His Royal Imperial Highness, Barack H Obama II

[sirjohn]

His Royal Imperial Highness, Barack Obama II

By Ben Shapiro 4/4/2012



America's constitutional structure is built on checks and balances. The idea behind these checks and balances is simple: We want interest counteracting interest, ego counteracting ego. We don't want any one person to gain too much power -- or any one faction or any one way of thought.

Gridlock, for lack of a better word, is good.

President Barack Obama, however, has a different idea. He believes that America must be fundamentally transformed. That fundamental transformation cannot be effectuated without a fundamental transformation of the system of American government.

The most important part of that transformation is the elevation of the presidency from a coequal branch of government to a pre-eminent branch of government. The president shouldn't be seen as just a player in the larger government struggle for power and policymaking; he should be seen as a larger-than-life figure, an almost godlike personage, the sort of fellow who can enact policy single-handedly.

No wonder, then, that President Obama declared war on the Supreme Court this week.

Now, there's a case to be made that the Supreme Court should not have the power of judicial review. That case is basic: If the Supreme Court can strike down anything at any time in the name of the Constitution, that power elevates it above the other branches. The checks and balances break down. The argument against judicial review is an argument in favor of checks and balances, not against them.

But that's not the argument Obama made. Instead, he argued that the Supreme Court should not strike down Obamacare, because that would be "unprecedented" and "extraordinary." What's so new about the Supreme Court's doing what it's been doing since 1803? Nothing, exactly, except that it would cut against Obama. In other words, judicial review is only bad when it rules against Obama.

The same holds true of Congress. Congress is great when it does what Obama wants. When it doesn't, Obama wants the power to simply ignore it. He has repeatedly stated on various issues, "If Congress won't act, I will." He's used his executive branch powers to appoint dozens of czars with Cabinet-level power but without Cabinet positions so that he doesn't have to have them approved by Congress. He's appointed officers in violation of the Constitution, wrongly maintaining that he has the right to do so.

In essence, Obama detests the checks and balances. He doesn't like gridlock. It stops him from implementing his vision.

Though Obama's power grab is unprecedented, his philosophy is not. It has roots in the progressivism of the early 20th century, when Woodrow Wilson ripped the Constitution as an archaic document that prevented him from crafting social change. He said the president should be a visionary rather than a mere vessel of the people. The president, he said, has to lead.

The "great leader" model of the presidency is extraordinarily dangerous. President Obama proves it each and every day; it's what gives him the power to tell our enemies that he'll have more "flexibility" after his "last election." He's our leader; we're his followers. It's that easy to him.

Fortunately, the Constitution doesn't allow for such egotism acted out in policy. The Constitution requires checks and balances. It requires that we battle out each and every policy change, that we compromise, deadlock and stall. Getting things done is not so important as getting the right things done. And nobody has a monopoly on what the "right thing" is -- no person and certainly no one branch of government.

[siboneyes]

A ‘Constitutional Scholar’ Who Doesn’t Understand the Constitution

April 3, 2012
By Frank Salvato

PAINTING OBAMA TRAMPLING ON THE CONSTITUTION

In a stunningly arrogant move, President Obama, the leader of one of the co-equal branches of the United States Government, intimated that should the United States Supreme Court rule the individual mandate included in the Patient Protection and Affordability Care Act is unconstitutional, they would be executing an act of “judicial activism. A more inappropriate and coercive comment has not been uttered in recent history by the President of the United States. Mr. Obama’s politically and ideologically motivated comments stand as testimony to not only his lack of constitutional literacy, it stands as a demented tribute to his audacity.

During a Rose Garden press conference, Mr. Obama, egregiously applied the notion of judicial activism to any decision that would invalidate any portion of the health insurance law commonly referred to as “Obamacare,” questioning how an “unelected group of people” could overturn a law approved by Congress. “I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress,” Obama said.

At the time of passage, it should be noted, Progressive Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate in numbers that did not require a bi-partisan effort. In fact, not one Republican voted for the final legislation.

Mr. Obama continued, “I’m confident that this will be upheld because it should be upheld,” describing the law as “constitutional.”

There is only one thing wrong with everything that the President said during this press conference regarding Obamacare and the United States Supreme Court: The President of the United States does not have the authority to declare legislation constitutional or unconstitutional. That power is exclusively the domain of the United States Supreme Court and, therefore, the decisions handed down by that body are legitimate simply because they exist.

[siboneyes]

PART 2

Of course, a real constitutional scholar would know this. Therefore, Mr. Obama is either trying to strong-arm the United State Supreme Court in the court of public opinion; he is pathetically devoid of any real constitutional knowledge; or both.

