The 180-degree legal transformation of Barack Obama

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

The 180-degree legal transformation of Barack Obama

Obama once disparaged presidents who use executive action to bypass Congress. How quickly things change...

By Tom Rogan January 28, 2013

Then-Senator Barack Obama in March 2008: Trouble keeping his own promises? Win McNamee/Getty Images

"The biggest problems that we're facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all. And that's what I intend to reverse when I'm president of the United States of America."
— Senator Barack Obama, March 31, 2008
Few politicians are disciples of truth. But when it comes to President Obama and executive power, the gap between rhetoric and reality is truly astonishing. The candidate who once promised a presidency of humility is long gone. Instead, this president has defined his administration by a naked and extreme exertion of executive power. And now he's been caught.
In its unanimous ruling late last week that the president's non-recess appointment of three officials to the National Labor Relations Board was unconstitutional, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals didn't pull any punches. Unfortunately, the court's ruling is a little late. For the past four years, Obama's executive authority has been restrained only by the limits of the president's imagination.
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Examiner.com

John Podesta: Obama 'warming up' to idea of ruling like dictator

John Podesta says Obama "warming up" to ruling like a dictator.

Getty Images

Joe Newby Policy & Issues Examiner

January 28, 2014

While appearing on NPR Tuesday morning, White House adviser John Podesta said President Obama is "warming up" to the idea of unilaterally ruling by executive fiat, bypassing Congress whenever he can, CNS News reported.
"But he doesn't like to do this, does he?" the NPR host asked.
"Uh, I think he's warmed up to it," Podesta responded, laughing.
Podesta assured NPR that Obama would be using his executive authority to address a number of issues, including global warming.
"And I think you'll see that across a wide range of topics, including retirement security, moving forward on his climate change and energy transformation agenda," he added. "There's a lot that he has the authority to do that's vested in him under the laws of the United States and his constitutional powers, and I think that he's looking forward to a year of action, and I think he's looking forward to tonight as a breakthrough year where he can lay out some of these practical, concrete ideas that will get people on-board a stable economic footing and see their wages going up for the first time in a long time."

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Examiner.com

Expert to Congress: Obama's illegal behavior could spark armed revolt

CATO Institute expert says Obama's failute to obey law could spark armed revolt.

CSPAN via Mediaite

Joe Newby Spokane Conservative Examiner

December 4, 2013

While testifying before a House panel Tuesday, Michael Cannon, director of the Cato Institute's Health Policy Studies, said Barack Obama's behavior -- specifically, his failure to adhere to the law -- could spark an armed revolt against the government, Mediaite reported.
“There is one last thing to which the people can resort if the government does not respect the restraints that the constitution places on the government,” he said. “Abraham Lincoln talked about our right to alter our government or our revolutionary right to overthrow it.”
“That is certainly something that no one wants to contemplate,” he added. “If the people come to believe that the government is no longer constrained by the laws then they will conclude that neither are they.”
“That is a very dangerous sort of thing for the president to do, to wantonly ignore the laws,” Cannon said, “to try to impose obligations upon people that the legislature did not approve.”
After the 2010 midterm elections, the liberal Center for American Progress advised Obama to use all of his executive power -- including his authority as commander-in-chief of the military -- to unilaterally push his agenda while bypassing Congress.
The result has been an unchecked executive branch issuing mandates through regulations and executive orders, sometimes ignoring established law.
In his written testimony, Cannon said that since signing the ACA into law, Obama has "failed to execute that law faithfully."
Obama, he said, "has unilaterally taken taxpayer dollars made available by the PPACA and diverted them from their congressionally authorized purposes toward purposes for which no Congress has ever appropriated funds."
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