WSJ: Ted Cruz: The Imperial Presidency of Barack Obama

[spursncowboys]

In the nation's history, there is simply no precedent for an American president so wantonly ignoring federal law

When Mr. Obama disagreed with federal immigration laws, he instructed the Justice Department to cease enforcing the laws. He did the same thing with federal welfare law, drug laws and the federal Defense of Marriage Act.
On many of those policy issues, reasonable minds can disagree. Mr. Obama may be right that some of those laws should be changed. But the typical way to voice that policy disagreement, for the preceding 43 presidents, has been to work with Congress to change the law. If the president cannot persuade Congress, then the next step is to take the case to the American people. As President Reagan put it: "If you can't make them see the light, make them feel the heat" of electoral accountability.


The Obama administration has been so brazen in its attempts to expand federal power that the Supreme Court has unanimously rejected the Justice Department's efforts to expand federal power nine times since January 2012.


The law (Obamacare) says that businesses with 50 or more full-time employees will face the employer mandate on Jan. 1, 2014. President Obama changed that, granting a one-year waiver to employers. How did he do so? Not by going to Congress to change the text of the law, but through a blog post by an assistant secretary at Treasury announcing the change.


The law says that only Americans who have access to state-run exchanges will be subject to employer penalties and may obtain ObamaCare premium subsidies. This was done to entice the states to create exchanges. But, when 34 states decided not to establish state-run exchanges, the Obama administration announced that the statutory words "established by State" would also mean "established by the federal government."


Most strikingly, when over five million Americans found their health insurance plans canceled because ObamaCare made their plans illegal—despite the president's promise "if you like your plan, you can keep it"—President Obama simply held a news conference where he told private insurance companies to disobey the law and issue plans that ObamaCare regulated out of existence.


In the more than two centuries of our nation's history, there is simply no precedent for the White House wantonly ignoring federal law and asking private companies to do the same. As my colleague Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa asked, "This was the law. How can they change the law?"
Similarly, 11 state attorneys general recently wrote a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius (http://topics.wsj.com/person/S/Kathleen-Sebelius/7804) saying that the continuing changes to ObamaCare are "flatly illegal under federal constitutional and statutory law." The attorneys general correctly observed that "the only way to fix this problem-ridden law is to enact changes lawfully: through Congressional action."

[ChumpDumper]

Ask Ted about the shutdown he started.

[ElNono]

Oh, *now* executive power is bad. When we were talking about the limitless expansion of the executive power when dubya was the head honcho, and we were saying that eventually the presidency would flip and you'll have the same shit, it was all crickets.

I still remember Cobra going with some theory that the executive is the enforcer of the laws and so it has charte-blanque, or some such :lol

[baseline bum]

Why do you hate America, Nono?

[boutons_deux]

TC is a ridiculous laughingstock, and so are the screwy Texans who elected him, and so is his screwy papa.

[FromWayDowntown]

Oh, *now* executive power is bad. When we were talking about the limitless expansion of the executive power when dubya was the head honcho, and we were saying that eventually the presidency would flip and you'll have the same shit, it was all crickets.

I still remember Cobra going with some theory that the executive is the enforcer of the laws and so it has charte-blanque, or some such :lol

Some of that is here, I think: http://www.spurstalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=127861&highlight=signing+statements

[boutons_deux]

http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/40379786?uid=3739920&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21103361232677

Eternally, Fox/Repugs/VRWC are depending the disengagement, ignorance, stupidity of their base and anybody else who would consider voting Repug.

==========

False Comfort & Impossible Promises: Uncertainty, Information Overload & the Unitary Executive

Cynthia R. Farina
(http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=45815)
Cornell Law School

February 4, 2010

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law, Vol. 12, No. 2, 2010 (http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1548014##)

Abstract:

The movement toward President-centered government is one of the most significant trends in modern American history. This trend has been accelerated by unitary executive theory, which provided constitutional and “good government” justifications for what political scientists have been calling the “personal” or “plebiscitary” presidency.

This essay draws on cognitive, social and political psychology to suggest that the extreme cognitive and psychological demands of modern civic life make us particularly susceptible to a political and constitutional ideology organized around a powerful and beneficent leader who champions our interests in the face of internal obstacles and external threats. The essay goes on to assess the representational and managerial claims of unitary executive theory in light of relevant work in election studies, public administration, and related areas. It concludes that the very conditions that make the personal, unitary executive presidency so appealing also ensure that no President can possibly be the leader it promises.

The essay concludes by considering the post-2008 revisionism that characterizes the George W. Bush presidency as a perversion of unitary executive theory. It points out that the Bush presidency not only was recognizably the kind of presidency contemplated by the theory, but also that the theory’s uncomplicated, unconditional certitude - qualities that make it so effective in responding to the cognitive and psychological stress of modern American life - predispose unitary executive Presidents and their followers to extremism.

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1548014

Unitary Executive is of course a conservative theory that directly violates the conservatives'/originalists' beloved Constitution, and apparently the execution of UE powers only applies to Repug Presidents, not Democratic Presidents. :lol

[Winehole23]

perhaps pertinent as well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_federal_executive_orders

http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/executive-orders/disposition.html

[Winehole23]

http://fm.cnbc.com/applications/cnbc.com/resources/files/2014/01/28/executive-orders-over-the-years2.png

[FromWayDowntown]

As I watched the SOTU, I found myself thinking that I'd be fascinated to see Obama press one very minor piece of a Republican legislative agenda just to see if the Republicans in Congress would obstruct its passage or embrace Obama.

[boutons_deux]

House GOP Leaders Declare 4 Areas Where They Can Work With Obama

House Republican leadership said they've identified four areas where they believe they can work with President Barack Obama based on principles he laid out in his State of the Union address this week.

The four areas are: skills training, natural gas, workplace rules and federally-funded research. The Republican leadership points to bills in each area that the House has passed, but either the Senate has not taken up the legislation or the White House has threatened to veto it.

The full letter is below.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/203422707/GOP-SOTU-Letter-to-Obama

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/house-gop-letter-obama-sotu?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+tpm-news+%28TPMNews%29

[boutons_deux]

Ask Ted about the shutdown he started.

Ted Cruz gripes that ‘folks in the media’ still blame him for government shutdown

Freshman Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) chided reporters on Tuesday for continuing to ask him about last fall’s Republican-led shutdown of the federal government. According to Yahoo! News (http://news.yahoo.com/ted-cruz-is-sick-and-tired-of-being-asked-about-the-government-shutdown-222149599.html), the Tea Party favorite is trying to change the subject every time he’s asked about it.

From a risible appearance (http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/01/26/veteran-cbs-host-laughs-in-cruzs-face-after-he-repeatedly-denies-shutting-down-government/) on CBS’ “Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer” last Sunday to a press conference on Tuesday, Cruz appears determined to shift the blame for the disastrous political maneuver on to Democrats and the Obama administration.

“I didn’t threaten to shut down the government the last time. I don’t think we should ever shut down the government. I repeatedly voted to fund the federal government,” Cruz told Schieffer (http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/01/26/veteran-cbs-host-laughs-in-cruzs-face-after-he-repeatedly-denies-shutting-down-government/). “It was Harry Reid and President Obama.”

His remarks on Tuesday (http://news.yahoo.com/ted-cruz-is-sick-and-tired-of-being-asked-about-the-government-shutdown-222149599.html) continued in that vein.

“I understand that there are a lot of folks in the media that love to talk about the shutdown from four months ago,” he said. “What we ought to be talking about is the fact that we have the lowest labor force participating in 30 years since 1978, that Obamacare has taken away more than 5 million people’s health insurance plans, that people are hurting, that income inequality has increased under the Obama agenda and that there is an abuse of power and lawlessness.”

“So that’s what we ought to be talking about. Efforts that distract from that conversation, I think, are deliberate efforts of smoke and mirrors distracting from the questions coming from the American people,” he insisted.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/01/29/ted-cruz-gripes-that-folks-in-the-media-still-blame-him-for-government-shutdown/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheRawStory+%28The+Raw+Story% 29

[spursncowboys]

Oh, *now* executive power is bad. When we were talking about the limitless expansion of the executive power when dubya was the head honcho, and we were saying that eventually the presidency would flip and you'll have the same shit, it was all crickets.

I still remember Cobra going with some theory that the executive is the enforcer of the laws and so it has charte-blanque, or some such :lol


From the article:

But this should not be a partisan issue. In time, the country will have another president from another party. For all those who are silent now: What would they think of a Republican president who announced that he was going to ignore the law, or unilaterally change the law? Imagine a future president setting aside environmental laws, or tax laws, or labor laws, or tort laws with which he or she disagreed.

[spursncowboys]

http://fm.cnbc.com/applications/cnbc.com/resources/files/2014/01/28/executive-orders-over-the-years2.png

I'm not understanding what your chart, or executive orders for that matter, have to do with the article.

