OBAMA'S "CZARS"-- Read who they are and realize what they want to do.

[daveman]

Are you under the impression that no one on the list has been confirmed to their position by the Senate?

Obama’s czars (*indicates individuals confirmed by Congress):

Afghanistan czar: Richard Holbrooke
Auto recovery czar: Steve Rattner (resigned); post previously held by Ed Montgomery (resigned)
California water czar: David J. Hayes*
Car czar: Ron Bloom
Domestic violence czar: Lynn Rosenthal
Energy and environment czar: Carol Browner
Government performance czar: Jeffrey Zients
Great Lakes czar: Cameron Davis
Green jobs czar: Van Jones (resigned)
Guantanamo closure czar: Daniel Fried
Information Czar: Vivek Kundra
Iran czar: Dennis Ross
Mideast peace czar: George Mitchell
Pay czar: Kenneth R. Feinberg
Performance czar: Jeffrey Zients
Science czar: John Holdren*
Safe school czar: Kevin Jennings
Stimulus accountability czar: Earl Devaney
Sudan czar: J. Scott Gration
TARP czar: Herb Allison*
Technology czar: Aneesh Chopra*
Terrorism czar: John Brennan
Urban affairs czar: Adolfo Carrion Jr.
Weapons czar: Ashton Carter*
WMD policy czar: Gary Samore
AIDS czar: Jeffrey Crowley
Border czar: Alan Bersin
Climate czar: Todd Stern
Cyber-security czar: Melissa Hathaway; post previously held by Howard Schmidt
Drug czar: Gil Kerlikowske*
Economic czar: Paul Volcker
Faith-based czar: Joshua DuBois
Health czar: Nancy-Ann DeParl
Manufacturing czar: Ron Bloom
Intelligence czar: Dennis Blair*
Regulatory czar: Cass R. Sunstein*
War czar: Douglas Lute
Oil czar: Ray Mabus


Read more: Do Obama’s czars rule America? ‘Oil czar’ Ray Mabus brings total to 38 according to Daily Caller count | The Daily Caller - Breaking News, Opinion, Research, and Entertainment​

Not all of them have.

That's right, not all of them have. Part of the confusion here is that these lists tend to mix up lots of different people who are playing very different roles (which is why I question how well-defined the "czar" term is here).

In the list in the OP, several of those people were confirmed by the Senate (Allison, Blair, Carter, Chopra, Hayes, Holdren, Kerlikowske, Sunstein) or recess-appointed to Senate confirmable positions (Bersin). Others occupy positions created by Congress (Devaney, Kundra) or hold positions whose authority derives directly from Congressional directives (Feinberg). Brennan is the deputy National Security Adviser so you might put him in the previous category or put him in one by himself. Some are on Task Forces that advise the President on a specific issue and their sole purpose is to come up with recommendations to submit to the President (Bloom, Montgomery). Others are special envoys, representatives, or advisers working for the State Department at the pleasure of the President (Fried, Gration, Holbrooke, Mitchell, Ross, Stern). None of these should seem particularly strange.

Others exist in executive branch organizations created by the President (though not necessarily Obama), like the Domestic Policy Council and its subdivisions, or they act as special advisers on certain issues. These are people like Browner, Carrion, Crowley, DuBois, DeParle, Samore--generally they're Assistants or Deputy Assistants to the President charged with managing some implementation activity or executive branch initiative (e.g. fostering faith-based initiatives). The Domestic Policy Council is an equivalent to the National Economic Council (the only difference being that the NEC is dedicated solely to economic issues and the DPC isn't) so people running divisions of that are essentially playing roles analogous to Larry Summers or Jason Furman (or their subordinates) on the NEC side.

This last bit--the executive branch positions, usually created by executive order--is what I assume people are suddenly concerned about (though you'll note that 1. this is a much smaller subset of the czar lists, and 2. this concept is hardly new). But let's zoom in one of those and do a little cast study on Adolfo Carrion, director of the White House Office of Urban Affairs.

The White House Office of Urban Affairs was actually created by Obama through an Executive Order. Carrion reports to Obama and to Melody Barnes, the head of the Domestic Policy Council. Part of their role is to coordinate urban policy so what does that mean? They've established an Urban Policy Working Group that's working with the NEC, DPC, and OMB to review the regional effects of various federal policies; a "Sustainable Communities Initiative" in which they're bringing together HUD, the EPA, and the Department of Transportation to coordinate some of their interrelated work; similar coordinating work on various areas of federal policy affecting low-income children. They're also apparently doing an Urban Tour at the behest of the President in which they're traveling to various cities to "1. Communicate the President’s vision and priorities for Urban and Metropolitan America; and 2. Identify best practices and innovative policy reforms for the Administration."

