Here’s my only question for Martha-Ann Alito: Were you a flag girl in high school? I’m guessing she was, which matters only slightly less than the idiotic controversy over her decision to raise a pair of “scandalous” flags on her property that were also seen at the insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The Alitos’ flags supposedly matter because her husband, Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., will be ruling soon on two cases involving the events of that day.

Martha-Ann’s flag, first hoisted at her home a few days after Jan. 6, initially sparked only the ire of a neighbor. Perhaps the neighbor has reason to dislike Martha-Ann, who is funny, feisty, unfiltered and the life of any party, according to mutual friends and my limited impression of her.

So, okay, maybe Martha-Ann is a tad impulsive. Alas, we never got together. I assume someone whispered in her ear that long, chatty walks with a Post columnist might not be such a good idea. Oh, but it would have been. Meanwhile, this supercilious scandal isn’t about flags, but about — what else? — abortion. As one justice, who shall not be named, once put it to me: “Everything is about abortion.” This is especially true now. Justice Alito was the author of the majority opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the case that ended the constitutional right to abortion. He has been in the crosshairs of Democratic political operatives ever since. That’s Footnote No. 1 in this tempest-y teapot. Footnote No. 2: Democrats dislike the 6-3 conservative-majority court — and the former president who appointed the three justices whose votes tipped the scales that reversed Roe v. Wade. Footnote No. 3: Having lost their bid to stack the court, Democrats are lobbing everything they can to diminish the court and the public’s trust.

My guess is Justice Alito doesn’t and didn’t know what his free-spirited wife was up to. His head tends to be in a cloud where words, not flags, occupy his mind. His critics seem to think they know best how he should conduct his marriage. By closely supervising his wife? Surely not.

the upside-down flag to represent their backward dreamscape, it was a signal of distress, which surely describes what follows. The neighbor-nemesis, who claims she never saw the flag, has been in a sustained squabble with Martha-Ann over a sign the former erected on her lawn that read, Alito told Fox News, “F--- Trump.” Martha-Ann objected to the sign because it was near a school bus stop, he said.

Fast-forward to now and, suddenly, the flag incident is all the news. Questions of ethics have been raised about Alito’s neutrality and opinionators began congealing around a demand that Alito recuse himself from cases concerning the events of Jan. 6. Harrumph, harrumph, harrumph. Oh, but there’s more. Yet, another of Martha-Ann’s flags, one that featured a pine tree and the words, “Appeal to Heaven,” flew over the New Jersey beach house she owns during the summer of 2023 — long after the 2021 Capitol riot. But because this flag also made an appearance at the Capitol on Jan. 6, The media horde and others made a giant leap: Martha-Ann must be expressing common cause with white nationalists who want a more-Christian government. (Cue heavy breathing.)

For his part, Alito adopted a defense that anyone in a multi-decade marriage might recognize. “My wife is a private citizen .... That logic, though likely true, opened another can of worms in some quarters, of course. Oh, sure, blame the wife. But I can tell you this: My workaholic husband is so busy in his own cloud that he couldn’t tell you where I am or what I’m doing on any given day. I could hang a flag from his car antenna, and he wouldn’t see it. I used to joke that it took him two years to notice that I had moved to Washington, D.C. I love this about him because I love freedom. I wouldn’t be surprised if Martha-Ann and countless other lucky women feel the same.

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