At What Point Does A President Lose His Legitimacy As Our Nation’s Leader And Become A Tyrant?
It breaks my heart to ask that question. Unfortunately, the events of the last two days have put this into the forefront of my mind. Barack Obama, after being urged to bypass the US Senate and appoint officials in violation of the Constitution and repeatedly threatening to “get things done” by executive order has now begun the process of establishing a dictatorship.
All those folks — friend and foe, alike — who whined about President Obama neither showing leadership nor exercising his considerable executive power to help the American people in a time of economic crisis got a heaping dose of his leadership and power yesterday. The recess appointment of Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is a direct challenge to obstructionist Senate Republicans.
Got that – the GOP has refused to consent to an Obama nominee, so it is therefore “obstructionist” and may be bypassed via Obama’s abuse of a constitutional power – despite the fact that Obama’s Justice Department argued recently that such an appointment would not be appropriate and the fact that Obama was a part of the group of Senate Democrats who devised and implemented the same process being used by Senate Republicans to prevent a recess appointment.
Which leads us to Exhibit B.
President Barack Obama on Wednesday said he will use a recess appointment to put two Democrats and one Republican on the National Labor Relations Board.
The move sidesteps Senate approvals to prevent the board from all but ceasing to function this year.
In other words, Obama’s appointments are designed to prevent the Senate from exercising its Constitutional prerogative to withhold consent from nominees as a means of limiting the Executive Branch.
Next let us move to Exhibit C.
President Obama will continue his campaign to bypass Congressional opposition to his jobs agenda Thursday by announcing a new partnership aimed at helping a quarter of a million young people find summer jobs.
The initiative, part of Obama’s “We Can’t Wait” campaign, is intended to replace a youth jobs fund that would have been enacted had Congress passed the president’s $447 billion jobs bill.
“America’s young people face record unemployment, and we need to do everything we can to make sure they’ve got the opportunity to earn the skills and a work ethic that come with a job. It’s important for their future, and for America’s. That’s why I proposed a summer jobs program for youth in the American Jobs Act — a plan that Congress failed to pass. America’s youth can’t wait for Congress to act. This is an all-hands-on-deck moment,” Obama said in a written statement.
What have we here? Nothing less than Barack Obama using an executive order to appropriate funds and implement programs that Congress has explicitly refused to adopt. Whatever happened to notions like “separation of powers”, under which the Legislative Branch makes the laws and the Executive Branch carries them out?
And this is part of a conscious strategy by the president, which we see in Exhibit D.
President Obama challenged congressional Republicans to embrace the "shared responsibility" of governance even as the White House appears ready to use unilateral executive powers to battle Capitol Hill. With Republicans taking over the House and increasing their number in the Senate, Obama faces the possibility of having his agenda stalled with limited room to maneuver -- making for tough sledding in the two years leading up to his 2012 re-election bid.
In response, Obama is expected to make more frequent use of executive orders, vetoes, signing statements and policy initiatives that originate within the federal agencies to maneuver around congressional Republicans who are threatening to derail initiatives he has already put in place, including health care reforms, and to launch serial investigations into his administration's spending.
What this means is that it is now Obama policy to govern by decree, over the explicit objection and rejection of policies by Congress.
In other words, Barack Obama has stamped the constitution “Void”.
Indeed, he has effectively overthrown the government of the United States, and replaced it with a dictatorship of the sort found in the less free, more backwards nations of the world like Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea, and Zimbabwe.
But having done so, Barack Obama has undermined his own legitimacy, for from what other source can he be viewed as deriving his powers and authority? And as such, do We the People owe him any respect, support, or obedience?
Or do we instead owe it to our forefathers and our posterity to recognize that Barack Obama is a tyrant, and to treat him in the fashion that our founding documents suggest to be appropriate?
At What Point Does A President Lose His Legitimacy As Our Nation’s Leader And Become A Tyrant?
It breaks my heart to ask that question. Unfortunately, the events of the last two days have put this into the forefront of my mind. Barack Obama, after being urged to bypass the US Senate and appoint officials in violation of the Constitution and repeatedly threatening to “get things done” by executive order has now begun the process of establishing a dictatorship.
Exhibit A is here. Got that – the GOP has refused to consent to an Obama nominee, so it is therefore “obstructionist” and may be bypassed via Obama’s abuse of a constitutional power – despite the fact that Obama’s Justice Department argued recently that such an appointment would not be appropriate and the fact that Obama was a part of the group of Senate Democrats who devised and implemented the same process being used by Senate Republicans to prevent a recess appointment. Which leads us to Exhibit B. In other words, Obama’s appointments are designed to prevent the Senate from exercising its Constitutional prerogative to withhold consent from nominees as a means of limiting the Executive Branch. Next let us move to Exhibit C. What have we here? Nothing less than Barack Obama using an executive order to appropriate funds and implement programs that Congress has explicitly refused to adopt. Whatever happened to notions like “separation of powers”, under which the Legislative Branch makes the laws and the Executive Branch carries them out? And this is part of a conscious strategy by the president, which we see in Exhibit D.What this means is that it is now Obama policy to govern by decree, over the explicit objection and rejection of policies by Congress. In other words, Barack Obama has stamped the constitution “Void”.
Posted by: Greg at 07:03 PM
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