[Th'Pusher]

I'm not understanding what your chart, or executive orders for that matter, have to do with the article.

Really? Some of you never cease to amaze...

[boutons_deux]

Really? Some of you never cease to amaze...

yep, but they're a source of never-ending entertainment

[spursncowboys]

Really? Some of you never cease to amaze...
:(

[ElNono]

From the article:

But this should not be a partisan issue. In time, the country will have another president from another party. For all those who are silent now: What would they think of a Republican president who announced that he was going to ignore the law, or unilaterally change the law? Imagine a future president setting aside environmental laws, or tax laws, or labor laws, or tort laws with which he or she disagreed.


I don't disagree with what he's saying. Some of us were not silent when the presidency was red or blue. The problem with politicians like him, is that once the presidency switches, they go silent and enjoy the perks.

I also can't take seriously anybody from the legislative flatly stating that "law x is unconstitutional". They're certainly entitled to their opinion, but that role is reserved to the judiciary. I'm sure he also thought the individual mandate was unconstitutional until it wasn't.

[boutons_deux]

WATCH: Jon Meacham Offers The Worst Criticism Of Obama’s Executive Orders

During a Thursday morning appearance on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, former Newsweek editor-in-chief Jon Meacham offered (http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/jon-meacham-executive-order-fdr-lincoln-obama) an incredibly silly criticism of President Obama’s plan to use executive orders to advance his agenda, when he picked two of the worst possible examples to “prove” his point that such a move would be unprecedented.

“We make fun of the executive orders and that is in fact something that — you know, you never really heard Lincoln and FDR say, ‘I’m going to rebuild America on an executive order,” Meacham told hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezkinski. “You know, it’s not something that resonates off the tongue.”

Of course, as Meacham — who won a Pulitzer Prize in 2008 for his biography of Andrew Jackson — should know, this is completely and obviously false. Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued more executive orders than any other president in the 20th century, as this chart from MSNBC’s Maddow Blog (http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/defining-tyranny-down) makes clear (note that President Obama ranks last, with just 168 executive orders throughout his first five years in office).

http://www.msnbc.com/sites/msnbc/files/styles/embedded_image/public/1.29.14.2.jpg?itok=X1brpeha


As for Abraham Lincoln, it doesn’t take a history expert to know that he literally attempted to rebuild a war-torn America via executive orders — including, most famously, the Emancipation Proclamation.

Meacham’s odd attack against President Obama’s promise to use executive orders in precisely the same way his predecessors did — except with lesser frequency — fits neatly with a pattern that has emerged throughout Obama’s time in office. Whether it’s issuing executive orders, or making recess appointments, or nominating judges to fill vacancies on federal courts, or utilizing the NSA, the president’s critics have become alarmingly eager to throw historical precedent out the window in the name of crafting a good political burn.

http://www.nationalmemo.com/watch-jon-meacham-offers-worst-criticism-obamas-executive-orders/

[boutons_deux]

Also:

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/signingstatements.php

[elbamba]

I also can't take seriously anybody from the legislative flatly stating that "law x is unconstitutional". They're certainly entitled to their opinion, but that role is reserved to the judiciary. I'm sure he also thought the individual mandate was unconstitutional until it wasn't.

It would make more sense for him to explain why the law is unconstitutional but then most of his followers would stop paying attention because they might have to think.

[boutons_deux]

Also:

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/signingstatements.php

Q: I’ve searched your website for George W. Bush’s signing statements and only find about 140. The Boston Globe said there were 750. Where are the rest of them?


A: In an article published on April 30, 2006, the Globe wrote that “President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office.”

In a clarification issued May 4, 2006, the Globe note that Bush had not really challenged 750 bills (which would have implied 750 signing statements), but “has claimed the authority to bypass more than 750 statutes, which were provisions contained in about 125 bills.”

not a peep from the Repugs, and my bet is many of them were Repug bills 2001-2006.

[spursncowboys]

It would make more sense for him to explain why the law is unconstitutional but then most of his followers would stop paying attention because they might have to think.
The law =/= The president's actions; which is what the article was about.

[spursncowboys]

I don't disagree with what he's saying. Some of us were not silent when the presidency was red or blue. The problem with politicians like him, is that once the presidency switches, they go silent and enjoy the perks. perhaps. Perhaps not though.


I also can't take seriously anybody from the legislative flatly stating that "law x is unconstitutional". They're certainly entitled to their opinion, but that role is reserved to the judiciary. I'm sure he also thought the individual mandate was unconstitutional until it wasn't.
huh?

[ChumpDumper]

The law =/= The president's actions; which is what the article was about.So what has he actually done that you personally are so angry about?

[boutons_deux]

Q: I’ve searched your website for George W. Bush’s signing statements and only find about 140. The Boston Globe said there were 750. Where are the rest of them?


A: In an article published on April 30, 2006, the Globe wrote that “President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office.”

In a clarification issued May 4, 2006, the Globe note that Bush had not really challenged 750 bills (which would have implied 750 signing statements), but “has claimed the authority to bypass more than 750 statutes, which were provisions contained in about 125 bills.”

not a peep from the Repugs, and my bet is many of them were Repug bills 2001-2006.


Imagine the Repug/Fox/right-wing-hate-media shitstorm if Barry "claimed the authority to disobey more than 100s of laws enacted since he took office." :lol

[boutons_deux]

Imagine the Repug/Fox/right-wing-hate-media shitstorm if Barry "claimed the authority to disobey more than 100s of laws enacted since he took office." :lol

Of course, with Repug full-court-press obstructionism since 2010, Boner's Boyz have blocked nearly everything, proposed totally unpassable bills, so Boner's Congresses are World Champion Do-Nothings

[spursncowboys]

So what has he actually done that you personally are so angry about?
You mean what the article is about? I quoted it.

[ChumpDumper]

You mean what the article is about? I quoted it.

I asked you. Use your words. Tell me what outrages you. Not cruz.

[spursncowboys]

I asked you. Use your words. Tell me what outrages you. Not cruz.
You're assuming I am outraged. Maybe I just thought he brought up some valid points. No one yet has commented towards his points. Maybe bd but I never read his. No offense bd

[ChumpDumper]

You're assuming I am outraged. Maybe I just thought he brought up some valid points. No one yet has commented towards his points. Maybe bd but I never read his. No offense bdoh so you don't care about it at all.

OK

[ElNono]

perhaps. Perhaps not though.

Well, we already know he went silent. He was the Associate Deputy Attorney General in the DOJ during dubya. Did you hear him complaining then? Me neither.


huh?

Teddy is now pulling the "X state prosecutors" card to validate his opinion on policy, just like when he pulled the "X state attorneys" to validate his (incorrect) individual mandate opinion.

He's a JD, so he's fully aware that it's only unconstitutional when the courts say it is. Heck, the SCOTUS is actually set to review the constitutionality of the "recess appointments" policy soon.


It would make more sense for him to explain why the law is unconstitutional but then most of his followers would stop paying attention because they might have to think.

Pretty much. It's the same reason why some of his followers don't understand why he hasn't brought up the articles of impeachment yet.

[Nbadan]

and the federal Defense of Marriage Act.

:lol Arrest them gays and their enablers

[EVAY]

Some of the confusion regarding the number of times that presidents of both parties have interpreted the laws congressed has passed to be able to enforce or not enforce parts or all of them is that Signing Statements are not the same thing as Executive Orders, but both of them put together reflect an executive's attempt
to do what he wants, in spite of or in interpretation of the laws regarding the issue at hand.

I hated when Bush did it; I hate it now. I was honestly surprised at WH's chart. Based on it, BO has about half of the number of executive orders as GB did, and I would have guessed it to be much higher.

the other thing of note from that chart, imo, was that all presidents are doing it pretty routinely, regardless of whether or not the congress is of their same party or not. That really suggests that it may be an administrative interpretation issue more than a partisan 'getting around the idiots in congress' issue.

[boutons_deux]

confusion?

spread widely by right-wing propaganda machine:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/executiveorders.asp

[Winehole23]

TR, Coolidge, FDR and Truman put them all in the shade going by sheer quantity, but it matters what you can get away with too.

[spursncowboys]

ElNono and Winehole23

Still not understanding what Executive Orders have to do with the article or his positions stated in the article. So here is the link of Obama's http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/executive-orders/obama.html

[boutons_deux]

The law =/= The president's actions; which is what the article was about.

What exactly do you KNOW has been illegal, unConsitutional in Obama's Exec Orders or signing statements?

[EVAY]

ElNono and Winehole23

Still not understanding what Executive Orders have to do with the article or his positions stated in the article. So here is the link of Obama's http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/executive-orders/obama.html

If you still fail to understand what Executive Orders have to do with Cruz' complaints, it is unclear to me how anyone can explain it any more fully.