So are they usurping authority or even engaging in policymaking apart from departments that weren't created by Executive Order? No, they're facilitating and synthesizing and, to some degree, promoting. Their job is essentially to get the right people from the right agencies (HUD, the EPA, whatever) sitting at the same table, talking about a certain priority (for them, of course, that would be urban issues) and potentially bringing suggestions and ideas to the table. All departments are directed in the Executive Order to "cooperate with the Office and provide such information, support, and assistance to the Office as the Director may request, to the extent permitted by law" but it also specifically stresses that this Office can't step on the toes of those other departments ("Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect authority granted by law to a department, agency, or the head thereof"). So the "czar's" power here is to get agencies relevant to the Office's focus--urban policy--at the table and to attempt to engage them in joint initiatives with each other on that policy area. Power has not been transferred to this new Office from those other departments (whose heads have been confirmed by the Senate).

So...screw advise and consent.

 

[LibocalypseNow]

Obama’s czars (*indicates individuals confirmed by Congress):

Afghanistan czar: Richard Holbrooke
Auto recovery czar: Steve Rattner (resigned); post previously held by Ed Montgomery (resigned)
California water czar: David J. Hayes*
Car czar: Ron Bloom
Domestic violence czar: Lynn Rosenthal
Energy and environment czar: Carol Browner
Government performance czar: Jeffrey Zients
Great Lakes czar: Cameron Davis
Green jobs czar: Van Jones (resigned)
Guantanamo closure czar: Daniel Fried
Information Czar: Vivek Kundra
Iran czar: Dennis Ross
Mideast peace czar: George Mitchell
Pay czar: Kenneth R. Feinberg
Performance czar: Jeffrey Zients
Science czar: John Holdren*
Safe school czar: Kevin Jennings
Stimulus accountability czar: Earl Devaney
Sudan czar: J. Scott Gration
TARP czar: Herb Allison*
Technology czar: Aneesh Chopra*
Terrorism czar: John Brennan
Urban affairs czar: Adolfo Carrion Jr.
Weapons czar: Ashton Carter*
WMD policy czar: Gary Samore
AIDS czar: Jeffrey Crowley
Border czar: Alan Bersin
Climate czar: Todd Stern
Cyber-security czar: Melissa Hathaway; post previously held by Howard Schmidt
Drug czar: Gil Kerlikowske*
Economic czar: Paul Volcker
Faith-based czar: Joshua DuBois
Health czar: Nancy-Ann DeParl
Manufacturing czar: Ron Bloom
Intelligence czar: Dennis Blair*
Regulatory czar: Cass R. Sunstein*
War czar: Douglas Lute
Oil czar: Ray Mabus


Read more: Do Obama’s czars rule America? ‘Oil czar’ Ray Mabus brings total to 38 according to Daily Caller count | The Daily Caller - Breaking News, Opinion, Research, and Entertainment​

Not all of them have.

That's right, not all of them have. Part of the confusion here is that these lists tend to mix up lots of different people who are playing very different roles (which is why I question how well-defined the "czar" term is here).

In the list in the OP, several of those people were confirmed by the Senate (Allison, Blair, Carter, Chopra, Hayes, Holdren, Kerlikowske, Sunstein) or recess-appointed to Senate confirmable positions (Bersin). Others occupy positions created by Congress (Devaney, Kundra) or hold positions whose authority derives directly from Congressional directives (Feinberg). Brennan is the deputy National Security Adviser so you might put him in the previous category or put him in one by himself. Some are on Task Forces that advise the President on a specific issue and their sole purpose is to come up with recommendations to submit to the President (Bloom, Montgomery). Others are special envoys, representatives, or advisers working for the State Department at the pleasure of the President (Fried, Gration, Holbrooke, Mitchell, Ross, Stern). None of these should seem particularly strange.

Others exist in executive branch organizations created by the President (though not necessarily Obama), like the Domestic Policy Council and its subdivisions, or they act as special advisers on certain issues. These are people like Browner, Carrion, Crowley, DuBois, DeParle, Samore--generally they're Assistants or Deputy Assistants to the President charged with managing some implementation activity or executive branch initiative (e.g. fostering faith-based initiatives). The Domestic Policy Council is an equivalent to the National Economic Council (the only difference being that the NEC is dedicated solely to economic issues and the DPC isn't) so people running divisions of that are essentially playing roles analogous to Larry Summers or Jason Furman (or their subordinates) on the NEC side.

This last bit--the executive branch positions, usually created by executive order--is what I assume people are suddenly concerned about (though you'll note that 1. this is a much smaller subset of the czar lists, and 2. this concept is hardly new). But let's zoom in one of those and do a little cast study on Adolfo Carrion, director of the White House Office of Urban Affairs.

The White House Office of Urban Affairs was actually created by Obama through an Executive Order. Carrion reports to Obama and to Melody Barnes, the head of the Domestic Policy Council. Part of their role is to coordinate urban policy so what does that mean? They've established an Urban Policy Working Group that's working with the NEC, DPC, and OMB to review the regional effects of various federal policies; a "Sustainable Communities Initiative" in which they're bringing together HUD, the EPA, and the Department of Transportation to coordinate some of their interrelated work; similar coordinating work on various areas of federal policy affecting low-income children. They're also apparently doing an Urban Tour at the behest of the President in which they're traveling to various cities to "1. Communicate the President’s vision and priorities for Urban and Metropolitan America; and 2. Identify best practices and innovative policy reforms for the Administration."

