We Cannot Be As Forgiving As Obama Was. They Must Face Justice

[skews13]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country. The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses. They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”. And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

No one went to jail.


We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.

 

[Wyatt earp]

Barney Frank was to big to go to prison over not taking action when Bush Jr warned him about Frannie and Freddie



.

 

[Vastator]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country. The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses. They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”. And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

No one went to jail.


We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.

Are you saying Mac, and the milquetoast militia; who are waiting for the dust to settle before they choose sides... Aren’t welcome?

 

[Thinker101]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country. The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses. They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”. And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

No one went to jail.


We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.

How about we start with punishing Obama for his abuse of power?

 

[Third Party]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country. The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses. They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”. And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

No one went to jail.


We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.

You want to send Obama to jail? Why?

 

[Wyatt earp]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country. The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses. They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”. And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

No one went to jail.


We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.

How about we start with punishing Obama for his abuse of power?

When did Obama ever abuse his power?????

Top 10 Ways Obama Violated the Constitution during His Presidency



Obama Only Furthered the Imperial Presidency

He points first to the 2011 Libya intervention. It involved neither a congressional authorization of the use of force, nor compliance with the 1973 War Powers Act, which requires at least congressional notification of troop commitments and affirmative permission after 60 days. Every president since the WPA’s enactment has claimed that it’s an unconstitutional limit on inherent executive authority over military power. Obama instead claimed that hundreds of missile strikes and dozens of air missions didn’t trigger the WPA because they only constituted “kinetic military action” rather than war.

It just doesn’t pass the smell test. Neither does at least some of the National Security Agency’s robust program of domestic surveillance, about which Director of National Intelligence James Clapper has lied to Congress. And then there’s the aggressive posture towards and persecution of journalists. It’s as if the goal was to show Donald Trump how it’s done.

This is all a world away from candidate Obama, who said this on the campaign trail in 2008: “The biggest problems that we’re facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all. And that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m president.” As George Mason law professor David Bernstein quipped, foolish voters thought that Obama was taking issue with the imperial presidency, when really he was only complaining that the wrong man occupied the throne.

How Obama Ignored Constitutional Checks and Balances

Indeed, once he lost the congressional majority that allowed him to sign breathtakingly unconstitutional legislation like Obamacare and Dodd-Frank, Obama began using his pen in other ways. Hearkening to Woodrow Wilson’s progressive view of the administrative state, President Obama steadily took out his frustrations with the checks and balances that inhibited his ability to “fundamentally transform” the country.

A lack of congressional acquiescence didn’t stop this president. Even in Obama’s first term, the administration launched a “We Can’t Wait” initiative, with senior aide Dan Pfeiffer explaining that “when Congress won’t act, this president will.” And when the reelected President Obama announced his second-term economic plans, he said that “I will not allow gridlock, or inaction, or willful indifference to get in our way.”

But no matter how much you hold it up to the light—and no matter what textual penumbras you induce—there’s no “gridlock clause” in the Constitution by which the president’s power increases to the extent Congress doesn’t support him. Indeed, gridlock is a feature of our system, not a bug, meant to check executive abuse and majoritarian populism both.

As we mark another peaceful transfer of power, let’s pause to note the 10 most significant ways in which Barack Obama violated the Constitution, in rough chronological order.

1. The Chrysler Bailout

Building on the Bush administration’s illegal use of TARP funds to bail out the auto industry, the Obama administration in 2009 bullied Chrysler’s secured creditors—who were entitled to “absolute priority”—into accepting 30 cents on the dollar, while junior creditors such as labor unions received much more. This subversion of creditor rights violates not just bankruptcy law, but also the Constitution’s Takings and Due Process Clauses.

This blatant crony capitalism—government-directed industrial policy to help political insiders—discourages investors and generally undermines confidence in American rule of law. The Supreme Court ultimately vacated the Second Circuit ruling that allowed this farce to proceed; Chrysler’s creditors are still out of luck, but there’s no legal precedent.

