Townhall...
Obama’s
2012 Slogan: ‘Can’t Work With Others’
by Debra J.
Saunders
Jan 08,
2012
President
Barack Obama is running for re-election with an unusual pitch: He can’t
work
with others.
He only
gets along with yes men. “I refuse to take ‘no’ for an answer,” Obama
said last
Wednesday of his decision to make a “recess” appointment that placed
Richard
Cordray as head of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The
Constitution, of course, gives the president the power to make
appointments
during Senate recesses. Technically, however, the Senate was in
session. The
imperial president bypassed Senate rules and years of precedent because
he
wouldn’t or couldn’t cut a deal.
Later
Wednesday, the White House announced three more recess appointments for
vacant
seats on the National Labor Relations Board. Obama explained, “When
Congress
refuses to act and, as a result, hurts our economy and puts our people
at risk,
then I have an obligation as president to do what I can without them.”
Obama, a
former constitutional law professor, just kicked the Constitution’s
delicate
balance of powers by using the executive boot to step on the Senate’s
power to
advise and consent.
I
understand the president’s frustration with the system. In December, 53
senators voted in Cordray’s favor, but under Senate rules, 60 votes are
needed
to bring his confirmation to an up-or-down floor vote. (Republican
senators
don’t have a problem with Cordray per se. They used his nomination in
an
attempt to roll back some of the regulatory powers and increase
congressional
oversight of the new consumer bureau, created in the Dodd-Frank law.)
The 60-vote
threshold may not seem fair. But in his 2006 book, “The Audacity of
Hope,”
Obama wrote, “To me, the threat to eliminate the filibuster on judicial
nominations was just one more example of the Republicans changing the
rules in
the middle of the game.” He was angry with Republicans for thinking
about
flouting precedent.
Obama,
however, didn’t seem to mind when Democrats changed the rules during
George W.
Bush’s presidency. On Nov. 16, 2007, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid
announced that the Senate would hold pro forma sessions -- that could
involve
little more than gavel rattling -- during the Thanksgiving holiday “to
prevent
recess appointments.”
According
to the Congressional Research Service, “the Senate pro forma session
practice
appears to have achieved its stated intent: President Bush made no
recess
appointments between the initial pro forma sessions in November 2007
and the
end of his presidency.” Upon Obama’s election, recesses resumed, but in
2010,
the Senate resurrected pro forma sessions.
And now
Reid agrees with Obama aides who say that his pro forma sessions are a
gimmick.
He’s supporting the president’s attempt to undermine Senate power.
In 2010,
two former Bush attorneys wrote an opinion piece in which they urged
Bush to
call the Dems’ bluff on “phony” pro forma sessions. Bush did not
oblige. He may
not have liked the “phony” rules, but he showed respect for the
Senate’s
prerogative.
What would
happen if Obama were to win re-election this year but the GOP won the
Senate?
How would Obama get anything done?
“He’s
poisoning the well,” observed University of California, Berkeley law
professor
and former Bush administration attorney John Yoo. Worse: “This is going
on when
his party is in charge.”
This is how
little Obamaland respects Reid’s Senate. White House communications
director
Dan Pfeiffer wrote on the White House blog Wednesday, “The Senate has
effectively
been in recess for weeks, and is expected to remain in recess for
weeks.” Then
Pfeiffer attacked the pro forma gimmick.
“It was
during one of those pro forma sessions, which they call a gimmick, that
we
passed the two-month extension for the payroll tax holiday,” Don
Stewart,
spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell dryly observed. On
Dec.
23, the Senate gave Obama what he wanted. As a reward, the
administration says
the Senate wasn’t really doing anything.
Republicans
scratch their heads. For years, the chattering classes bemoaned Bush’s
copious
use of executive power. Yet when Obama steps on the Senate, news
reports
describe Obama’s behavior as bold and media-savvy.
The bigger
issue, however, concerns Team Obama’s apparent decision to win
re-election by
playing to the liberal base, not the American political middle. While
the
administration should be working to heal the economy, the
administration is
busy pointing fingers at bad Republicans.
Tea Party
Express co-founder Sal Russo likened the Obama strategy to Bush guru
Karl
Rove’s strategy to win re-election in 2004 by ginning up the base.
Russo
doesn’t see how it could work for the Democrats this year.
To
independent voters especially, the president’s failure to work with
Congress
doesn’t compute. “Look, you’re president,” Russo said. “Why can’t you
just walk
over to Congress and talk to these guys?”
To the
average Joe, there’s only one standard, noted Russo. “You’ve got to get
the job
done.”
Read this
and other columns at Townhall
|