Mr. Obama often plays fast and loose with the truth when the truth inhibits the potency of his statements, his recent statements that the United States has only two percent of the world’s oil supply is a perfect example. Investor’s Business Daily points out, in no uncertain terms:

“When you look at the whole picture, it turns out that there are vast supplies of oil in the US, according to various government reports. Among them: At least 86 billion barrels of oil in the Outer Continental Shelf yet to be discovered, according to the government’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management; About 24 billion barrels in shale deposits in the lower 48 states, according to Energy Information Administration; Up to 2 billion barrels of oil in shale deposits in Alaska’s North Slope, says the US Geological Survey; Up to 12 billion barrels in ANWR, according to the USGS; As much as 19 billion barrels in the Utah tar sands, according to the Bureau of Land Management…”

The column goes on and on proving the President either grossly in error on his statistics or willfully misleading in an effort to win a political argument with egregious “facts.”

Where the issue of Mr. Obama being a constitutional law professor is concerned, we see a bit of a stretch as well. The University of Chicago Law School bestowed the official title of “senior lecturer” to Mr. Obama. Whereas the school uses “senior lecturers” to teach classes, they are not officially professors. Perhaps this is why Mr. Obama doesn’t recognize the three branches of the United States of America as co-equal. Maybe this is why he routinely side-steps the authority of the Legislative Branch in legislating through regulatory control or deeming Congress “not in session” in his use of the recess appointment. Maybe this is why he believes he can declare his signature legislation, the one achievement he holds above all else from his tenure as President of the United States – Obamacare, constitutional in his usurpation of the exclusive authority of the United States Supreme Court to decide the constitutionality of legislation brought before them.

Or maybe it is something quite different. Maybe it is a Progressive arrogance, a political Progressive arrogance, an audacity, as it were, that leads him to believe that his empirical presidency has the power to disregard the United States Constitution, the American system of government and the fact that there are three branches of government in the United States and that we have a government of laws, not of men, as John Adams said so potently in the run up to the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

A true constitutional scholar would understand the constitutional reality of the Separation of Powers and the constitutional concept of “checks and balances” that maintains the balance among the three co-equal branches of government.

So, We the People really should be incredibly alarmed at Mr. Obama’s statement that a striking of the individual mandate included in Obamacare would equate to “judicial activism.”

The statement is not only uneducated and absurd; it is either a warning sign that we have a constitutionally illiterate President or a Progressive activist who would just assume spit on the Constitution than try to understand it.

We the People should be alarmed that we have a President who would place his ideology and agenda above the people he is supposed to serve.

[siboneyes]

OBAMA Flunking Constitutional Law   Adam J. White

April 4, 2012

Last week, President Obama clumsily announced that it would be "unprecedented" for the Supreme Court to strike down "a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress." This week, his words are already having an effect in the courts—but not the effect he hoped for. Yesterday, in another case challenging Obamacare, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ordered Justice Department lawyers for a briefing on whether the Justice Department actually believes what the president said.

We can expect the Justice Department lawyers, with the help of the White House counsel, to walk back the president's statement in a hurry. In fact, President Obama is already walking it back himself, as Steve Hayes noted last night.

But the president's most recent "clarification" is no great improvement on last week's mistake. In his re-explanation yesterday, President Obama—a former law professor, Harvard Law Review president, and "the best student that" Harvard's Laurence Tribe "ever had"—continued to demonstrate a surprisingly poor grasp on constitutional law and Supreme Court history.

Here is the president's new argument, as delivered yesterday to an Associated Press luncheon:

Well, first of all, let me be very specific. We have not seen a Court overturn a law that was passed by Congress on a economic issue, like health care, that I think most people would clearly consider commerce—a law like that has not been overturned at least since Lochner. Right? So we’re going back to the ’30s, pre-New Deal.

And the point I was making is that the Supreme Court is the final say on our Constitution and our laws, and all of us have to respect it, but it’s precisely because of that extraordinary power that the Court has traditionally exercised significant restraint and deference to our duly elected legislature, our Congress. And so the burden is on those who would overturn a law like this.

Now, as I said, I expect the Supreme Court actually to recognize that and to abide by well-established precedence out there. I have enormous confidence that in looking at this law, not only is it constitutional, but that the Court is going to exercise its jurisprudence carefully because of the profound power that our Supreme Court has. As a consequence, we’re not spending a whole bunch of time planning for contingencies.

