I would like to continue yesterday’s theme: the unconscionable power grab by the president as he dismissed the Constitution outright by appointing Richard Cordray to the new consumer protection bureau [so-called, but hardly accurate] without Senate confirmation. You just can’t do that when the Congress has not recessed. And what is meant by a genuine recess anyway? If we go back to the time of the writing of the Constitution, the Founders never conceived of a Congress that rarely went home. They even inserted a provision that required Congress to meet at least once each year because they were concerned about the president trying to rule by himself.

Well, their fears were well founded.

For the Founders, a recess undoubtedly meant the many long months in between congressional sessions. Nowadays, Congress only leaves for a week or two here and there; they’ve turned their jobs into fulltime endeavors. Taking advantage of a recess of a few weeks to insert an appointee that the Senate may reject is not in the spirit of the Founders, whether done by Republican or Democrat. Obama has simply taken it to a new level, ignoring the need for a recess before making an appointment. He concluded, apparently by his royal prerogative, that since Congress wasn’t doing much right now, he could declare it in recess.

He has little use for that old, outdated document called the Constitution. I mean, why bother with that when you can just declare yourself the ultimate authority?

But don’t worry, he’s doing it for the people:

It’s the refrain used by all dictators.

So will the media watchdogs call him on this? Aren’t they seekers of truth? What about the general public? Don’t they want truth and fidelity to the rule of law to be the hallmark of our republic?

Or are they satisfied with something less . . .  and far more selfish?

We now have another example of how President Obama will govern if he wins reelection and has to deal with a completely Republican Congress—he will simply ignore Congress and do what he wants. Why do I say that? Have you heard what he did this week?

A new agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, was created by Congress despite the opposition of most Republicans. Obama nominated Richard Cordray to be the head of the agency. The Senate has to confirm such appointments, as cited in the Constitution. Republicans, though, are concerned that this agency will become an arm of big government to lash out at businesses. Certainly the Obama administration has a history of doing so. Republicans wanted assurances that this new bureaucracy can be kept in check, so they have not yet confirmed Cordray.

The president decided he was tired of waiting and simply placed Cordray in the position, saying that Congress is in recess, so he has the authority to do so. The only problem is that Congress is not in recess. He has merely declared it to be and has acted accordingly.

This is blatantly unconstitutional.

Using unconstitutional means to achieve his goals is not something new to him, but this act of indifference to the rule of law is more obvious than most. Yet he believes he will get away with it, and he’s probably correct in that assessment. Most Americans know so little of constitutional limitations that they won’t think twice about it. Further, he can score political points by saying he is the one trying to protect consumers, while Republicans are siding with big business.

Never mind the truth, just demogogue.

He’s betting this type of inexcusable bravado will be the ticket to a second term. His strategy is clear:

How many will he fool this time?

A voice from the American past has a message for us today. His name was James Garfield, who was elected president in 1880. Four years earlier, on the centennial anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Congressman Garfield—who also was an ordained Disciples of Christ minister—offered this sage insight in a speech commemorating American independence:

Now more than ever before, the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless, and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness, and corruption. If it be intelligent, brave, and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature. …

If the next centennial does not find us a great nation … it will be because those who represent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation do not aid in controlling the political forces.

In short, the Congress, and the government as a whole, are, in the words of a common cliché, merely a reflection of the people who put them in power. If our current Congress is corrupt, we have only ourselves to blame. If the presidency has been debased by class-warfare ideology, again we have to point the finger at ourselves.

Will we learn our lesson after what we have endured the past three years? The 2010 congressional elections show some promise that we have, but we’ll have to wait until November 2012 to know for sure.

The Founders set up three co-equal branches of government. They presumed the initiative would rest with the legislative branch, which would determine the laws. The executive branch’s duty was primarily to carry out those laws. Throughout our early history, most of the presidents recognized that distinction; rarely did one come to the office with a broad agenda. That doesn’t mean we didn’t have forceful presidents at times. Washington, just by his stature, brought stability to the new nation. Jackson sought to impose his will in a number of ways, so much so that a rival political party arose, the Whigs, that had as its unifying feature the unseating of “King Andrew.”

Yet someone like Jackson was the exception. It wasn’t until Theodore Roosevelt that we had anyone pushing a number of specific programs from the start. He was then dwarfed by Woodrow Wilson, who in turn looked pale compared to FDR, who then gave up his crown as the most active president when LBJ fostered his so-called Great Society.