So are they usurping authority or even engaging in policymaking apart from departments that weren't created by Executive Order? No, they're facilitating and synthesizing and, to some degree, promoting. Their job is essentially to get the right people from the right agencies (HUD, the EPA, whatever) sitting at the same table, talking about a certain priority (for them, of course, that would be urban issues) and potentially bringing suggestions and ideas to the table. All departments are directed in the Executive Order to "cooperate with the Office and provide such information, support, and assistance to the Office as the Director may request, to the extent permitted by law" but it also specifically stresses that this Office can't step on the toes of those other departments ("Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect authority granted by law to a department, agency, or the head thereof"). So the "czar's" power here is to get agencies relevant to the Office's focus--urban policy--at the table and to attempt to engage them in joint initiatives with each other on that policy area. Power has not been transferred to this new Office from those other departments (whose heads have been confirmed by the Senate).

So...screw advise and consent.

Holbrooke stands out especially to me. They should have fired him instead of McChrystal. He has done so much damage over there with the Afghan Government. He's a typical dimwitted bureaucrat who has mishandled things badly over there. We are losing Afghanistan and it's because of dimwitted bureaucrats like Holbrooke. He has to go if we plan on making any gains over there.

 

[American_Jihad]

Land of the Czar's_________WTF

A lot of husband and wife teams working for BO white house all commies...

Samantha Power married to Cass Sunstein

Not Kidding: Obama Has New ‘Atrocities Czar’​

4/25/12 by Aaron Klein

Look what's on Samantha Power's to-do list

President Obama’s National Security Adviser Samantha Power will head the new White House Atrocities Prevention Board, which is tasked with formulating a response to war crimes, crimes against humanity and mass atrocities.

Power helped to found a global military doctrine called Responsibility to Protect that was also devised by several controversial characters, including Palestinian legislator Hanan Ashrawi, a staunch denier of the Holocaust who long served as the deputy of late Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat.

Power once suggested investing “literally billions of dollars” in a “mammoth protection force” to intercede in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Notorious left-wing radical Tom Hayden recently wrote Power sees war as an “instrument for achieving her liberal, even radical, values.”

Get Aaron Klein’s “Red Army: The Radical Network that must be defeated to save America” from WND’s Superstore

In his speech at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum on Monday, Obama announced the new Atrocities Prevention Board to be chaired by Power.

The inter-agency group is to meet monthly to determine methods to use in international conflict, including sanctions and civilian as well as military response-team training.

The board’s creation was the culmination of Power’s efforts that last year defined preventing atrocities as a “core national-security interest and a core moral responsibility of the United States.” The official White House statement marked the first time the U.S. government had made such a proclamation.

‘Mammoth protection force’ for Palestinians?

In a 2002 question and answer session with the University of California-Berkeley Institute of International Studies, Power was asked how the U.S. should respond if “one party or another” were “moving toward genocide” in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

She replied: “What we need is a willingness to actually put something on the line in sort of helping the situation. And putting something on the line might mean alienating a domestic constituency of tremendous political and financial import.”

Power was referring to pro-Israel groups using language some would consider anti-Semitic by implying such groups maintain inordinate power in U.S. politics.

She continued, “It may more crucially mean sacrificing – or investing, I think, more than sacrificing – literally billions of dollars not in servicing Israelis’, you know, military but actually in investing in the new state of Palestine, in investing billions of dollars it would probably take also to support, I think, what will have to be a mammoth protection force, not of the old, you know, Srebrenica kind or the Rwanda kind, but a meaningful military presence.”

‘Uses war to achieve radical values’

More:
Not kidding: Obama has new ‘atrocities czar’

 

[Jackson]

One name rang a bell.... Vivek Kundra

Obama's CIO Vivek Kundra Previous Close Employees Arrested for Fraud, Bribery

1. Arrested this morning was Yusuf Acar, who currently is the District of Columbia's acting chief security officer; The second suspect arraigned on bribery charges is Sushil Bansal, CEO and founder of Advanced Integrated Technologies Corp. (AITC), a Washington-based outsourcing vendor that has won a number of contracts from the district's IT department.

2. This is where Vivek Kundra was CEO just one week ago. Bansal is on a H-1B guest worker Visa, previously worked also for D.C. city government and magically started his own company for which he is now indicted for fraud and bribery by the FBI.

3. How can someone on a temporary non-immigrant H-1B Visa start a company in the United States in government and in security?

4. Secondly, how can the Obama administration put someone in a CIO position with these kind of connections and seemingly is promoting offshore outsourcing?

5. How in God's name can the government even promote the offshore outsourcing of government jobs? How can the government not realize the security issues in using offshore outsourcing?

6 How many other government contracts, I.T. security issues do we have these kind of offshore outsourcing agenda, bribes, hand rubbing and so on?

7. This is not the direction you want to take a ever more critical security area, never mind the fraud, bribery and abuses.

Obama's CIO Vivek Kundra Previous Close Employees Arrested for Fraud, Bribery | The Economic Populist


So much for vetting.