Obama can decide what laws to enforce but Bush could not
Over a week ago President Obama announced a sweeping policy granting temporary amnesty to certain illegal aliens who were brought to America by their parents by wrongly claiming prosecutorial discretion.
Yesterday, after the Supreme Court decision in United States v. Arizona (SB 1070), the president terminated a long-standing program with Arizona that was an illegal immigration enforcement partnership and has decided not to take increased calls from Arizona law enforcement officials concerning illegal immigrants.
But how does Obama’s use of “discretion” square with history?
In a 2007 ruling the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the Environmental Protection Agency in a 5-4 split decision wherein the Court decided the EPA must declare, according to law, carbon dioxide a pollutant and regulate it accordingly. Well, what in the world happened to discretion and executive privilege?
What in the world happened to Obama’s philosophy that the government can decide how, when, where and why to apply investigative and regulatory resources? What happened to Obama’s philosophy that a president can rule by executive order when he has been unable to push his agenda through Congress?
What happened to the philosophy that the president can decide what is and is not fair or important for the American economy as Obama and the left now claim?
In another case according to an article in the New York Times:
Environmentalists are suing U.S. EPA over a rule that aims to regulate greenhouse gases from only the largest industrial sources, arguing that the agency exempts too many big polluters.
The Center for Biological Diversity is joining a number of industry groups in challenging EPA’s “tailoring” rule, which will force large facilities to limit their greenhouse gas emissions starting next January. But while industry groups argue that EPA climate rules will hurt businesses, CBD says the agency is not going far enough.
“We want to make sure that there are some lines in the sand that are drawn and that truly the large industrial sources of greenhouse gases are actually regulated,” CBD senior counsel Bill Snape said. Today marks the legal deadline for opponents to challenge the rule in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
You cannot dispute that “green” organizations in the United States and President Obama are politically left. And the political left over the past couple of years has proclaimed that Obama should use dictatorial powers to sidestep “obstructionist” Republicans in Congress.
Is this current lawsuit a case of leftist green organizations running afoul of their dictator? Is the 2007 Supreme Court decision proof that Obama has run afoul of his responsibilities as president?
I repeat the words of Patrick Henry, “why stand we here idle?”
