Posted on 05/17/2013 3:10:59 PM PDT by Kaslin
Editor's Note: This column was co-authored by Bob Morrison.
Former Education Sec. Bill Bennett said the most important thing about a school was its ethos. He meant the prevailing character of the school as an institution. That word also applies to the Obama administration, or any administration.
We should not, therefore, be surprised by the IRS scandal. It was completely predictable. It is one of the inevitable consequences of contempt for law. President Obama gave lawlessness a spur in this State of the Union Address in 2010. This was the ethos of his administration-
Mr. Obama had promised in his 2008 campaign to “fundamentally transform the United States” and he kept that promise in 2010 when he used this most august, most formal occasion of our republic to deliver a blistering denunciation of the Supreme Court’s ruling in the controversial case of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.
The black-robed Justices were seated before him as he tongue-lashed them. They had been invited as honored guests. But Mr. Obama wanted them there as props. He wanted to show the world that he was master in our house.
Chief Justice John Roberts saw the danger to our institutions from this unprecedented act of disrespect:
The image of having the members of one branch of government standing up, literally surrounding the Supreme Court, cheering and hollering while the court, according the requirements of protocol, has to sit there, expressionless, I think, is very troubling.
And it does cause you to think whether or not it makes sense for us to be there. This -- to the extent the State of the Union has degenerated into a political pep rally, I'm not sure why we're there.
“Very troubling,” indeed. And it was there that President Obama opened the gates to the IRS abuse of power. He showed his contempt for all previous practice, for two hundred thirty years of constitutional government in that assault on the Supreme Court. During the campaign, he had egged on his supporters, telling them to “get in their faces.” The night of his 2010 State of the Union Address, Barack Obama got in their faces.
We can hear our liberal friends object: “You conservatives howl about Supreme Court rulings you don’t like. Your crocodile tears now are hypocritical.”
That counter criticism deserves an answer. We do, indeed, vociferously denounce Supreme Court rulings that are incorrect, unjust, and cruel. We would put Roe v. Wade, which has brought about 55,000,000 deaths,at the head of our list. But we know how to conduct our opposition.
President Reagan used his State of the Union Addresses to appeal for the lives of unborn children. He eloquently said, in his 1986 State of the Union Address that “abortion is a wound in America’s soul.” But he did not use that occasion to lambaste the Justices seated silently before him.
Rather, President Reagan treated the Supreme Court with great respect. He ordered his Solicitor General, Rex Lee, to climb the steps of the Supreme Court with a formal petition calling upon the high court to correct its ruling in Roe v. Wade.
Even when his strongest convictions were offended by what the Court had done, even when he viewed the matter at hand as vital to the life of the nation, Ronald Reagan treated our courts with the highest respect.
President Reagan knew that if he fostered disrespect for law and for our free institutions of government, he would sow the wind. He did not want us Americans to reap the whirlwind.
Not so, President Obama. His arrogant and offensive behavior toward the Supreme Court of the United States on that grim, dark evening of January 27, 2010 was the opening gun in the race to crush his opponents.
It was not a great stretch for middle level bureaucrats at IRS to see that they would please this president if they made life miserable for his opponents. And they did.
Rather than the elected Chief Magistrate of a free people, President Obama acted that night more like an angry monarch lashing out. The story of King Henry II of England is useful here. King Henry was outraged that Thomas Beckett, his handpicked Archbishop of Canterbury, was defying him on the selection of priests and bishops. The king loudly denounced the Archbishop in his own circle. Over a late night dinner, the king cried out: “Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?”
King Henry’s barons gathered around his table took the hint. They entered Canterbury Cathedral and cut down Thomas Beckett, killing him as he stood at the altar of God.
No one believes that President Obama countenances anything as dire as that. But it is the Obama Ethos we need to consider when we look into the IRS’s abuses of power in the suppressing Obama’s political opposition.
That speech to the nation in 2010 showed that President Obama was willing to trash our history and our institutions. He didn’t ask his cohorts to rid him of any meddlesome priests. But the IRS did go after the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. The time to stop abuse of power is before it comes to this point.
No one believes that President Obama countenances anything as dire as that.
Oh No? I think most Americans would be truly disturbed
if they could but see what Obama might countenance in
the goal of his “Complete transformation of America”.
Another problem could be the disappearance of any concept of right and wrong.
Good post!
He’s set the tone..he’s sewn the wind. His minions have infested every branch of public service (service?..HAH!)
2 Thessalonians 2:3-4 Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God.
The author seems to be suggesting that Supreme Court decisions are, and should be regarded as, inherently legitimate. I not only disagree with that notion and consider it dangerously misguided, but also believe it to be responsible for much of this country's state of decay.