We have a president currently who is an odd mixture: his agenda is far-reaching; his goal was to transform America as we know it. Yet at times he is strangely silent when it comes to advocating specific solutions. Whenever something is politically radioactive, he steps back and lets Congress take the lead . . . and the blame.

Don’t be confused by this; it’s not respect for the original intent of the Founders. He would be another King Andrew if he could. He’s just very adept at sidestepping anything that might hurt his chances for reelection, and if there’s one thing at which he excels, it is passing the buck. This is not a new strategy for him; he has done it in the past as well, and this is merely a continuation of that master strategy:

In the Illinois Senate, he was known as Senator Present, as he avoided as many controversial votes as possible. As a United States Senator, he spent more time running for president than he did carrying out the duties of his office. Now, as president, he absents himself whenever politically expedient. Frankly, I wish he’d practice the disappearing act more often. It would help us return to the Founders’ vision.

So now it’s official: the Super Committee wasn’t so super after all. Abject failure. No agreement on how to cut the budget by $1.2 trillion, which wasn’t even really a budget cut, but merely a slowing of the growth of the national debt. Democrats on the committee wanted to use it as a way to increase taxes by $1 trillion; Republicans rightly balked at that. Republicans offered cuts along with the closing of some loopholes to increase revenues; Democrats wouldn’t go along. This was destined to fail from the start.

I don’t want to be too hard on the committee; after all, it’s just a microcosm of the entire Congress.

For some odd reason, though, the public still continues to hold Republicans more responsible for the failure than the Democrats, despite the fact that the Republican-dominated House has passed bills with some teeth, only to see them die in the Democrat-dominated Senate—the same Senate that has refused to pass a budget for nearly one thousand days. This is frustrating. It reveals the lack of economic knowledge among the populace. They don’t like deficits, apparently, but don’t understand how to get rid of them. Taxing the rich more doesn’t even dent the problem. In fact, it only hurts economic growth, which is the only way out of the doldrums.

Leon Panetta, Obama’s own Secretary of Defense, has gone to Congress to bemoan the automatic cuts that are now going into effect. Panetta believes they will seriously harm our nation’s defenses. That’s Obama’s Secretary of Defense talking, not some Republican. Yet Obama will never take responsibility for the damage he has done.

His greatest [?] accomplishment has been to add roughly $5 trillion to the national debt in less than three years. I have to admit no other president has been able to match that feat.

His campaign strategy will be to blame Republicans. We’ll have to see just how gullible the electorate is in November 2012. My fear is that stupidity will reign once again, and we will have to suffer through a second term.

The deadline draws near. The so-called Super Committee is supposed to come up with more than a trillion dollars in savings by Wednesday. I never gave this committee much credence since it’s made up of equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans. Stalemate was inevitable.

Democrats on the committee came up with what they thought were dandy ideas for savings. The only problem? They weren’t real.

Republican efforts have been rejected, even though they contained the closing of tax loopholes to increase revenue. There doesn’t seem to be much hope for resolution. Those who are supposed to be wielding the axe do so in vain. If the Super Committee were a Pilgrim and the national debt were a turkey, there would be no Thanksgiving.

So what’s the solution?

Yeah, that should work. It’s the Washington way.

So what else has been happening this week besides presidential politics? Well, there were some other elections. In Ohio, Big Labor outspent the opposition and demagogued so successfully that the voters overturned the legislature’s law that attempted to control the collective bargaining power of government unions. They hail it as a victory. That’s because they think short-term and don’t stop to consider that this vote only worsens the financial situation. The result?

Those same Ohio voters, apparently confused by the concept of having a consistent philosophy of government, then rejected the individual mandate of Obamacare. Well, at least common sense prevailed on that one.

Back in Congress, Attorney General Eric Holder had to testify before a congressional committee about the Fast and Furious debacle. He refused to acknowledge that the plan to allow guns to migrate to the drug cartels led to the murder of a Border Patrol agent. He continues to act as if he’s not really responsible for those who operate under his authority. Does anyone see a pattern here?

Why bother?

Also hard at work was the so-called Super Committee trying to come up with a proposal for deficit reduction that both sides can agree on. Democrats walked out at one point. I can see the media spin on this one now:

Let’s not omit the president from this overview. In Europe for a G-20 summit, he and the French president found something to agree on—they both can’t stand Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The only problem is that the microphones picked up their comments; they didn’t know they could be overheard trashing the Israeli leader. Well, you know, he’s just such a pest!

Of course, he might have some legitimate concerns.