[siboneyes]

PART 2

This is wrong on many levels. Let me take them one at a time:

First of all, Lochner was not the last time that the Court overturned Congress on an economic issue, because Lochner didn't involve Congress. It didn't involve any federal law. The case challenged New York laws—as evidenced by the case's name, Lochner v. New York.

Second, the Court continued to overturn federal laws well into the New Deal. The Supreme Court struck down key components of the New Deal, including the National Industrial Recovery Act, the Frazier-Lemke Farm Bankruptcy Act, and the Railroad Retirement Act. (And these decisions were not simply the work of anti-FDR reactionaries: The first two opinions were unanimous—indeed, the farm case's opinion was written by progressive icon Louis Brandeis.)

Moreover, the Court continued to strike down laws "passed by Congress on an economic issue" well into modern times. In 1998, the Court struck down the Coal Industry Retiree Health Benefit Act for violating either the Fifth Amendment's Takings Clause or its Due Process Clause. In 1997, the Court struck down part of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act for violating the Constitution's protection of state sovereignty. The Court has struck down myriad federal statutes regulating "economic issues," on First Amendment grounds. And so on.

Simply put, there is nothing new about the Court striking down federal statutes regulating economic matters. What President Obama probably meant to say—let's give him the benefit of the doubt—is that the Court has not recently invoked the Commerce Clause to strike down a federal law purporting to regulate something that (in Obama's words) "I think most people would clearly consider commerce"—namely, health care or health insurance.

But that argument, stripped of all the president's bluster, is just a matter of question-begging. Because even if you grant that health insurance or health care is interstate commerce, that still does not answer the question that the Court must answer in the Obamacare cases: Can Congress can go so far as to mandate that people buy health insurance?

Contrary to the president's assertion yesterday, there are no "well-established precedence [sic] out there" to guide the Court's decision, because no previous case has considered the question. The issue is without precedent.

The president may well continue to pound the table, attempting to dissuade the Court from nullifying his landmark legislative achievement. But he ought to leave the constitutional arguments to the solicitor general's office, because right now he's only vindicating the old saying: the lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client.

Adam J. White is a lawyer in Washington, D.C.

[sirjohn]

Napolitano: 'The President Is Dangerously Close to  Totalitarianism'

April 7, 2012 | Reaganite Republican

Says power-mad Obama harbors 'extreme view'

on role of the Supreme  Court and Constitution...

Appearing on Fox the  other night, Judge Andrew Napolitano told Neil Cavuto  that Barack Obama's flippant disregard for all other branches but the Executive  is getting downright scary

(and that's just going by what he says in  public):__________________________________________________​_____________________

"I think the President is dangerously close to  totalitarianism. A few months ago he was saying, the Congress doesn’t  count. The Congress doesn’t mean anything. I’m going to rule by decree and  administrative regulation. Now he’s  basically saying the Supreme Court doesn’t count. It doesn’t matter what they  think. They can’t review our legislation. That would leave just him as the only  branch of government standing, so I think he has some problems with  understanding the Constitution or accepting limitations on his power. Look, they are equal branches of  government, but with respect to what the law means, or the Constitution means,  the Court is superior to the President… No  President in modern times has questioned their authority. They’ve questioned the  way the authority has been exercised – not their right to make the decision. This is an extreme view of the  Supreme Court and the Constitution, one that has not been articulated since  Andrew Jackson was in the White  House...."

[siboneyes]

OBAMA ES UN NARCISISTA  MEGALOMANÍACO

“There is scarce a king in a hundred  who would not, if he could, follow the example of Pharaoh - get first all the  people’s money, then their lands, and then make them and their children servants  forever. It will be said that we do not propose to establish kings. I know it.  But there is a natural inclination in mankind to kingly government. It sometimes  relieves them from aristocratic domination. They had rather have one tyrant than  500. It gives more the appearance of equality among citizens, and that they  like. I am apprehensive - therefore - perhaps too apprehensive - that the  government of these States may in future times end in a monarchy [not called a  monarchy but an executive with monarchial powers]. But this catastrophe, I  think, may long be delayed, if in our proposed system we do not sow the seeds of  contention, faction and tumult, by making our posts of honor places of profit.  If we do, I fear that, though we employ at first a number and not a single  person, the number will in time be set aside, it will only nourish the fetus of  a king (as the honorable gentleman from Virginia very aptly expressed it), and a  king will the sooner be set over us.”