[ElNono]

ElNono and Winehole23

Still not understanding what Executive Orders have to do with the article or his positions stated in the article. So here is the link of Obama's http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/executive-orders/obama.html

You don't? It's pretty clear to me. This is an article ranting about the alleged abuse of Executive Power (and all that encompasses: clout, policy, discretion, orders, etc) in this administration. He isn't wrong, but coming from a guy that didn't say a word when such expansion of power was taking shape while he was part of another administration makes it at the very least pretty hypocritical and largely partisan (despite his claims to the contrary).

[spursncowboys]

You don't? It's pretty clear to me. This is an article ranting about the alleged abuse of Executive Power (and all that encompasses: clout, policy, discretion, orders, etc) in this administration. He isn't wrong, but coming from a guy that didn't say a word when such expansion of power was taking shape while he was part of another administration makes it at the very least pretty hypocritical and largely partisan (despite his claims to the contrary).
What I meant was the focus on Executive Order specifically.

That's a good point. I'm not wanting to be a Cruz cheerleader but don't really see 1. why focusing on Obama's predecessor will do anything; and 2. how he could have any impact on the Bush years for speaking out publicly against abuse of power-except giving someone else a job (his).

[Winehole23]

in the first graf: http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2014/02/rep-paul-ryan-obama-presidency-increasingly-lawless/

[boutons_deux]

in the first graf: http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2014/02/rep-paul-ryan-obama-presidency-increasingly-lawless/

the "lawless n!gg@ President" is the kind in inflammatory, DISHONEST bullshit from Repugs that could inflame some racist, ignorant bubbas to take the law into their own gun-filled hands.

[ElNono]

What I meant was the focus on Executive Order specifically.

That's a good point. I'm not wanting to be a Cruz cheerleader but don't really see 1. why focusing on Obama's predecessor will do anything; and 2. how he could have any impact on the Bush years for speaking out publicly against abuse of power-except giving someone else a job (his).

You're telling me he's right in prioritizing his cushy government job and political career over his principles? I would agree that's what he did, I wouldn't agree it's right. But he's just another opportunist politician, so it's not unexpected, tbh.

And focusing on Barry's predecessor should matter, because the expansion of Executive Power was one of the biggest issues during that administration, and because Teddy was part of that administration, in the DOJ no less.

[ElNono]

I guess if Teddy is named AG in a potential Christie administration, then he will adjust his "principles" of use/abuse of Executive Power so it's no longer a concern. After all, he's done it once, why not do it twice?

[Winehole23]

the "lawless n!gg@ President" is the kind in inflammatory, DISHONEST bullshit from Repugs that could inflame some racist, ignorant bubbas to take the law into their own gun-filled hands.The motif of the President as outlaw hardly originated with the current GOP, but it seems to have made itself at home there now . . . just as it was at home on the progressive left under GWB . . . and on the right under Clinton . . . and on the left under GHWB . . . and Reagan . . . and Ford . . . and Nixon .. and Johnson.

[Th'Pusher]

The Presidency Comes With Executive Power. Deal With It.
Obama's just doing what he's empowered to do
BY ERIC POSNER Share


In his State of the Union address, President Barack Obama vowed to act on his own if Congress did not do its part. Republicans duly took the bait. “We don’t have a monarchy in this country,” said Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana. “The abuse of power by the administration has only become more brazen,” said Senator Ted Cruz.


Obama has unsheathed the sword of executive power, and yet rather than use it to smite his foes, he seems intent on clipping hedges. He says he will raise the minimum wage for a few thousand employees of federal contractors, tinker with the pension system, trim red tape, cajole business leaders to fund pre-kindergarten education, and do something unspecified to help stop gun violence.




Obama begged Congress for help far more often than he vowed to go it alone. Obama’s significant acts of executive power—the Libya intervention, the refusal to defend DOMA before the Supreme Court, non-enforcement of the immigration law against certain groups, climate regulation, NSA surveillance, recess appointments, executive privilege, and so on—lie in the past.


So we have a paradox. In his first term, Obama humbly beseeched Congress for help and sang the virtues of bipartisanship while resorting to unilateral action whenever he needed to. Today, he announces his defiance of Congress yet seems uninterested in using his newly acknowledged executive powers to, for example, shut Guantanamo Bay or raise the debt ceiling on his own.


Be that as it may, it is worth understanding what is at stake in these debates. We all learned in school that the founders feared executive power and so gave policy-making authority to Congress. In fact, the founders feared a too-powerful Congress as well, and they sought to create a strong executive. But the idea that Congress makes law and the president executes it—and any deviation from this pattern is tyranny—is burned into our political culture.


This system of separation of powers was cumbersome from the start. The country did well in its first few decades probably because state governments led the way, and state government structure was far less rigid than federal structure, which finally collapsed with the Civil War. When the communications and transportation revolutions created national markets and new opportunities and threats in foreign relations, it was finally clear that the federal separation-of-powers system could not manage policy at a national level.


The problem was that Congress was an enormously clumsy institution. Its numerous members fiercely advanced their deeply parochial interests. Policies of great importance for one section of the country, or one group of people, could not be embodied in legislation unless logrolling could be arranged, which was slow, difficult, and vulnerable to corruption. As a public, deliberative body, Congress could not react swiftly to changing events, nor act secretly when secrecy was called for.


No one held a constitutional convention to replace the eighteenth-century constitution with a twentieth-century one. Instead, political elites acting through the party system adjusted the government structure on their own. Congress created gigantic regulatory agencies and tasked the president to lead them. Congress also acquiesced as presidents asserted authority over foreign policy. The Supreme Court initially balked at the legislative delegations but eventually was bullied into submission; it hardly ever objected to the president’s dominance over foreign affairs.




This was not a smooth process. The rise of executive power sometimes hurt important interests and always rubbed against the republican sensibilities that Americans inherited from the founders. From time to time, Congress reaped political benefits from thwarting the president. But today Congress reacts rather than leads. It investigates allegations of corruption in the executive branch. It holds hearings to torment executive officials. It certainly doesn’t give the executive the budget he always wants, or pass every new law that he believes that he needs. But existing laws and customs almost always give the president the power he needs to govern. And when they don’t, Congress will sooner or later give him the power he wants. Witness the Dodd-Frank Act and the Affordable Care Act—two massive expansions of executive power.


In monarchies, the official position was that the king made policy but everyone understood that his ministers did. In our system, the official story is that Congress makes policy and the president implements it—such is the inertia of history. But the reality is that the president both makes policy and implements it, subject to vague parameters set down by Congress and to its carping from the sidelines. Presidents can defy the official story and assert the reality if they want. That is what the George W. Bush administration did, to its eventual sorrow. In hindsight, the broad assertions of executive power by Bush administration lawyers in signing statements, executive orders, and secret memos were naïve. They described, with only some exaggeration, the actual workings of the government, but their account conflicted with the official narrative and thus played into the hands of critics, who could invoke tyranny, dictatorship, and that old standby, the “imperial presidency.”


Democratic presidents have been shrewder. Bill Clinton and Obama have been just as muscular in their use of executive power as Ronald Reagan and Bush, but they resisted the temptation to brandish the orb and scepter. Whereas Republican presidents cite their constitutional powers as often as they can, Democratic presidents avoid doing so except as a last resort, preferring instead to rely on statutes, torturing them when necessary to extract the needed interpretation. Thus did Obama’s lawyers claim that the military intervention in Libya did not violate the War Powers Act because the U.S. bombing campaign did not amount to “hostilities” (the word in the statute). A more honest legal theory—one that does not require such a strained interpretation of a word—is that the War Powers Act infringes on the president’s military powers, but a theory like that would have provoked howls of protest.


In most cases, lawyers do not need to resort to such measures because Congress has already granted authority. The president’s power to raise the minimum wage comes from the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act of 1949, which, in typically broad language, permits the president to set contract terms with federal contractors so as to promote “efficiency.” Far from being a bold assertion of executive power, this is the type of humdrum presidential action that takes place every day.


Congress gave the president the power to determine contract terms because Congress did not want to—practically speaking could not—negotiate those terms itself every time the U.S. government entered a contract. This principle explains why Congress gives the executive branch enormous discretion to determine health, education, environmental, and financial policy. Congress directed the financial regulators to implement the Volcker Rule, but it would be entirely up to those regulators to make the rule meaningful or toothless. Nor can Congress block Obama’s decision to effectively implement the Dream Act—which was not passed by Congress—by not enforcing immigration laws against those who would have benefited from the act.


Meanwhile, the founders’ anxieties about executive tyranny have proven erroneous. The president is kept in check by elections, the party system, the press, popular opinion, courts, a political culture that is deeply suspicious of his motives, term limits, and the sheer vastness of the bureaucracy which he can only barely control. He does not always do the right thing, of course, but presidents generally govern from the middle of the political spectrum.


