By Isaac Yetiv , Ph.D
LA JOLLA, California — Years ago, I warned about a dangerous trend of usurpation of authority by the Executive power to the detriment of the other two co-equal powers, the Legislative and the Judiciary. I even called it “Bonapartism.”
The drafters of the US Constitution, fearing ” the rule of one opinion, whether of a tyrant or of a mob,” created a government structure premised on the idea that humans are fallible, fickle, and unreliable…and need to be feared. James Madison, who promoted this Hobbesian view, famously wrote that ” if men were angels, we wouldn’t need a government.” He insisted on the “Checks and Balances” between the three “co-equal Powers” and on their “separation.”
In US history, there have been, from time to time, encroachments of the Executive branch on the other two, but never as pervasive and imperious as is happening today in the Obama administration. A few commentators and pundits denounced Obama’s unilateral acts as mini-coups.Judge Andrew Napolitano declared apprehensively:” I think Obama is dangerously close to totalitarian rule by decree.”
The truth is that we should not be surprised. Obama promised , five days before his first election in 2008 , to “fundamentally transform America.” One may admire his candor when he repeatedly declared,,” I can’t wait for Congress to act, and I will govern [ rule?] by executive orders and regulations if necessary.” And later, with blunt arrogance, he arrogated to himself the right to use his “pen and phone” to act unilaterally “to protect the middle-class.”
Imbued with his mentor, Saul Alinsky’s doctrine and “Rules for Radicals,” and inured to the Chicago school of hard politics, he surrounded himself with a host of politicoes and academics of the same ilk, and he hired an army of “czars” to advise him on how to achieve the “transformation.”
The ruthless machine went to work with the unspoken slogan of “the end justifies the means,” unencumbered by such niceties as truth and decency, and demonizing the opponents without shame.
It was aided and abetted by an apathetic public, a hypnotized political opposition immobilized by political correctness run amok and pathological fear of being labeled “racist,” and the abject abdication of the mainstream media that have betrayed their vocation of watchdogs and became lapdogs instead.
This arrogance of unchallenged power resulted in abuse of power that led to the “avalanche of scandals” which had plagued the Obama administration. Each one of them would have toppled a British Prime Minister, in their parliamentary system of government. I am beginning to doubt the virtues of our presidential system in which the only way to remove a president is by impeachment, a process initiated in the House but adjudicated in the Senate. Any sane observer will tell you that the Republican House will never initiate the impeachment of the first Black president, as they have done with Clinton for a much lower offense.
No need to rehash the “avalanche.” Suffice it to say that at least some of them, especially Benghazi, are, according to neutral experts, impeachable offenses.
One would think that, having come out unscathed from the “avalanche,” the president would be more careful in his respect of the laws and the constitution. But no ,he doubled down in his efforts to go it alone and “transform America.” As I wrote above, other presidents have used the tool of “executive order” but in circumstances that will not change laws already on the books, especially those they themselves fought hard for their passage, or violate the Constitution, as did Obama.
Here are just a few examples:
.- The immigration law was unilaterally “amended” by fiat of the president who exempted a category of immigrants from certain provisions of the law.
– The “Affordable heathcare Act,” aka “Obamacare” became law by the vote of one party alone, after a lot of arm-twisting, using carrot and stick, making false promises and even outright lies like ” If you like your health plan (or doctor), you can keep it.” repeated, before the elections –and after–28 times, and without which Obama may have lost the 2012 election.
But when the implementation of the law proved disastrous, Obama started tampering with it, announcing a “change”–without even calling it a “change”– every Monday and Thursday, oblivious with contempt to the fact that he is trespassing and violating the Constitution that has assigned the task of legislating and amending laws to the US Congress and not to the Executive branch.
To date, there have been 29 changes and 251 waivers and exemptions to carefully selected and politically motivated favored groups (If the law is so good, why exempt friends from it?)
When the president does not “waive and exempt,” he modifies and delays-and-redelays “until after the elections” ostensibly to bail out his party’s candidates for re-election in states where they are certain to be defeated. He does it even when the law, his law, prescribes specific dates in non-equivocal language such as “…SHALL be done in the months following December 31, 2013.”
The president’s usurping power has become so egregiously in-your-face that even his fellow Democrats couldn’t keep their mouth shut anymore: Tom Harkin, Senator from Iowa, questioned publicly if Obama is authorized to change the law; the Justice Department Legal Counsel declared that “the president has no authority to refuse to enforce the law” (“to faithfully execute” says the Constitution;) former President Bill Clinton scolded the president,saying that “Obama must keep his promises,” referring to ” If you like your health plan, you can keep it. Period.”
Even the lethargic and slobbering mainstream media woke up: Washington Post gave Obama four pinocchios. And the expert academics , usually Obama fans who voted for him and “agree with him on many issues,” lashed out at his violations of the Constitution. One of them, the eminent professor of constitutional law, Jonathan Turley, appeared on TV more than once and wrote about “the danger to the Constitution caused by the 28 times that Obama changed Obamacare unilaterally,” his “amendment to the immigration law,” his “rewriting or ignoring the legislation.” He also lamented the “fecklessness of the Congress,” adding ominously that we “will rue the day when we remained silent.”
What will happen now? As said above, impeachment is out of the question. There remain lawsuits,up to the Supreme Court, though slow and uncertain, or defunding Obama’s programs which is politically unsavory. Maybe some other genial idea !
If, at least, we could console ourselves with patent successes of an authoritarian president (like Mussolini making the trains run on time)! But the opposite is true: the Obama administration has gone from failure to failure, both in domestic and foreign affairs. This week’s polls show calamitous numbers: Obama has the lowest rate of job approval in his presidency :38% against 54% of disapproval; and in foreign policy, it is even worse: only 35% approve against 56%.
I have ceased to analyze if Obama’s failures are caused by an inept leadership or an inapt ideology.
Whatever it is, his attempted one-man rule must be stopped by legal means for the sake of the Republic.
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Isaac Yetiv is a freelance writer and lecturer based in La Jolla, California. He may be contacted via issac.yetiv@sdjewishworld.com
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