Texas senator is fine with a Supreme Court justice’s acceptance of bribes.

How does the Wall Street Journal defend Thomas’s cheery acceptance of bribes?

The left’s assault on the Supreme Court is continuing, and the latest front is the news that Justice Clarence Thomas has a rich friend who has hosted the Justice on his private plane, his yacht, and his vacation resort. That’s it. That’s the story. Yet this non-bombshell has triggered breathless claims that the Court must be investigated, and that Justice Thomas must resign or be impeached. Those demands give away the real political game here.

But “the left” didn’t invent the rule that travel donations (aka “his private plane, his yacht”) must be reported.

The left didn’t even invent the fact that lavish gifts can look like, and can be, bribes.

ProPublica, a left-leaning website, kicked off the fun with a report Thursday that Justice Thomas has a longtime friendship with Harlan Crow, a wealthy Texas real-estate developer. The intrepid reporters roamed far and wide to discover that the Justice has sometimes traveled on Mr. Crow’s “Bombardier Global 5000 jet” and that each summer the Justice and his wife spend a vacation week at Mr. Crow’s place in the Adirondacks.

The piece is loaded with words and phrases intended to convey that this is all somehow disreputable: “superyacht”; “luxury trips”; “exclusive California all-male retreat”; “sprawling ranch”; “private chefs”; “elegant accommodation”; “opulent lodge”; “lavishing the justice with gifts.” And more.

Are those words and phrases intended to convey that it’s all disreputable or that it’s all very lavish? There’s a difference. The lavishitude certainly contributes to the disreputability, but then, that’s quite a sound reason for reporting it, no?