2. Obamacare Implementation

One can, and many have, written whole articles about how the Affordable Care Act is such an affront to the rule of law that its individual mandate and Medicaid coercion—both of which Chief Justice John Roberts rewrote—are just the tip of the lawless iceberg. On implementation, we can’t blame Congress or courts. Here’s a sample:

• The Labor Department announced in February 2013 that it was delaying for a year the part of the law that limits how much people have to spend on their own insurance. This may have been sensible, but changing a law requires actual legislation.
• Later that year, the administration announced via blogpost on the eve of the July 4holiday that it was delaying the requirement that employers of at least 50 people provide complying insurance or pay a fine. This time it cited statutory authority, but the cited provisions allow the delay of reporting requirements, not the mandate itself.
• The famous pledge that “if you like your plan, you can keep it” backfired when insurers started cancelling millions of plans that didn’t comply with Obamacare. So Obama called a press conference to proclaim that people could continue buying non-complying plans for another year—despite the ACA’s language to the contrary. He then refused to consider a House-passed bill that would’ve made this action legal.
• A little-known part of Obamacare requires congressional staff to get insurance from health exchanges, rather than a taxpayer-funded program. Obama directed the Office of Personnel Management to interpret the law to maintain the generous benefits.
• Obamacare grants tax credits to people whose employers don’t provide coverage if they buy a plan “through an Exchange established by the State”—and then fines employers for each employee receiving such a subsidy. No tax credits are authorized for residents of states where the exchanges are established by the federal government, as an incentive for states to create exchanges themselves. Because so few (16) states did, however, the IRS issued a rule allowing subsidies (and fines) for plans coming from “a State Exchange, regional Exchange, subsidiary Exchange, and federally-facilitated Exchange.” Yes, we can also blame the Supreme Court for upholding this.
• The Department of Health and Human Services granted more than 2,000 waivers to employers seeking relief from Obamacare’s regulations. Nearly 20 percent of them went to gourmet restaurants and other businesses in former Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco district. Nevada, home to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, got a blanket waiver, while GOP-controlled states like Indiana and Louisiana were denied. Beyond political favoritism, such dispensations violate a host of constitutional and administrative law provisions like equal protection and the “intelligible principle” needed for congressional delegation of authority to cabinet agencies.
• HHS also continues paying insurance companies to compensate them for losses caused by Obamacare’s ignorance of basic economics. Alas, Congress never appropriated these funds, so the House of Representatives is suing the administration and won in the district court. Now on appeal, House v. Burwell is stayed until the D.C. Circuit hears from the incoming Trump administration. (Full disclosure: My wife joined the House general counsel’s office last month and is litigating the appeal.)

3. Political Profiling by the IRS

After seeing a rise in the number of applications for tax-exempt status, the IRS in 2010 compiled a “be on the lookout” (“BOLO”) list to

 

[basquebromance]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country. The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses. They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”. And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

No one went to jail.


We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.

who are you supporting against Trump in 2020?

 

[Tijn Von Ingersleben]

Barney Frank was to big to go to prison over not taking action when Bush Jr warned him about Frannie and Freddie



.

That faggot would have loved prison.

 

[toobfreak]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country.

Democrats caused the recession and Republicans tried to stop it

The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses.

They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”

Bill Clinton: "I could have killed" Osama bin Laden - CBS News

And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

ECOMINOES: Frank And Dodd Started The Mortgage Crisis, But Not For The Reason You Think

No one went to jail.

No one went to jail.

We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.

I tried to stop short of saying what an idiot you are because I knew you didn't need any help putting your own foot in your mouth.

 

[Ridgerunner]

In 2008, when Barack Obama was elected president, there were a lot of things wrong with our country. The Bush/Cheney administration had engaged in extremely blatant abuse of power. They had started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives under false pretenses. They had botched the pursuit of Bin Laden, perhaps intentionally in an attempt to extend the “Global War on Terror”. And their domestic policies had exacerbated a real-estate and credit cycle to the point where we ended up in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

No one went to jail.


We cannot be as forgiving as Obama was. They must face justice.

No centrists this time.