#169 (1/6/2012) - Preident Bypasses Constitution!

[HAPPY NEW YEAR! THANK YOU for your continued prayers as I have continued to have renewed struggles with my health. Please check here on Sunday as I hope to post a Sunday Special. And on Sunday, please remember to tune in to the broadcast of "Truth That Transforms" (Orlando - 5 pm, ch. 55.1) Finally, in case you missed it, please check the blog posting #169 below.]

[Note: The President's recess appointment yesterday was just the latest example of how he has used his executive power to bypass the check and balance of our Constitution to impose his will on America. As with most of the things posted on this blog for almost 3 years now, you will not hear this more TRUTHFUL perspective from the mainstream media's reporting. We can only pray that in this year's critical Presidential election, the American people will be fully aware of the TRUE nature of the President's actions and decide that this is NOT the kind of leadership we can tolerate.]

Obama’s Tyrannical Abuse of Power - Posted By Mike Brownfield On January 5, 2012

[1] Standing behind a podium on a stage just outside Cleveland, President Barack Obama delivered a speech yesterday that will reverberate throughout history. No, its lasting impact will not come because of its soaring rhetoric. Instead, it will make its mark because it was at that moment on a Wednesday afternoon in Ohio that the President announced his plans to act in total and utter disregard of the U.S. Constitution [2] with his illegal appointment of Richard Cordray to serve as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).

It’s an astonishingly reckless exercise of executive authority that Heritage’s Todd Gaziano described [3] as a “tyrannical abuse of power.” Never before in the 100-plus years of precedent on the recess appointment power has a President taken such an action while the Senate was still in session. Yet notwithstanding that fact, President Obama yesterday decided that he would be the first.

Here’s why the President finds himself so far outside of constitutional bounds. Under Article II, section 2, clause 2 of the Constitution [2], the President has the power to fill vacancies that may happen during Senate recesses, as Gaziano writes [3]. In this case, President Obama was seeking to fill the vacancy in the CFPB, a new agency that has come under significant criticism [4] given its unparalleled powers [5] to issue expansive regulations with virtually no accountability. Republicans in the Senate, to date, have refused to confirm the President’s nominees to head up the CFPB, vowing to block Senate approval until reforms are made [6] to the agency. So President Obama has decided to act without their approval by attempting to make a recess appointment. The trouble is that Congress is not in a recess because the House of Representatives never consented, as required under the Constitution, Article I, section 5. That means that the President simply does not have the power to make this appointment. Gaziano explains [3] the implications of the President’s actions:

"[The recess appointment] power has been interpreted by scores of attorneys general and their designees in the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel for over 100years to require an official, legal Senate recess of at least 10-25 days of duration. (There are a few outlier opinions, never sanctioned by the courts, that suggest a recess of six to seven days might be enough–but never less than that.)"

"The President’s purported recess appointment of Cordray would render the Senate’s advice and consent role to normal appointments almost meaningless. It is a grave constitutional wrong that Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has already denounced. But it fits a pattern of extra-constitutional abuse by the White House that seems more interested in energizing a liberal base than safeguarding the office of the presidency."

Why take such action? The President says it’s because he can’t wait for Congress to act on behalf of the American people. The truth is that the President is hell bent on ramming through his agenda, and he is entirely unwilling to compromise with the duly elected representatives who sit in the House and Senate. By circumventing the Senate and appointing Cordray, the President can ensure that his big-government regulatory agenda is enacted without the reforms that Congress is demanding. Unfortunately, the Cordray appointment is not the only example of the President’s wanton, unilateral actions.

Apart from Cordray, the President also plans to make three appointments [7] to the National Labor Relations Board without Senate approval, which will fundamentally alter the makeup of the board and enable the President to realize his Big Labor agenda. That means an unrestrained push to unionize businesses at all costs and punish companies that seek to grow in non-union states (as was attempted in the Boeing case) — even if it means harming both workers and the economy. And in the case of environmental regulations, immigration law, No Child Left Behind, the auto bailout [8], the selective enforcement of voting rights laws, and the regulation of the Internet (among others), the Obama Administration has in fact enacted its agenda via legislative fiat time and time again.

In an interview last month with 60 Minutes,[9] the President gave warning of his intentions to preside over an imperial presidency for the next year. “What I’m not gonna do is wait for Congress,” he said. “So wherever we have an opportunity and I have the executive authority to go ahead and get some things done, we’re just gonna go ahead and do ‘em.” The President now, though, seems to have made a significant course correction. With these latest illegal, unconstitutional appointments, the President has jumped at an opportunity to act regardless of the fact that he has no executive authority to do it. And under his feet is a trampled Constitution and 100 years of precedent for which he has no use. It’s time for Congress and the American people to take a stand against President Obama’s abuse of power.
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Article printed from The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation: http://blog.heritage.org

URL to article: http://blog.heritage.org/2012/01/05/morning-bell-obamas-tyrannical-abuse-of-power/ URLs in this post:
[1] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/Obama-podium-pointing.jpg
[2] U.S. Constitution: http://www.heritage.org/initiatives/first-principles/primary-sources/the-constitution-of-the-us
[3] described: http://blog.heritage.org/2012/01/04/a-tyrannical-abuse-of-power-obama-attempts-to-appoint-cordray-to-cfpb/
[4] significant criticism: http://blog.heritage.org/2011/12/06/consumers-need-protection-from-consumer-protection-bureau/
[5] unparalleled powers: http://blog.heritage.org/2011/06/02/new-evidence-reveals-vast-powers-of-consumer-finance-bureau
[6] until reforms are made: http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2011/09/gop_senators_tell_richard_cord.html
[7] make three appointments: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jan/4/obama-unprecedented-recess-appointment/
[8] auto bailout: http://blog.heritage.org../2011/07/06/is-general-motors-headed-back-to-square-one/
[9] interview last month with 60 Minutes,: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-57341032/president-obama-the-economy-the-congress-the-future/?pageNum=2&tag=contentMain;contentBody

Copyright © 2011 The Heritage Foundation. All rights reserved.
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The Cordray Imperial Charter; Authority cannot be bound only by the laws it likes.
by John Hayward 01/05/2012
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48561

An excerpt: "Yesterday President Obama decided to do away with that pesky little “Constitution” thing, and assign himself the power to make recess appointments when the Senate is not in recess. The Constitution could not be more clear about this: “The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the end of their next session.” The meaning of this power is equally clear, providing a mechanism for the President to expediently fill important offices left vacant by sudden illness or resignation. The President is most certainly not granted the power to unilaterally decide whether the Senate is in recess or not."

[bold and italics emphasis mine]