Obama’s assertion of unilateral executive authority is just routine stuff. He follows in the footsteps of his predecessors on a path set out by Congress. And well should he. If you want a functioning government—one that protects citizens from criminals, terrorists, the climatic effects of greenhouse gas emissions, poor health, financial manias, and the like—then you want a government led by the president.


Eric Posner is a professor at the University of Chicago Law School

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116450/obama-use-executive-power-unexceptional

[Th'Pusher]

Dp

[Winehole23]

so good you had to post it twice.

not only did we hear you the first time, that's exactly what GWB said.

[Winehole23]

lol Tory Obama

[Th'Pusher]

so good you had to post it twice.

not only did we hear you the first time, that's exactly what GWB said.

you act like GWB was the first one? Maybe reread your own post #46.

[Th'Pusher]

Congress has ceded power to the executive over time...generally for practical purposes. That's just a fact, regardless o which party resides in the whitehouse.

[Winehole23]

you act like GWB was the first one?lol strawman

[Th'Pusher]

lol strawman

Fine. Doesn't change the fact that congress has ceded power to the executive for decades and generally for practical purposes. Enough with your partisan bullshit...

[Winehole23]

what partisan bullshit? emphasizing the continuity between Obama and Bush? or was it my suggestion that the demonization of US presidents (starting with LBJ and Nixon) by progressive leftists set the table for the contemporaneous food fight?

[Winehole23]

Congress has ceded power to the executive over time...generally for practical purposes. That's just a fact, regardless o which party resides in the whitehouse.It's clear Congress doesn't want responsibility even for clearly enumerated powers like declaring war, and at the moment seems to be obstinately avoiding doing anything at all.

In the nineteenth century the virtues and the flaws of Congressional power became plain, the pendulum has swung more to a strong national leadership by the Executive and Judicial branches. That that's much improved over the bad old days is debatable.

[Winehole23]

the swing has been very dramatic in the last decade or so.

[Th'Pusher]

what partisan bullshit? emphasizing the continuity between Obama and Bush? or was it my suggestion that the demonization of US presidents (starting with LBJ and Nixon) by progressive leftists set the table for the contemporaneous food fight?
The article attempted to address the evolution of the condition since the cival war. Your response emphasizing the recent continuity, while relevant, was banal tbf.

[Winehole23]

well pardon me for deviating from tin hat paranoid and balls out crazy. it's a discussion board. beg pardon for being boring.

[Winehole23]

btw, still waiting for you to give color to your accusation of partisanship, I heard none.

do you have any particulars on that, or did you just say it idly?

[Winehole23]

The article attempted to address the evolution of the condition since the cival war. Your response emphasizing the recent continuity, while relevant, was banal tbf.the Posner repost was a late arrival as well. has anyone else bothered to respond to it? :lol

[FuzzyLumpkins]

After 2AM and wine drunk posting again.

[Winehole23]

you have no idea what I was drinking, Sir.

[TeyshaBlue]

:lol

[Winehole23]

Imperator-in-waiting Ted Cruz to announce tomorrow:


Senator Ted Cruz (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/c/ted_cruz/index.html?inline=nyt-per) intends to declare on Monday that he will run for president in 2016, making him the first major hopeful to formally enter the race, an aide to Mr. Cruz said.


Mr. Cruz, Republican of Texas, will make his announcement at Liberty University in Virginia, where he is expected to be a speaker at a convocation ceremony. His intention to declare his candidacy was first reported by The Houston Chronicle (http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/politics/us/article/Ted-Cruz-to-announce-presidential-bid-Monday-6150894.php?t=ec04aca79dc2a96c75&cmpid=twitter-premium) and an aide to Mr. Cruz, who requested anonymity, confirmed the report on Sunday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/23/us/politics/ted-cruz-to-announce-on-monday-he-plans-to-run-for-president.html?_r=0

[boutons_deux]

Imperator-in-waiting Ted Cruz to announce tomorrow:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/23/us/politics/ted-cruz-to-announce-on-monday-he-plans-to-run-for-president.html?_r=0

Thanks, Texas rednecks and shitkickers!

[CosmicCowboy]

Cruz is an irrelevant footnote to the 2016 election.

I do however enjoy watching boo get so spittle spewing agitated by him.

[boutons_deux]

Cruz is an irrelevant footnote to the 2016 election.

I do however enjoy watching boo get so spittle spewing agitated by him.

Cruz, "doc" Carson, Jimmy Ricky, InSaneTorum, Walker, etc, will drag too-moderate, Wall St-loved JEB to the extreme right, where he must go to win all y'all's tea bagging votes.

[baseline bum]

Nigga isn't allowed to become president under the constitution that the teabaggers want to follow so closely.

[boutons_deux]

Nigga isn't allowed to become president under the constitution that the teabaggers want to follow so closely.

He's a (shit stain of an) American citizen, like Obama, through the US citizenship of his mother.

[baseline bum]

He's an (shit stain of an) American citizen, who, like Obama, through the US citizenship of his mother.

Nigga is born in Canada

[spursncowboys]

I'm voting for him!

[Winehole23]

why, if I may ask? what are the Ted Cruz selling points?

[boutons_deux]

Nigga is born in Canada

... to an American mother, so he's American.

[spursncowboys]

1. He's not a Bush

2. He can defend his views and articulately argue them. This is the biggest thing for me. As a conservative, you have to be able to defend every part of your views against the MSM. Since perception is reality If you cannot communicate well you can't push any views.

3. He's not in anyone's financial pocket yet. Therefore people will fund him because they like the person he portrays himself to be.

4. He went to an Ivy League school, so it'll keep all the conspiracy theories going.

Basically, I pick a long shot, since it never gets to Texas anyways. I wouldn't be upset with Scott Walker. I could live with Paul, Perry, or Huckabee.

What about you?

[Winehole23]

He's not a BushOne of his strongest attributes. Jeb is the obvious choice of the GOP establishment, like Romney and McCain before him.


He's not in anyone's financial pocket yet. Grover Norquist, oil and gas, lawyers, financial sector: https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00033085#fundraising



Basically, I pick a long shot, since it never gets to Texas anyways. I wouldn't be upset with Scott Walker. I could live with Paul, Perry, or Huckabee.

What about you?I'd hate voting for any of those jerks. I don't think any of them would be good presidents.

I'll probably throw my vote away on some principled non-entity, like I usually do. Tempted as I was to vote against Obama, in 2012 I found none to my liking and did not vote for president.

[Winehole23]

He can defend his views and articulately argue them.That's one way to put it. Andrew Ferguson described him this way in the Weekly Standard:


He paused, lost for a moment in thought. “You know,” he said, cocking his head, “I’m convinced that the real divide in American politics isn’t between Republican and Democrat—it’s between the people and the entrenched politicians in Washington, D.C.”


It sounded like an applause line to me. And so, coming from nowhere, did a call to abolish the IRS. He went on in this mode for a while, until, leaning back on a couch in his office with his press secretary a few feet away tapping her BlackBerry, he began to sound as if he was giving a stump speech, and then I realized: He was giving a stump speech. Line after line I had heard him say on C-SPAN or YouTube. He told me the life story of his father, a Cuban immigrant, in precisely the same words he had used in the convention speech. He launched into a tribute to Ronald Reagan that I had first heard last year in his campaign for the Senate. The Margaret Thatcher quote sounded familiar, too.


And it sounded even more familiar a few hours later when Cruz spoke before a meeting of the Kingwood Tea Party, north of Houston. His press secretary and I didn’t applaud in his office when he told us about the real divide in American politics, but they went wild in Kingwood. They nodded knowingly when he talked about what focused the minds of politicians. I paged through my interview notes to find something he might have told me that he wasn’t saying to the Tea Partiers right then, in nearly identical language. I failed.


I’m not complaining. Professional public speakers have no choice but to recycle material. And for the hack, hearing a politician say the same thing multiple times makes note-taking vastly easier. “Disciplined” is a term of art in politics, and generally a compliment. It describes a stubborn, admirable, and often necessary insistence on the part of a politician on talking about only what he wants to talk about, in terms of his choosing. I think Cruz senses that his fluency seems slightly artificial, a little too pat, since he takes care to alter his cadence and punctuate it with “you knows” and “let me tell yas” and those thoughtful pauses that allow him to glance reflectively off to the side and bite his lower lip, before rousing himself to deliver a sentence he has delivered several hundred times.


