There are days when I wake up and I feel that I am in an episode of "The Twilight Zone". The past year has felt like I'm living in The Complete Definitive Collection. But just as the Twilight Zone has a few episodes with a twisted sense of humor, I occasionally find news articles that reflect that black humor. Today, I found this article on FoxNews whose title reads, "Obama Administration Tests Constitutional Power After Controversial Appointment". Let that sink in for a moment before continuing.
The article begins (emphasis added):
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce may sue the Obama administration over President Obama's controversial appointment of Richard Cordray to head a controversial consumer financial board, officials from the business group told Fox News on Wednesday after an unprecedented display of executive power that is sure to poison already-strained relations with the GOP.
Chamber spokeswoman Blair Latoff and colleague Bryan Goettel both told Fox News that their understanding is that "we are not ruling it out." However, they said they still "need to understand the specifics of the appointment to determine if a legal challenge is even possible."
The chamber was early in its criticism of the president's move Wednesday to appoint Cordray to chair the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in a move that invites legal challenge but which administration officials say is perfectly within the president's authority to do.
"To say we are disappointed in the move by the president today would be a gross understatement," Chamber President Tom Donohue said in statement. "This controversial appointment is unprecedented, constitutionally questionable, and puts the authority of the director and the validity of the bureau’s work in legal jeopardy. What's more, it ignores repeated calls to reform the bureau by restoring basic checks and balances."
Others are also questioning the validity of the president's move. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who could become the majority leader in 2012, released an ominous statement Wednesday, saying the appointment "lands this nominee in uncertain legal territory, threatens the confirmation process and fundamentally endangers the Congress' role in providing a check on the excesses of the executive branch."
Once again, let those emphasized phrases sink in for a moment. This president has argued that he can detain anyone suspected of terrorism indefinitely. He even signed a bill authorizing him to do so. (Footnote-Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell voted against the amendment that would have banned indefinite detainment of Americans and voted for the NDAA bill that Obama signed into law.) If capturing the suspect is too time-consuming, the president can order the CIA assassinate him. These are only the most recent constitutional violations which are legion for this administration and builds upon the unconstitional actions of past administrations. But this appointment to a consumer financial board is "an unprecedented, constitutionally questionable display of executive power" according to FoxNews and "fundamentally endangers the Congress' role in providing a check on the excesses of the executive branch" according to Senator McConnell who voted for the bill that officially destroys habeus corpus.
Some may not find this dark humor funny. I can understand that. But I gave up hope for liberty in my lifetime months ago. As Murray Rothbard noted:
Any man who is an individualist and a libertarian in this day and age has a difficult row to hoe. He finds himself in a world marked, if not dominated, by folly, fraud, and tyranny. He has, if he is a reflecting man, three possible courses of action open to him: (1) he may retire from the social and political world into his private occupation...(2) he can set about to try to change the world for the better, or at least to formulate and propagate his views with such an ultimate hope in mind; or, (3) he can stay in the world, enjoying himself immensely at this spectacle of folly.
I used to belong to group #2. However, after three years of blogging, studying, and interacting with people after taking the red pill, I'm now in group #3. I'm just enjoying another day in the Twilight Zone.
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