When the president tries to undermine the legitimacy of the federal judiciary, he must be told in short order that the White House is picking a fight it will not win. For the sake of the country, let us hope the attacks on “so-called” Judge James Robart were merely reckless and not politically calculated. Because speeding further down that path would end in an ugly constitutional crash. …

It is yet another unforced error from a president who keeps stepping on his own good headlines while stirring deep unrest among political friends and foreign allies. As the White House improves its internal decision-making process, West Wing staffers would do the country and world a great service if it could somehow apply a similar discipline to the president’s Twitter feed.