It doesn’t stop, though. Later we sat together in the back seat of a car driving to another speech. Cruz spoke in personal ways about going to his alma mater, Princeton, but the word clumps from the speeches, the set pieces that he arranges in one sequence or another and seldom departs from, were always within reach. He spoke of his father again. He mentioned the great divide in America, again, and was quoting Margaret Thatcher when I realized he was giving a speech again, except this time at close quarters, only a few feet away, in the back seat of a car. I made a quick calculation of how many vertebrae I would damage if I slipped the lock, opened the door, and did a tuck and roll onto the passing pavement. The answer was: too many. So I contented myself with looking out the window at the Houston exurbs until the speech wound down and I could ask another question, after which the speech resumed and I watched the endless series of tire stores and taco stands and Jiffy Lubes roll by.
In normal life a human being who was as disciplined as Cruz would seem merely creepy. But of course Cruz doesn’t lead a normal life, and nobody, not his detractors or his fans, would have it any other way.


"He was always a good talker,” his mother Eleanor Darragh told me not long agohttp://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/washington-builds-bugaboo_753924.html?page=3

[spursncowboys]

One of his strongest attributes. Jeb is the obvious choice of the GOP establishment, like Romney and McCain before him.

Grover Norquist, oil and gas, lawyers, financial sector: https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00033085#fundraising


I'd hate voting for any of those jerks. I don't think any of them would be good presidents.

I'll probably throw my vote away on some principled non-entity, like I usually do. Tempted as I was to vote against Obama, in 2012 I found none to my liking and did not vote for president.
Oh I'm not silly enough to think he's broke. I have no idea how but I've been getting his texts for years for money.

Do you mean a third party? Would you vote for Warren if she ran?

Did you read that article a week or two ago about how Jeb is going around getting all the big donors to back him? He basically stole all of Perry's guys in Texas.

[baseline bum]

Oh I'm not silly enough to think he's broke. I have no idea how but I've been getting his texts for years for money.

Do you mean a third party? Would you vote for Warren if she ran?

Did you read that article a week or two ago about how Jeb is going around getting all the big donors to back him? He basically stole all of Perry's guys in Texas.

Goodhair is unelectable nationally, so why would donors piss their money away on him?

[Winehole23]

Would you vote for Warren if she ran?I like some of the things Warren stands for, but I'm very far away from being convinced to vote for her. I don't think she'll run against HRC.

[ChumpDumper]

Cruz is hilariously unelectable. He's only slightly less desirable to Democrats as an opponent than Donald Trump. He'd have to base his entire campaign on the politics of identity. I thought Republicans didn't like that.

[Winehole23]

I have no idea how but I've been getting his texts for years for money.I'd hold that against somebody, but each to his own...

[boutons_deux]

Even in Texas, Republicans have warmed to Walker at the expense of Cruz. After trailing Cruz by 25 points among Texas Republicans, Walker now is within a point, according to one recent survey.

Cruz, a champion debater at Princeton University, could shine when Republicans begin monthly debates in August.

Cruz has a lot of goodwill among conservatives. A Quinnipiac University Iowa poll last month found 46 percent of Republicans viewed him favorably and 19 percent unfavorably. And two-thirds of tea party supporters and 55 percent of white evangelicals see him favorably.

Bush is seen unfavorably by 40 percent.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/03/ted-cruz-to-announce-presidential-run-on-monday/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheRawStory+%28The+Raw+Story% 29

[ElNono]

2. He can defend his views and articulately argue them. This is the biggest thing for me. As a conservative, you have to be able to defend every part of your views against the MSM. Since perception is reality If you cannot communicate well you can't push any views.

I actually think the exact opposite. He's a terrible speaker, which is why I don't see him getting very far.

[boutons_deux]

I actually think the exact opposite. He's a terrible speaker, which is why I don't see him getting very far.

he speaks rhetoric, demagoguery, pure bullshit, but tea baggers slurp it down. Krazy Kruz is smart, but he's fucking evil smart.

dubya was laughable "speaker", a youtube mega-hit! I don't think Repugs, esp tea baggers, GAF about speaking ability, just social issues. So if anyone can mumble out the right hot buttons, they're ok with the right-wing rabble, Christian Taleban, gun fellators, old white men

[spursncowboys]

RW3ziXAGgPg
This isn't about his views of it. But he was able to articulate his reasoning and not apologize. That's pretty rare with "conservatives".

[CosmicCowboy]

he speaks rhetoric, demagoguery, pure bullshit

Pot, meet kettle

[ElNono]

Pot, meet kettle

It really is...

[ElNono]

This isn't about his views of it. But he was able to articulate his reasoning and not apologize. That's pretty rare with "conservatives".

:lol he certainly did a good job on hitting all the soundbites: Reagan, flat-tax, abolish IRS, constitutionalist, our ally Israel, communism...

[boutons_deux]

Pot, meet kettle

your butthurt is showing, druggie

[Winehole23]

it's his knee and he needs the meds. too bad there's no medicine that cures you being an asshole.

[TeyshaBlue]

:lol

[boutons_deux]

Five Conspiracy Theories That Ted Cruz Actually Believes (http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/03/23/3637462/five-conspiracy-theories-ted-cruz-actually-believes/)



George Soros leads a global conspiracy to abolish the game of golf.

Communists infiltrated Harvard Law School.

Islamic law threatens the United States.

Obama wanted immigration reform to fail so he can campaign on it in 2016.

George W. Bush led an assault on Texas’ “sovereignty.”


(http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/03/23/3637462/five-conspiracy-theories-ted-cruz-actually-believes/)http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/03/23/3637462/five-conspiracy-theories-ted-cruz-actually-believes/

Thanks, Texas! If you had any fucking brains, you would be embarrassed, ashamed of this shit stain you sent to the Senate.

[CosmicCowboy]

Anyone watch Cruz this morning? i was trapped in the hyperbaric chamber when he came on. Got to hand it to the guy...he is pretty heavy handed on the god and religion stuff but motherfucker can sure give a rousing speech. He spoke for 45 minutes without notes or a teleprompter. VERY impressive delivery.

[boutons_deux]

Krazy Kruz is silver-throated, Christian supremacist demagogue.

anti-woman, LGBT-hating, anti-science, anti-knowledge, he's fucking evil. Figures he'd announced a Christian supremacist fake college like Falwell's Liberty.

From being enraptured by his delivery, what would say his government policies would be? Or is "delivery" all you need to vote for him?

[CosmicCowboy]

4 specific policy goals were abolish obamacare, abolish common core, flat tax, and abolish the IRS.

I give him 0% chance of accomplishing any of them.

[boutons_deux]

4 specific policy goals were abolish obamacare, abolish common core, flat tax, and abolish the IRS.

I give him 0% chance of accomplishing any of them.

All he will accomplish is masturbating his ego while pocketing $10Ms in campaign loot.

[Spurminator]

He spoke for 45 minutes without notes or a teleprompter. VERY impressive delivery.

What's the big deal about teleprompters anyway? It's not like Cruz was giving an extemporaneous speech. It was painstakingly prepared and ghostwritten just like every other political speech.

All this means is he took more time to memorize. That's actually less natural than giving a speech with a teleprompter reminding you what to say. This is a virtue? Business leaders, church leaders and all varieties of public speakers use prompters and notes when giving speeches. It wasn't a bad thing until it became a lazy partisan talking point on a slow news day.

[boutons_deux]

yeah, lots of President, other use teleprompters. Obama trashed for using teleprompter was a Repug/Fox fabricated outrage. Fucking dubya couldn't speak English

[Spurminator]

Meanwhile, at TedCruz.com for past few hours... Surprised they haven't taken the site down.

http://i.imgur.com/ScXGNc7.png

[Spurminator]

NM, appears he doesn't own that domain.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/03/ted-cruz-trolled-website-owner.html

[CosmicCowboy]

All he will accomplish is masturbating his ego while pocketing $10Ms in campaign loot.

Sounds like Boo without the money.

[boutons_deux]

Texas Sen. Cornyn Won't Back Cruz In 2016 Primary Bid


http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/cornyn-wont-support-cruz-2016?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+tpm-news+%28TPMNews%29

[boutons_deux]

25 Hilarious Twitter Suggestions for Ted Cruz' Campaign Slogan


Here are 25 of the best suggestions under #TedCruzCampaignSlogans. Sure hope Cruz is paying attention.
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted0-1.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted0-1.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted0-1.png)

http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted1-3.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted1-3.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted1-3.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted1a-3.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted1a-3.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted1a-3.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted2-2.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted2-2.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted2-2.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted2a-1.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted2a-1.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted2a-1.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted3-2.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted3-2.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted3-2.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted4-3.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted4-3.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted4-3.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted_5-3.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted_5-3.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted_5-3.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted6-2.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted6-2.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted6-2.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted7-1.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted7-1.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted7-1.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted8-1_biden.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted8-1_biden.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted8-1_biden.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted9-1.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted9-1.png)
Click to enlarge.
(http://www.alternet.org/files/ted9-1.png)
http://cdn.alternet.org/files/styles/large/public/ted10-2.png (http://www.alternet.org/files/ted10-2.png)

http://www.alternet.org/tea-party-and-right/25-hilarious-twitter-suggestions-ted-cruz-campaign-slogan

[boutons_deux]

Endorse This: Casting A Paul Over The Cruz Kickoff

Some of the students at far-right Liberty University apparently weren’t happy about being forced to attend Senator Ted Cruz’s (R-TX) presidential campaign announcement (http://www.nationalmemo.com/texas-republican-senator-ted-cruz-launches-presidential-bid/) — their own preferred candidate is Senator Rand Paul (R-KY).

