I have a provocative thought. What if the Supreme Court never rules on Roe v. Wade after all? You know, we saw the leak. But we also know that the leak could be in the form of a document that was passed around to see if people would support it, or what the best argument would look like.

But what if, instead of just waiting for the right time to release it — because apparently these big decisions, they wait for a certain time of the year, which is not now. Somebody can fact-check me on this, but is it at the end of the session or something, sometime in the summer? Is it August? I forget. August, October, whatever it is. So there's a time when they do the releasing of the big decisions, and this is not yet the time. So it could be that we haven't seen it because it's just not the right time.

On the other hand, what if they floated this thing just to see what the public reaction would be? What if? Oh, somebody says June. No, I think really June. Oh, about June 30, at the end of June. Somebody's saying, okay, well I'm sure you're smarter than I am about Supreme Court stuff, so let's say end of June. Well, let's say that that's right, just because I read it in a comment and how could that be wrong?

So maybe they floated it and they thought, no, it will tear the country apart, so let's back off. Do you think there's any chance that that's going to happen, or that the decision is substantially rewritten? I don't think that's going to happen. But do you think there's any chance, any chance, that you just won't see it and there'll never be an explanation why? Very, very low chance. Very, very low. But not zero. Not zero. It could actually happen.

And it could be that public opinion is something they factor in. Now here's why I think the Supreme Court should factor in public opinion. Because they're the last credible institution, and they're under assault. Their credibility. If you lose the Supreme Court, your whole system is in a lot of trouble, right? So it could have a cascading effect.

So I do think that the Supreme Court would take the health of the republic and the credibility of the court itself as a higher priority than the technical rightness of a decision. What do you think?

Let me forget about this question. You know, just forget about Roe v. Wade for a moment. Do you think in general this statement holds, that the Supreme Court justices would favor the integrity and credibility of the court and the system over any specific ruling? I'd say yes.

And can you think of anything that would be more of a shock to the system than the Roe v. Wade ruling? Let's say that the majority court are Republican-leaning or conservative. Do you think that the justices who would be presumably the ones overruling it, do you think those justices would be happy to have a Democrat elected president again? Or do you think that they would prefer getting a Republican president?

Because think about the human beings who have to sign that thing. On one hand, it would be a feather in their cap, I guess, forever. Something maybe they've always wanted to do. They'd be at the center of history. There'd be lots of reasons to do it from their perspective. But there'd also be a good reason not to do it if they thought it was going to rip the system apart. Because as the justices have pointed out, the states will just make their own rules anyway. So whatever happens is going to be at least more localized. It's not like the biggest deal in the world in some sense, right?

It'll take a while for state laws to become whatever they were going to become. But they don't really have to rule on this, do they? They could just punt. They could just kick that can down the road forever.

So if I were to predict, I will predict that it'll be exactly what it looks like. I'll predict that there will be a ruling and it looks just like the draft. But today is, let's say, good news day. I know some of you want it to be overturned, but the good news would be that it protects the system. That's what I think. It protects the system.

So you might argue that you'd rather put the system at risk to save that many of what you think are babies. That wouldn't be a ridiculous opinion.

Yeah, the one thing about the whole abortion debate is that — am I the only one? I'm sure I'm not, right? I would imagine this is closer to universal — that you have some respect for the other side. Would you say maybe far more than other topics? I would say that's true. No matter which side you come down on, you have to respect the other side. I think on this topic you have to respect it, especially if they show their work.

I'll tell you who I don't respect: someone who won't show their work. You know, this is why I believe it. I know it has some costs. Here are the benefits. I prefer these benefits to these costs. You know, if you can say it outright, then I'm going to respect that opinion even if I disagree with it.

But as I've often said, I have a penis, for those of you who are not aware of that, and I don't think that my opinion on abortion should be in any way persuasive. So it's better if I don't give it to you. Just stay out of it. And whatever women want to decide, or the public in general who wants to get involved, I will back it. You know, whatever gets decided, I'm okay with it. All right? Because that means the majority. Yeah, I'm gonna go with the majority on this one, because when you have a question that just can't be settled.

Do I think the outrage was enough to pressure a change? That's a good question. I don't believe that the risk of violence in the streets would prompt the change, because I don't think there's that much risk of that. I mean, there would be some, but it wouldn't be out of control.

I think that the Supreme Court would know that making this ruling would be interfering in a presidential election, because it could change the result of the presidential election. Do you think they might wait until after the presidential election? Think