What is necessary is to make a distinction between things which are legitimate, and things which are illegitimate but for which there exists no applicable remedy. I consider one of the rules of tournament bridge to be applicable here (from memory): players are forbidden from deliberately violating any of the rules of tournament bridge, even if the prescribed punishment is one they would be willing to accept. For example, if a player accidentally drops a card so that it is exposed, the player will typically be penalized by having to play that card at the first legal opportunity whether or not it would be advantageous. If, however, a player were to deliberately drop a card that he knew he would want to play anyway, for the purpose of letting his partner know he was going to play it, such a player would be cheating. No player in a respectable club would openly boast about doing such a thing and getting away with it, since any respectable club would eject such a player.
It is fine to suggest that Supreme Court decisions, whether legitimate or not, are binding upon the parties thereto (since the fact that the decisions were illegitimate would not imply the existence of a remedy). That does not imply, however, that such decisions are legitimate. If decisions are held up to scrutiny, judges will feel substantial pressure to write decisions which can actually be justified by the text of the Constitution and statutes. If decisions are considered to be beyond scrutiny, judges will feel no such pressure and will write decisions which are increasingly lawless, unless or until they reach a point where the lawlessness of their decisions can no longer be ignored.
The abuse of power will continue as long as psychotic adolescents elect other psychotic adolescents.
The way it looks, there are plenty of those around that might last a few generations.
IMHO
Right there with you... The individual mandate of Obamacare was upheld. Many here were calling John Roberts a traitor, or worse. We’re those people wrong to do so?
Rulings of the SC should be viewed with the same mistrust and criticism as any other branch of government. Calling congress a bunch of idiots and the president a fool does not bring about disrespect for the law. Nor does saying that rulings of the SC are stupid and wrong. It is necessary to prevent tyranny.
Brilliant article!
One of the first things a dictator does (and believe me, from translating documents from the newly leftist Latin America, I know all about this) is to attack the courts.
The first thing for a leftist dictator is to get elected, which he then claims as a seal of approval. This is usually accomplished by populist rhetoric and a particular "hook" - many Latin American dictators proclaim their "indigenous" blood or call themselves "negritos" (Chavez, for example, who does have some African blood), depending on what appeals to the mob.
They then start immediately to undermine all the procedures, and if there are obejctions that get taken to the courts - they destroy the judiciary.
Obama has somehow managed to sideline the judiciary here. Normally presidents just appoint sympathetic judges, which is reasonable (except for Bush, who bent over backwards to show that he wasn't partisan, with the result that a lot of his appointments weren't good). But Obama has virtually crushed and marginalized the Supreme Court, and I don't know how he did it. However, they're still in office, alive and well.
If the examination and prosecution of Obama's crimes and those of his henchpersons seems like it's going to go futher and have any effect, look for him to make some major changes to the judiciary.
The courts are the big enemies of leftist dictators, particularly in the second stage (which is where Obama is now), and eliminating that enemy is very important to them.
I read a story a long time ago that explained this issue very clearly.
The reason we have all this violence, is because we tolerate it.
I read a story a long time ago that explained this issue very clearly.
The reason we have all this violence, is because we tolerate it.
His mentor would have blithely eliminated 25,000,000 people who couldn't be "reeducated".
He, personally, has displayed his contempt for the American People and our Constitution, repeatedly.
Would he have some "troublesome" Americans whacked?
Maybe even an accidental Border Patrol Agent?
Just call me "No one".
When criminals run the government, criminals run the streets.
From a lack of confidence, created by an over reaching government that oppresses it citizens with corrupt agencies like the IRS.
There is nothing I can add to it, other then you said it
I think another HUGE message was sent when Eric Holder declined to prosecute the Black Pampers hanging out in front of the Philly polling station. IOW, “Go ahead and break the law...Obama has your back.”
The Supreme Court's only legitimate authority is over the actual parties to the cases before it. If the Supreme Court can correctly inform people as to what things are legitimate and illegitimate, that would be a useful function, but that is not part of its authority. If something is unconstitutional, the Court should say so, but that doesn't mean the court has the authority to make unconstitutional things illegitimate. Unconstitutional things are by illegitimate by definition; the Supreme Court does not make them so.
Further, I think there is a certain level of human nature that wants to explore boundaries. Someone who is told that what they say, no matter how outrageous, will be treated as gospel will be inclined to say increasingly outrageous things until someone calls BS. On the other hand, those who knows that people's willingness to listen to them will be contingent upon their speaking truth, will be more inclined to avoid saying things that would be shown to be wrong and thus losing people's trust.
The problem with the SC is that they have gotten away from saying that the government has limits. They seem to be of the mindset that limits are flexible depending on what the government wants to do. So yes.. that’s where lawlessness comes from. If the Supreme Court doesn’t care about the limits of the Constitution (the supreme law of the land), why should anyone care about any other law?
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