But they didn’t get mad. Instead, they got even — with some “I Stand With Rand” shirts!

http://www.nationalmemo.com/endorse-this-casting-a-paul-over-the-cruz-kickoff/

Thanks, Texas rednecks, Bible humpers, y'all put up yet another fool for President.

[angrydude]

Five Conspiracy Theories That Ted Cruz Actually Believes (http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/03/23/3637462/five-conspiracy-theories-ted-cruz-actually-believes/)



George Soros leads a global conspiracy to abolish the game of golf.

Communists infiltrated Harvard Law School.

Islamic law threatens the United States.

Obama wanted immigration reform to fail so he can campaign on it in 2016.

George W. Bush led an assault on Texas’ “sovereignty.”


(http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/03/23/3637462/five-conspiracy-theories-ted-cruz-actually-believes/)http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/03/23/3637462/five-conspiracy-theories-ted-cruz-actually-believes/

Thanks, Texas! If you had any fucking brains, you would be embarrassed, ashamed of this shit stain you sent to the Senate.




Those are pretty weak. After #1 they're all just rhetoric.

[DMX7]

Meanwhile, at TedCruz.com for past few hours... Surprised they haven't taken the site down.

http://i.imgur.com/ScXGNc7.png

Pretty funny that someone purchased it and then used it for pro Obama messaging.

[angrydude]

The easiest knock on him is his disturbing evangelical side/rhetoric. While not on the Rick Santorum level in public, in private, it gets pretty close.

[boutons_deux]

Those are pretty weak. After #1 they're all just rhetoric.

that's all Krazy Kruz has, rhetoric to rouse the rabble. Who wants to see this actually with political/governmental power?

[boutons_deux]

when you flat deny science, it makes sense to defund it

============

Cruz (http://www.cruz.senate.gov/), who earlier this year called (http://www.cruz.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=2077) for Nasa to refocus its investment on the hard sciences and low-Earth orbit exploration rather than ‘political distractions’ that he labelled as ‘extraneous’ to the agency’s mandate, will chair the panel’s space, science, and competitiveness subcommittee that oversees Nasa. Observers worry that Cruz sees climate science as just such an ‘extraneous’ pursuit and they note that roughly 10% of Nasa’s budget currently funds earth sciences, including monitoring global warming and climate change.

During a Senate Commerce Committee hearing (http://www.commerce.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?p=Hearings&ContentRecord_id=4ccea8c1-af33-4439-ba02-075de42c9946&ContentType_id=14f995b9-dfa5-407a-9d35-56cc7152a7ed&Group_id=b06c39af-e033-4cba-9221-de668ca1978a) on March 15, Cruz asserted that earth science is not a ‘hard science’ and that Nasa has to ‘get back to hard sciences.’

He added that since President Obama entered office, there has been a ‘disproportionate increase’ in funding for Nasa’s earth science programme, which has come at the expense of space exploration as well as planetary science, heliophysics and astrophysics.

He apparently isn’t alone. The new chairman of the appropriations subcommittee that fund Nasa and the NSF, Republican John Culberson, has reportedly recently reiterated that the earth sciences don’t meet his definition of ‘the pure sciences’.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/battle-over-science-funding-gets-fiercer-in-u-s-congress/?WT.mc_id=SA_DD_20150323

[spursncowboys]

:lol he certainly did a good job on hitting all the soundbites: Reagan, flat-tax, abolish IRS, constitutionalist, our ally Israel, communism...
a politician used soundbites? No!...No!...Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo oooooooooooo.

[ElNono]

a politician used soundbites? No!...No!...Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo oooooooooooo.

:lol not meant as criticism, I was actually impressed that he managed to pull all of those in such little time.

[spursncowboys]

:lol not meant as criticism, I was actually impressed that he managed to pull all of those in such little time.
Yeah I doubt they'll do a drinking game with him. Completely wasted after one sentence.

[boutons_deux]

Imagine President Ted Cruz

if you know Mr. Cruz, or are familiar with how government is supposed to work, or with reality in general, you’ll find some of his imaginaries problematic, like abolishing the Internal Revenue Service, sealing the border, or “repealing every word of Obamacare.”

But Mr. Cruz says he is a champion of personal liberty, too, and gay people who love each other are demanding their liberty to marry, just not in a way he finds acceptable.

No data support Mr. Cruz’s claim that insurance premiums are “skyrocketing” under Obamacare.

The rest of the world, of course, is indifferent to one Republican’s oratorical dog whistles. The global climate will keep changing, and causing calamities, with or without the acknowledgment of Mr. Cruz and his fellow climate know-nothings.

the contradictions slip by if you’re not paying attention. America is great but needs to be made great again.

Privacy is sacrosanct, and government should not get between you and your doctor, unless you’re a woman who wants to avoid or end a pregnancy.

Mr. Cruz wants to repeal programs that protect some immigrants from deportation, but he has also said in the past that Republicans need to do better with Hispanic voters or risk extinction as a national party.

His federalist views are incoherent: he wants states to be free to experiment with marijuana legalization (http://takingnote.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/27/ted-cruz-and-jeb-bush-on-pot/), but attacked Mr. Obama for not cracking down on states that do so.

wants voters who sent him to Washington to keep him in Washington, with a promotion, though he says, “The answer will not come from Washington.”

Mr. Cruz, whose oratory captures so many Republican paradoxes and idiocies, especially on immigration and health care, has set a solid baseline for the messy job ahead.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/03/24/opinion/imagine-president-ted-cruz.html?_r=0

Liberty "university"

(ranked by Forbes as the 636th best university in the nation (out of 650), and by U.S. News as No. 80 among “Regional Universities (South) )

guaranteed Krazy Kruz an audience that he can't otherwise draw by fining non-attendees $10, you know, aka "Liberty! Freedom!" denied.

[boutons_deux]

Meet Ted Cruz's Karl Rove: "He Leaves a Path of Destruction"


http://www.motherjones.com/files/imagecache/top-of-content-main/pema.jpg

a controversial Missouri-based political operative (http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/cruz-builds-white-house-team/article/2558888) named Jeff Roe, who is known for his ruthless, bare-knuckled style and who has recently been in the news due to a tragic death.

Following the apparent suicide last month of Missouri state auditor Tom Schweich, who was a Republican gubernatorial candidate, Republican legislators (http://politicmo.com/2015/03/02/mike-parson-schweich-speech/) and party elders (http://www.stltoday.com/news/opinion/columns/tony-messenger/messenger-a-gop-stalwart-calls-for-soul-searching-in-wake/article_45681e7d-65c8-5ca3-b840-859b722ac77b.html) in the state denounced the toxic culture within the state GOP and pointed to it as a cause of Schweich's death. And some cited Roe as a prime purveyor of the political hardball and scorched-earth tactics that have transformed many Missouri elections into mud-drenched campaigns of personal destruction.

Roe's merciless style has been legend in Missouri for over a decade. And now he is poised to practice his brand of political bloodsport against Cruz's 2016 rivals.

Graves' opponents in these campaigns have described their encounters with Graves' staffers as "close to assault" and "evil."

Graves' 2002 challenger, a Democrat named Cathy Rinehart, says she filed a police report after a group of Graves' campaign aides "accosted" her during a parade. (No charges came from her report.)

"It was intimidation, it was very threatening," Rinehart, the Clay County assessor, recalls. "They did it the whole campaign."

One Graves staffer would drop by the assessor's office almost daily, she remembers, to make sure she was there working.

The level of "nastiness" and "intimidation" during the campaign was "very, very, very bad," she says. And she faults Roe for the tone of the campaign.

"Politics ain't beanbag," Roe said after the election.

"I don't think Jeff has changed his tactics at all," Rinehart adds. "He just thinks it's funny, and it's not funny."

"They'll do anything," Broomfield says of Roe and his associates. "There's no limit."

A state appeals court judge later threw out the case for lacking "substantial evidence" of malice, even though Brazil's lawyer had turned up evidence suggesting Roe knew his blog's version of events might not be accurate. What Roe did to him "should be illegal," Brazil says.

