In Part 1 (“Not all presidential executive orders are created equal”), I discussed some specifics in President Obama’s recent executive order, or EO, “The National Defense Resources Preparedness,” and how it is a completely audacious overreach of presidential power, especially enacting peacetime martial law.
Here I will discuss why analysts are wrong for simply overlooking it as a benign order similar to other presidents.
I finished Part 1 by saying, whether in preparation for war (like with Iran) or some other national emergency, the federal government does not have the authority to take over our food and water supply, energy supplies (including oil and natural gas), technology, industry, manufacturing, transportation, health-care facilities, etc.
And taking the additional preliminary steps for enacting martial law even during a time of peace is an unprecedented and reckless abuse of executive power. As Alex Jones’ Prison Planet explained, “a key addition to the language made by Obama is that all these industries and means of production can be seized “under both emergency and non-emergency conditions.”
This presidential order is another sweeping power grab in a long and dangerous legacy of presidential overreaches. Our founders would have absolutely never allowed it, and we shouldn’t, either.
As James Madison, the father of our Bill of Rights, explained, “The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security.”
(It is no surprise that early presidents like Adams, Madison and Monroe issued only one executive order each. In modern times, Clinton issued 364, G.W. Bush 291 and the king of EOs is President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who issued 3,728 executive orders.)
Liberals and progressives are saying that Obama’s recent EO is merely an update of previous presidential orders, specifically “to EO 12919, issued by President Clinton on June 7, 1994, which itself was an amendment to EO 10789, issued in 1958 by President Eisenhower, and which in fact, was later amended by EO 13286, issued in 2003 by George W. Bush.”
Many are even comparing the number of EOs issued by modern presidents as justification for Obama’s recent rash of EOs. But what’s critical with presidential EOs isn’t merely the number of them that each president enacts but the caliber of the power and edicts invested within each.
Not all presidential executive orders are created equal, just as not all punches are the same: Some are jabs and others packed with explosive and crushing power to our rights and republic.
So it is that former President G.W. Bush’s plethora of EOs for his “War on Terror” don’t compare or justify President Obama’s 115 EOs so far. The former’s goal might have been overly imperialistic, but the latter’s goal has been clearly stated from the beginning to “fundamentally transform the United States of America” from within.
Business Insider just sent out this added reminder:
The Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act of 2011, or Trespass Bill, signed into law by Barack Obama on March 9, 2012, “potentially makes peaceable protest anywhere in the U.S. a federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.”The Enemy Expatriation Act, if passed and signed into law, could “let the government strike away citizenship for anyone engaged in hostilities, or supporting hostilities, against the United States. The law itself is rather brief, but in just a few words it warrants the U.S. government to strip nationality status from anyone they identify as a threat.”
If you view President Obama as some benign and benevolent dictator and his “National Defense Resources Preparedness” EO as “routine,” than congratulations: you are drinking the Kool-Aid of this supreme sultan of socialism.
I will give the president credit for this: He has perfected the soft-lob political pitch that turns later into a disastrous fast ball that creams American citizens and our republic. A perfect example is the Congressional Budget Office’s recently released updated figures that reveal how Obamacare will cost twice as much as the original price tag first soft-lobbed at the American public, from $900 billion then to $1.76 trillion between now and 2022.
President Obama’s latest EO, “The National Defense Resources Preparedness,” is one more soft-pitched stepping stone allowing the president to test how far he can push the boundaries of his socialistic-dictatorial agenda.
Mr. President, America is a constitutional republic, not a centralized authoritarian state like Vladimir Putin’s Russia or Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela. Our founders cast a plethora of warnings to any national leader walking in the direction you are.
But since you won’t listen to America’s founders’ wisdom about the limitations of the federal government, then maybe you’ll heed a warning from a super-power global leader about the perils of state supremacy.
In January 2009, in the same month that you took office, Vladimir Putin, former president and now president-elect, explained the warning in this way during his speech at the opening ceremony of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland:
Excessive intervention in economic activity and blind faith in the state’s omnipotence is another possible mistake. True, the state’s increased role in times of crisis is a natural reaction to market setbacks. Instead of streamlining market mechanisms, some are tempted to expand state economic intervention to the greatest possible extent. The concentration of surplus assets in the hands of the state is a negative aspect of anti-crisis measures in virtually every nation. In the 20th century, the Soviet Union made the state’s role absolute. In the long run, this made the Soviet economy totally uncompetitive. This lesson cost us dearly. I am sure nobody wants to see it repeated. Nor should we turn a blind eye to the fact that the spirit of free enterprise, including the principle of personal responsibility of businesspeople, investors and shareholders for their decisions, is being eroded in the last few months. There is no reason to believe that we can achieve better results by shifting responsibility onto the state.
As the adage goes, if we don’t learn from history, we’re doomed to repeat it.
Friends and fellow patriots, like a dog returns to its vomit, so our president is repeating the mistakes of the past, but that doesn’t mean we have to as citizens.
Remember, EOs become law 30 days after being published in the Federal Register if they go unchallenged by Congress. So if you don’t like one or all of them, write or call your representatives and the president today to voice your opinion about the assault on your rights and liberties. You can call the White House at (202)456-1111 or email the president.
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