices' line of hypotheticals went wrong is that another "rule" is that cases are generally decided narrowly if possible. for instance, if a plaintiff lacks standing, you stop there. the supreme court usually creates "rules" when there are many cases that the lower courts are deciding in an inconsistent fashion, leading to much confusion about how a law should be interpreted or how best to comply with it.
that's obviously not the case here. there's been *one* presidential criminal defendant in roughly a quarter millenium, so this is hardly the type of case that warrants getting into hypotheticals to establish a unifying "rule".
moreover, the supreme court already decided that nixon had to comply with a subpoena as his tapes didn't lie within the "outer perimeter" of his presidential duties. that is, we already *have* a rule, so the court first needs to explain why that rule isn't good enough to cover the present circumstances.
near as i can figure, it doesn't work for them because it doesn't allow them to create the dictatorship they are drooling for.
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