Years later, Brazil still detests Roe. "Jeff Roe is a disgusting human being," he says. "He leaves a path of destruction."

An Axiom promotional video brags of Roe's "well-deserved reputation for being ruthless" and notes that his "controversial campaign tactics are the stuff of political legend."

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/03/meet-ted-cruz-karl-rove-jeff-roe

Roe will trash Krazy Kruz's primary opponents ONLY, because KK won't get out of the primary.

[unleashbaynes]

He read something without a teleprompter and we're supposed to be impressed? That's some low standards.

[boutons_deux]

Jon Stewart, of course:

Ted Cruz’s creepy presidential announcement, which took place before a captive audience of Liberty University students, is really putting things in perspective for us all.


“I may owe Mitt Romney an apology,” Jon Stewart said on Monday’s “Daily Show,” after learning that Cruz and his wife actually practiced waving and kissing before the announcement. “Even the Mitt Romneytron 3000 didn’t have to rehearse waving and kissing,” he continued.

If you were wondering why so many of the students in the audience looked bored out of their minds (and why one girl was even wearing a Rand t-shirt): It’s because the conservative Christian university required students to attend the Ted Cruz announcement as part of their weekly convocation. No word on whether the university also required students to text “constitution” to an undisclosed number, as per Cruz’s orders.
“Let me clarify this a little bit:

Students at Liberty University were required to attend a partisan political speech where a small-government conservative who had just promised he would respect privacy rights, told them if they cared about freedom, text your information to a mysterious address that collects your cell phone number for undisclosed purposes,” Stewart said.

http://www.salon.com/2015/03/24/i_may_owe_mitt_romney_an_apology_jon_stewart_mocks _ted_cruzs_absurdly_creepy_presidential_announceme nt/

[Big Empty]

Donald Trump stirring shit up. I saw that he told Faux news that Cruz couldnt be president since he was canadian ha ha

[Big Empty]

I guess atleast Trump thinks hes God

[boutons_deux]

Ted Cruz Vows To 'Stand Happily Together' With Glenn Beck As He Runs For The White House

http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/ted-cruz-vows-stand-happily-together-glenn-beck-he-runs-white-hous

The Krazy Kruz Klown Kar is filling up!

[ChumpDumper]

Anyone watch Cruz this morning? i was trapped in the hyperbaric chamber when he came on. Got to hand it to the guy...he is pretty heavy handed on the god and religion stuff but motherfucker can sure give a rousing speech. He spoke for 45 minutes without notes or a teleprompter. VERY impressive delivery.


What's the big deal about teleprompters anyway? It's not like Cruz was giving an extemporaneous speech. It was painstakingly prepared and ghostwritten just like every other political speech.

All this means is he took more time to memorize. That's actually less natural than giving a speech with a teleprompter reminding you what to say. This is a virtue? Business leaders, church leaders and all varieties of public speakers use prompters and notes when giving speeches. It wasn't a bad thing until it became a lazy partisan talking point on a slow news day.You know who could truly speak extemporaneously for a solid hour?

http://www.corbisimages.com/images/Corbis-U1767796-15.jpg?size=67&uid=454e547f-482d-4108-bcba-4a223fd76582

[boutons_deux]

The seven dumbest things Ted Cruz ever said (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/23/1372776/-The-seven-dumbest-things-Ted-Cruz-ever-said)




We begin with Ted Cruz pontificating on ????? (http://swampland.time.com/2013/09/25/top-10-ted-cruz-quotes/)
I will credit my father, he invented … green eggs and ham. He did it two ways. The easy way was he would put green food coloring in … But if you take spinach and mix it into the eggs, the eggs turn green … I do not like green eggs and ham. I do not like them, Sam I am.

Ted Cruz taking on the internets: (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/11/13/1344716/-After-nonsensical-comments-on-Net-Neutrality-conservatives-rage-against-Ted-Cruz)
"Net Neutrality"is Obamacare for the internet; the internet should not operate at the speed of government.

Teddy C on climate change: (http://www.iflscience.com/space/anti-science-senator-will-oversee-committee-covering-nasa-and-science-funding)
"You always have to be worried about something that is considered a so-called scientific theory that fits every scenario. Climate change, as they have defined it, can never be disproved, because whether it gets hotter or whether it gets colder, whatever happens, they'll say, well, it's changing, so it proves our theory."

Ted Cruz-mo-Dee on the Constitution: (http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/10/11/2770311/craziest-ted-cruz-said-today/)
This is an administration that seems bound and determine to violate every single one of our bill of rights. I don’t know that they have yet violated the Third Amendment, but I expect them to start quartering soldiers in peoples’ homes soon.

Theodore Cruzington III on hate speech: (http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/5-years-after-passage-hate-crimes-law-religious-rights-dire-predictions-still-havent-come-tr)
If you look at other nations that have gone down the road towards gay marriage, that’s the next step of where it gets enforced. It gets enforced against Christian pastors who decline to perform gay marriages, who speak out and preach biblical truths on marriage, that has been defined elsewhere as hate speech, as inconsistent with the enlightened view of government.

Who could forget Gentle Ted's response to the young girl asking "The world is on fire?" (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/16/1371241/-Ted-Cruz-terrifies-a-small-child-His-ideas-should-terrify-us-all)
“The world is on fire,” Cruz replied, turning to face the girl and her mother. “Yes! Your world is on fire!”

And finally: (http://swampland.time.com/2013/09/25/top-10-ted-cruz-quotes/)
Twenty years from now if there is some obscure trivial pursuit question, I am confident I will be the answer.


http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/23/1372776/-The-seven-dumbest-things-Ted-Cruz-ever-said?detail=email#

Short list, they will be 100s of additions

[TeyshaBlue]

Cruze has the moonbat blogs working overtime. :lol

[boutons_deux]

Cruze has the moonbat blogs working overtime. :lol

yeah, shootin a fool in a barrel

[angrydude]

I wonder if boutons thinks he gets paid to shill for the left?

The problem with the "Cruz is crazy" strategy is that he doesn't actually bring any unorthodox ("risky") ideas to the table like Ron Paul, and he isn't going to stick his foot in his mouth again and again like Rick Perry or Sarah Palin.....and the left is going to work overtime to find it but I doubt they find him saying anything racist either.

What they're going to end up saying is Cruz is crazy because he's a conservative.

[angrydude]

I guess you could say he's full of himself. That much seems pretty much true. Doesn't really fit the crazy narrative though. More of the Romney "49% and war on women" narrative.

[Nbadan]

Doesn't really fit the crazy narrative though.

:lol

[boutons_deux]

http://www.truthdig.com/images/made/images/cartoonuploads/sack_1_500_379.jpg

[Winehole23]

Cruze has the moonbat blogs working overtime. :lollikes attract

[boutons_deux]

http://www.truthdig.com/images/made/images/cartoonuploads/sack_1_500_379.jpg

[ElNono]

Abolishing the IRS is not crazy talk?

[boutons_deux]

I wonder if boutons thinks he gets paid to shill for the left?

The problem with the "Cruz is crazy" strategy is that he doesn't actually bring any unorthodox ("risky") ideas to the table like Ron Paul, and he isn't going to stick his foot in his mouth again and again like Rick Perry or Sarah Palin.....and the left is going to work overtime to find it but I doubt they find him saying anything racist either.

What they're going to end up saying is Cruz is crazy because he's a conservative.

I'm not shilling for the left. I'm attacking the crazy, sociopathic right.

Krazy Kruz isn't crazy, because knows exactly how to pander to the craziest of the right wing extremists, how to rouse the govt-hating, gun-fellatin rabble. He knows very well IRS and ACA will never be killed. In spite of all the Repug/ALEX/VRWC obstructionism, attacks for 5 years, ACA is working pretty damn well into a hugely fucked-up-for-profit health care racket.

[Winehole23]

It’s one of the selling points, if you will, to the American people as they decide who is going to follow Barack Obama. I think they’re going to make a rather radical shift away from a young, untested United States senator whose policies have really failed.http://samuel-warde.com/2015/02/ted-cruz-responds-rick-perry-calling-republican-barack-obama-video/

[Nbadan]

..... whose policies have really failed.

Failed :lol

How many straight quarters of growth now after the Bush failed policies...and near dollar meltdown?

[Nbadan]

Ted Cruz To 'Global Warming Alarmists': Galileo Was 'Branded A Denier' Too
Source: TPM


Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) likened himself to Galileo as he defended his position as a climate change denier in an interview Tuesday in New York City with the Texas Tribune.

-snip-

When Root said that "most people say the science is clear," Cruz was ready with a rebuttal. He cited a 1970 Newsweek article that touted "global cooling," a trend that, he said, wasn't supported by data, as support for his belief that we should "follow the science."

