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 THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE Number 707, February 3, 2013 Government kills. Government steals. Government kidnaps. Government enslaves. Government lies. Government is vastly worse than anything or anybody it was created to protect us from.
The Impeachable Offenses of Barack Hussein Obama
Attribute to L. Neil Smith's The Libertarian Enterprise
Introduction: I've had no additional commentary on Part 1 or Part 2 since the Part 2 publication, and there have been no significant new developments in terms of the President's executive orders on "gun control," including actual publication of the text which he signed. (Impeachable offenses and simple disgraceful performance by other officials at the recent hearings on the subject are not the subject of this series of articles). So I will continue from my point of departure in Part 1, but continue the numbering from point 6 since the bulk of Part 2 is (unnumbered) point 5. 6. Usurpation of Congressional Authority: Recess Appointments During Session This item has been in the news this week because a Federal appeals court has just found these recess appointments to be unconstitutional because they violate the Separation of Powers — which fact was known to the President, and ignored, when he issued them.i It goes without saying that if a Republican President had done that, the Democrats in the Senate — and the Media — would be calling for his impeachment; so the same should be applied to President Obama. Mr. Kerpen's review of the situationii notes that, as I lamented in the introduction to Part 2, "White House Press Secretary Jay Carney insisted the decision 'does not have any impact, as I think the NLRB has already put out, on their operations or functions, or on the board itself.' So the administration is openly defying the courts and the Constitution." In other words, the President is denying that even the declaration that his action was illegal should have any impact on the consequences of that action. That in and of itself should also be grounds for impeachment. 7. The Invasion of Libya: Violation of the War Powers Act These examples are all very straightforward and have been very publicly visible; this one is no different. The President authorized military force to support the rebels in Libya against its late president Moammar Gadhafi. He not only refused to get Congressional approval for this action, but he refused to account to Congress when they asked him for such accounting. Another example of defiance of the Constitutional division of powers, and another example of the Democrat-led Senate's refusal to hold him to account. There is not yet any evidence that this action has accrued any benefit to the United States — and the death of the Ambassador in Benghazi suggests that the President's actions have been harmful to the United States in the long term. There is little doubt that the President has given "aid and comfort to an enemy" — the plan to give fighter jets and Abrams tanks to the Moslem Brotherhood regime in Egypt being another immediate example. 8. Immigration. This isn't a screed on the legitimacy of our present immigration system and on those who enter the United States outside of the system.iii The fact remains that we have immigration laws, laws that the citizens of the country want to have enforced, and that Congress therefore cannot change, but that presidents of both parties have chosen to ignore. Whether or not anyone agrees with that law, it remains the law; there is no dispute that Congress has the power "to establish an uniform rule of Naturalization," and that the President is obligated to enforce that law. In two particulars, the President has failed to do so: a) The President (and Attorney General) have worked to prohibit the State of Arizona from enforcing an immigration provision equivalent to the present US law, even though otherwise the state has areas which are virtually lawless due to the activities of drug gangs.iv b) The President's executive-order implementation of the so-called "Dream Act" provisions. Whether or not you agree with current immigration law, the President has no constitutional ability to unilaterally rewrite the law for his personal, political benefit.
i I also must wonder what constitutional authority justifies a National Labor Relations Board to which the President makes appointments in the first place, but the fact that such officials were appointed without the required Congressional approval certainly does nothing to add further legitimacy to the process. ii http://townhall.com/columnists/philkerpen/2013/01/31/obamas-act-of-constitutional-disobedience-n1502070 iii Regarding immigration, in brief I believe: (a) The borders should be controlled sufficiently to reduce the risk of terrorists (or, if you will, “all them undocumented combatants in an undeclared war”) entering the United States with weapons of mass destruction; (b) otherwise, people should be relatively free to come and go, for work or for play, and at will, (c) but with no expectation that they will receive any preferences relative to other immigrants or citizens (including government "handouts" or relief from taxes due to "working under the table"), and (d) with the same "path to citizenship" for all immigrants. My objection to illegal immigration is not at all racial; it's the fact that illegal immigrants don't contribute taxes and then demand government services paid for by my taxes: either make them pay, or let me have a tax holiday too. Equal treatment for all, not preferential treatment for those whose votes are for sale. iv One also does not have to be a fan of current drug laws to recognize and recoil from the savage lawlessness of the drug gangs. Much may be said of the value of de-fanging them by ending the second failed prohibition experiment. But again, the drug controls are laws the President is enjoined to enforce — and is failing to do so. Was that worth reading?
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