— Benjamin Franklin

[siboneyes]

President Obama’s Secretary  Paid   Higher Tax Rate Than He Did

April 13, 2012 Brendan Smialowski

President Obama today released his 2011 federal income   tax,  with he and his wife reporting an adjusted gross income of  $789,674.  The Obamas  paid $162,074 in total tax – an effective  federal income tax  rate of 20.5%. The  Obamas also reported donating  approximately 22% of  their income to charity — $172,130.

President Obama has been making a big political push for the “Buffett Rule,” which would require millionaires to pay a minimum of 30%   of  their income in taxes. To illustrate the point, the president has   pointed out  that billionaire investor Warren Buffett pays a lower tax  rate  than does his  secretary.

President Obama’s secretary, Anita Decker Breckenridge,   makes  $95,000 a year. White House spokeswoman Amy Brundage tells ABC  News  that  Breckenridge “pays a slightly higher rate this year on  her  substantially lower  income, which is exactly why we need to  reform our tax  code and ask the  wealthiest to pay their fair share. ”

It should be noted that president would not be impacted  by  the  Buffett Rule, though he would see his taxes go up if the  so-called  Bush tax cuts  on higher income wage-earners were allowed  to expire, as the  president says he  wants.

-Jake Tapper



~COMRADE OBAMA DID NOT PAY  HIS  FARE SHARE IN TAXES....  DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I   DO!!!

Let's look at this: OBAMA made   $789,674 and gave $172,130 to charity. That leaves $617,544 taxable income.  From  that he took enough deductions to bring his income down to $142,700  at the VERY  top to mean he paid in the 20% bracket. So he wrote off  $464,844 of his income  for mortgage interest, taxes and other non-taxable  ventures.

It astounds me that he can   bIitch and whine about the rich getting all these breaks but he da.mn sure  takes  them himself. No one made him do it - it was his   choice.

[siboneyes]

Yes, Obama Eating Dogmeat Matters
My Brain | 4/21/12 | Alan Levy

"And away from the dinner table I was introduced to dog meat (tough), snake meat (tougher) and roasted grasshopper (crunchy)...."---Bark Hussein Obama, writing in Dreams From My Father

***********************************

Yes, it matters. Yes, it matters a great deal.

This little quote speaks volumes. It shows just how foreign Obama truly is. It shows how foreign his upbringing was. Not only that, it also shows how much the Arrogant and Lazy Mainstream Media sucks at its job.

Now, before we get started, yes, I know that former domestic terrorist Bill Ayers may have ghost written Chairman Obama's books. However, that changes nothing. Even if Ayers ghost wrote the above quote, that doesn't mean it wasn't proofread by the future American dictator, nor does it mean that Ayers wasn't given first hand accounts about Bark's life, this incident included.

Back to the matter at hand.

This quote, among thousands admittedly far more important, illustrates just how foreign Obama's upbringing truly was and how truly foreign his thought processes are. For thousands of years, dogs have been domesticated by humans living in western civilization. Dogs (along with cats) are universally accepted as pets, but not as food. Many western cultures have outlawed the eating of dogs and cats for that purpose. It's a social more. Most folks find eating dogmeat almost as repugnant as polygamy and incest. It simply isn't done by normal people with a normal upbringing.

But yet, in the above quote, Obama is treating it as if it was no big deal, like eating duck pate or escargot. That coudn't be further from the truth. It's barbaric.To a lot folks in western civilization, especially those who consider their pets part of the family like I do, this is almost like admitting that one ate Aunt Gladys for dinner. The very fact that this was included in his autobiography, when there was no real reason to do so, shows just how out of touch Bark Obama truly is with American culture.

The worst thing about it is the fact that the Arrogant and Lazy Mainstream Media isn't making more of this. I know they're doing their doggone best to make sure their Fuhrer gets another term to finish off America, but hey, just once, can't they pretend to be Americans who have a vested interest in American culture ? More importantly, as Mark Levin brilliantly asked, why isn't the Arrogant and Lazy Mainstream Media asking when Bark Obama stoppedeating the flesh of Man's Best Friend ?

Yes, I know I should be writing about Bark Obama's countless scandals, ranging from arming Mexican drug cartels with Operation Fast and Furious to aiding the Muslim Brotherhood take control of Libya. I get it. In the grand scheme of things, this is nowhere near as important as those crimes against humanity. However, we can't lose sight of things like this. After all, snippets like this from Bark Obama's childhood explain why he's the [fill in your favorite curse word here] he is today. What's more important, it's a barometer of what kind of [fill in your favorite curse word here] he'll be if he gets another four years without having to worry about be reelected.

We are on the edge of complete economic, political, and social disaster. I can't gussy it up. I can't make it sound palatable. The truth is what the truth is.