With the sentence commutation of Roger Stone, and much of Washington D.C. shrieking in horror, Nancy Pelosi, on cue, is proposing legislation to curtail the powers of the president. Adam Schiff, who non-stop perpetuated the Russia collusion hoax for three years, across a broad swath of media outlets, and remains unrepentant for his voluminous series of lies, odiously commented: “Anyone who cares about the rule of law in this country is nauseated.”
When a president or a presidential administration oversteps its bound, we all should rightly be alarmed. So, how alarmed were Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, and legions of others in Congress from, say, January 20, 2009 to January 20, 2017?
Under President Obama, as with all presidents, the federal government is supposed to serve U.S. citizens, not conduct massive political agendas, shield their own law breakers, thwart national elections, spy on its own citizens, sell guns to drug dealers, and offer lavish rewards to illegal entrants.
Summoning Magical Powers
Early in Obama’s first term, he succinctly conveyed to immigration activists that he lacked the legal authority to “waive away the law Congress put in place.” A few years later, in defiance of a measure already dismissed by Congress, Obama’s Department of Homeland Security somehow found the power to bestow “lawful status” upon 4.3 million illegal aliens (that figure versus one Roger Stone).
To put such numbers into context, the population of each of the following states is less than 4.0 million: Oklahoma, Connecticut, Utah, Iowa, Nevada, Arkansas, Mississippi, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, Idaho, West Virginia, Hawaii, New Hampshire, Maine, Montana, Rhode Island, Delaware, South Dakota, North Dakota, Alaska, Vermont, and Wyoming.
And what of President Obama’s over-employment of executive orders, agency guidance, executive agreements, and agency rule-making? Even The New York Times concluded that Obama’s unilateral alteration of domestic policy was unparalleled in recent times, and that his two terms were characterized by “bureaucratic bulldozing, rather than legislative transparency.”
A Shielded, Rogue President
Our government has to be accountable – need it be said – and transparent in all its activities and operations. Instead, with Obama, we had the extreme opposite: Rogue officers, in rogue departments of rogue agencies, who flouted the law, conducted covert campaigns, and, as the U.S. Attorney John Durham's investigation will soon reveal to all, contorted democracy in countless, major ways.
The federal government officers and the legion of appointees, as well as civil servants, who succumbed to immoral, criminal, and treasonous behavior in the Obama administration was shameful. The most egregious agency offenders included the Internal Revenue Service, Department of Justice, National Security Agency, and Department of Commerce.
Not shy about revealing their bias, in 2014, 95% of National Treasury Employees Union contributions went to Democrats, including 11 Democratic members of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. The IRS employees union dues thus helped to finance the election of people responsible for scrutinizing IRS behavior.
In any other era, such deeds would merit non-stop, major news headlines. The outrage would be palpable. Editorials would rail against such payola. The public would demand redress. In the Obama years, such behavior and activities were standard fare and raised no hackles.
A Tidal Wave of Impropriety
During Obama’s presidency, the federal government quickly abandoned 232 years of propriety. Concerned citizens hardly knew where to turn. Worse, the percentage of concerned citizens – those aware of how the government under Obama was functioning, versus how it ought to function – proved to be a small fraction of the population.
Granted, most U.S. citizens on all sides of the political spectrum are dupes of the media, to put it politely. They cannot cite major dates in U.S. history, nor what is contained in the U.S. Constitution. They have little knowledge of the Bill of Rights. They cannot name a single cabinet member. Indeed, most cannot name their congressional representative, and many could care less about such ignorance.
For all eight years, the federal government under Obama strayed so far from its responsibilities that even lifelong, law abiding, dedicated civil servants gingerly clung to their posts, hoping to retire unscathed. Concurrently, an uneducated populace gives presidential administrations and federal agency ‘activists’ a green light to engage in unwarranted and even criminal behavior.