"I am the child of two mathematicians and scientists," Cruz said. "I believe in following evidence and data. On the global warming alarmists, anyone who actually points to the evidence that disproves their apocalyptical claims, they don't engage in reasoned debate. What do they do? They scream, 'You're a denier!' They brand you a heretic."

"Today the global warming alarmists are the equivalent of the flat-earthers," Cruz continued. "You know it used to be: 'It is accepted scientific wisdom the Earth is flat.' And this heretic named Galileo was branded a denier."

-snip-

Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-galileo-denier-climate-change

[DarrinS]

Ted Cruz To 'Global Warming Alarmists': Galileo Was 'Branded A Denier' Too
Source: TPM



Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-galileo-denier-climate-change


I don't like Cruz, but he makes a good point here.

[boutons_deux]

I don't like Cruz, but he makes a good point here.

AGW deniers are the flat-earthers.

[Nbadan]

Solved! The Cruz logo...

http://ww2.hdnux.com/photos/35/33/01/7712877/3/920x920.jpg
http://s3.postimg.org/gfcvqaa7n/tedplop.jpg

[boutons_deux]

http://www.truthdig.com/images/made/images/cartoonuploads/Screen_Shot_2015-03-26_at_125003_PM_590_477.png

[boutons_deux]

http://www.truthdig.com/images/made/images/cartoonuploads/hh_3_590_397.jpg

White Repugs vs BLACK MUSLIM

[boutons_deux]

GOP Rep: Cruz Supporters Won't Stop Pestering Me With 'Vulgar' Phone Calls

Rep. Peter King (R-NY) said Friday that supporters of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) had inundated his office with "vulgar, rabid and adolescent-type phone calls" ever since he criticized the presidential candidate earlier this week, the Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/03/27/gop-congressman-ted-cruz-backers-are-making-boorish-phone-calls-to-my-office) reported.

"The puerile language used is what most kids outgrow and move beyond when they reach sophomore year in high school," King wrote in a post on his Facebook page Friday morning. "Clearly, these Cruz supporters suffer from severe cases of arrested development."

King said it was "particularly shameful" that women and interns in his office had been subjected to the callers' "perverse rantings."

He said that Cruz was not responsible for all of his supporters' actions, but added: "Frankly, I can not imagine supporters of Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Lindsey Graham, John Kasich, Marco Rubio, or other candidates reacting so disgracefully."

A spokesman for Cruz declined to comment to the Washington Post.

On Monday, King said that Cruz was more like a "carnival barker" (http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-peter-king-carnival-barker) than the leader of the free world. :lol

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/peter-king-ted-cruz-vulgar-calls?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+tpm-news+%28TPMNews%29

King should call Walker a Kockenstein monster, Graham An Old Lesbian, Rubio a Cuban anchor baby, and see how his phone calls go.

[unleashbaynes]

OK so this guy's clearly a joke. Wonder who the GOP has up their sleeve...

[boutons_deux]

OK so this guy's clearly a joke. Wonder who the GOP has up their sleeve...

Repug primarying will probably come down to Kockenstein vs Jeb. Kock Bros $100Ms vs Wall St's $100Ms, with Jeb winning.

[DarrinS]

Repug primarying will probably come down to Kockenstein vs Jeb. Kock Bros $100Ms vs Wall St's $100Ms, with Jeb winning.

You're going to miss this guy


http://youtu.be/vP7V0hrt1aw

[boutons_deux]

You're going to miss this guy


not nearly as unimpressive as your guy ridiculous Coal Bitch McConnell.

What will be missed is Reid's influence if his successor doesn't have the same. I'm rooting for a real aggressive, progressive like Patty Murray for Dem Senate leader. Schumer is too close to Wall St.

[spursncowboys]

Ted Cruz To 'Global Warming Alarmists': Galileo Was 'Branded A Denier' Too
Source: TPM



Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-galileo-denier-climate-change
I'm guessing you were one who didn't think Obama likened himself to Gandi?
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/03/02/obama_likens_himself_to_gandhi_and_nelson_mandela. html

[ChumpDumper]

I'm guessing you were one who didn't think Obama likened himself to Gandi?
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/03/02/obama_likens_himself_to_gandhi_and_nelson_mandela. htmlMan Republicans will reach for anything.

[boutons_deux]

I'm guessing you were one who didn't think Obama likened himself to Gandi?
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/03/02/obama_likens_himself_to_gandhi_and_nelson_mandela. html


No, I didn't think that, because he didn't say that.

RCP's headline is bullshit misleading, at least it misleads you rightwingnuts.

[boutons_deux]

http://images.dailykos.com/images/60862/large/TedCruzColoring.jpg?1386611682

Ted Cruz says so much that is noxious and unhinged that it's easy to overlook just how deranged he truly is. But this (http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-03-25/ted-cruz-i-had-more-legislation-pass-the-senate-than-all-but-a-handful-of-republicans-) exchange with Fox "News" talking head Megyn Kelly should not get a pass:


"This is what some of your critics point to," said Kelly. "They say, yes, you've led the fight on certain issues, but what have you actually accomplished?"

Cruz reached into his bag of ready answers and insisted that gun safety legislation would have passed after Sandy Hook, if not for him. "Much of Washington was consigned," he insisted. "I did everything I could to energize and mobilize the grassroots, to stand up and protect the Second Amendment, and every single proposal of Barack Obama would undermine the Second Amendment, was voted down on the Senate floor."


The mind reels. But TBogg (http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/03/after-these-kids-were-slaughtered-ted-cruz-was-more-worried-about-protecting-guns/) finds the appropriate words:


His most notable accomplishment, after 26 people — 20 of them small children — were systematically tracked down and butchered, was that he fought to make sure that guns remained cheap, plentiful, and easy to obtain in America?Ted Cruz is a sociopath.

And he wants to be president.


And some people will vote for him because of it.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/26/1373389/-The-fundamental-inhumanity-of-Ted-Cruz?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+dailykos%2Findex+%28Daily+Kos %29

Thanks, TX rednecks, TX gun fellators, TX Christian Taliban!

[boutons_deux]

After Vicious Smear Campaign by Ted Cruz Adviser, Two Missouri GOP Officials Commit Suicide

Yesterday, Spence Jackson, a spokesman for Missouri state auditor Tom Schweich—who committed suicide last month—was found dead (http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/spence-jackson-spokesman-for-the-late-tom-schweich-found-dead/article_81520750-f9cd-560c-8ecd-78163eeed778.html?mobile_touch=true) of “an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.”

The deaths of Jackson and Schweich have sparked outrage in Missouri. In the final days of his life, Schweich was subject to both an overt and covert campaign attacking him personally, including rumors that he was Jewish (he did have Jewish lineage on his grandfather's side but was a practicing Episcopalian) .

In his eulogy for Schweich, former Missouri Senator John Danforth issued a strong rebuke (http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/tom-schweich-eulogy-john-danforth-115702.html) of the campaigns waged against the former state auditor, saying, “Words do hurt. Words can kill. That has been proven right here in our home state.”

In the days leading up to Schweich's suicide, he alleged that the state's GOP chairman, John Hancock, was telling people he was Jewish.

“Until recently, I mistakenly believed that Tom Schweich was Jewish, but it was simply a part of what I believed to be his biography,” Hancock reportedly emailed (http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/state-gop-chair-denies-spreading-rumors-about-schweich-before-suicide/article_bb79ecfb-e8e9-55dd-92d8-6244080503ba.html) to his party's central committee (he did not attend Schweich's funeral). Hancock did not explain why Schweich's faith was relevant.

It wasn't an explanation that Danforth bought. “Someone said this was no different than saying a person is Presbyterian. Here's how to test the credibility of that remark: When was the last time anyone sidled up to you and whispered into your ear that such and such a person is a Presbyterian?”

In addition to a whisper campaign against Schweich's faith, his intended campaign for governor of Missouri made him the target of political rivals who already began hitting him with paid advertisements.

In one radio ad, composed by Ted Cruz adviser Jeff Roe's Axiom Strategies (http://www.politico.com/story/2014/08/2016-elections-ted-cruz-110437.html), he was called a “little bug” and compared to the television character Barney Fife due to his physical build.

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/after-vicious-smear-campaign-ted-cruz-adviser-two-missouri-gop-officials-commit?akid=12956.187590.VMYBYv&rd=1&src=newsletter1034088&t=9

[DMX7]

Cruz's logo is much better than Romney's toothpaste logo.

[boutons_deux]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iJhWoHGB-c

[Winehole23]

Oh, *now* executive power is bad. When we were talking about the limitless expansion of the executive power when dubya was the head honcho, and we were saying that eventually the presidency would flip and you'll have the same shit, it was all crickets.

I still remember Cobra going with some theory that the executive is the enforcer of the laws and so it has charte-blanque, or some such :lol
Now it's good again:


https://apnews.com/25ca8d3b39024f9e828df7ebeb718274