John Roberts has a very thin skin. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is peeved that the President criticized the Supreme Court’s campaign finance decision during the State of the Union:

U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts said Tuesday the scene at President Barack Obama’s first State of the Union address was “very troubling” and that the annual speech to Congress has “degenerated into a political pep rally.” Responding to a University of Alabama law student’s question about the Senate’s method of confirming justices, Roberts said senators improperly try to make political points by asking questions they know nominees can’t answer because of judicial ethics rules. “I think the process is broken down,” he said.

I think the campaign finance system is broken down after the Citizens United decision. Robert Gibbs explained what is really “very troubling”:

“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,” Gibbs said. “The president has long been committed to reducing the undue influence of special interests and their lobbyists over government. That is why he spoke out to condemn the decision and is working with Congress on a legislative response.”

Glenn Greenwald has an excellent take on Roberts’ outburst, which concludes:

Supreme Court Justices, in particular, have awesome, unrestrained power. They are guaranteed life tenure, have no authorities who can sanction them except under the most extreme circumstances, and, with the mere sweep of a pen, can radically alter the lives of huge numbers of people or even transform our political system (as five of them, including Roberts, just did, to some degree, in Citizens United). The very idea that it’s terrriby wrong, uncouth, and “very troubling” for the President to criticize one of their most significant judicial decisions in a speech while in their majestic presence — not threaten them, or have them arrested, or incite violence against them, but disagree with their conclusions and call for Congressional remedies (as Art. II, Sec. 3 of the Constitution requires) — approaches pathological levels of vanity and entitlement. The particular Obama/Roberts/Alito drama is an unimportant distraction, but what this reflects about the mindset of many judges, including (perhaps especially) ones on the Supreme Court and obviously the Chief Justice of that court, is definitely worth considering.

We are often led to believe that judges are imbued with some mystical powers of fairness and justice. They’re not. They’re political appointees. For years, John Roberts was groomed for his job by the GOP. Make no mistake, Roberts is on the Court to push an ideological agenda. And, that’s what he is doing.

Obama had every right to criticize the Citizens United decision. He would have been wrong not to.