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Government

Here’s How Obama Is Using Executive Power to Bypass Legislative Process

Feb. 11, 2013 8:20am Billy Hallowell

WASHINGTON (TheBlaze/AP) — This is what “Forward” looks like. Fast forward, even.

President Barack Obama’s campaign slogan is springing to life in a surge of executive directives and agency rule-making that touch many of the affairs of government. They are shaping the cost and quality of health plans, the contents of the school cafeteria, the front lines of future combat, the price of coal. They are the leading edge of Obama’s ambition to take on climate change in ways that may be unachievable in legislation.

Altogether, it’s a kinetic switch from what could have been the watchword of the Obama administration in the closing, politically hypersensitive months of his first term: pause. Whatever the merits of any particular commandment from the president or his agencies, the perception of a government expanding its reach and hitting business with job-killing mandates was sure to set off fireworks before November.

Since Obama’s re-election, regulations giving force and detail to his health care law have gushed out by the hundreds of pages. To some extent this was inevitable: The law is far-reaching and its most consequential deadlines are fast approaching.

President Barack Obama Is Using Executive Power to Bypass Legislative Process | Gun Control, Health Care

US President Barack Obama applauds outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta during an Armed Forces Farewell Tribute in honor of Panetta at Joint Base Myer-Henderson in Arlington, Virginia, February 8, 2013. Panetta will retire once his likely successor, former Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel, is confirmed by the US Senate. Credit: AFP/Getty Images

The rules are much more than fine print, however, and they would have thickened the storm over the health care overhaul if placed on the radar in last year’s presidential campaign. That, after all, was the season when some Republicans put the label “death panel” (one that some have dubbed “over-the-top”) on a board that could force cuts to service providers if Medicare spending ballooned.

The new health law rules provide leeway for insurers to charge smokers thousands of dollars more for coverage. They impose a $63 per-head fee on insurance plans — a charge that probably will be passed on to policyholders — to cushion the cost of covering people with medical problems. There’s a new fee for insurance companies for participating in markets that start signing customers in the fall.

In short, sticker shock.

It’s clear from the varied inventory of previously bottled-up directives that Obama cares about more than “Obamacare.”

“I’m hearing we’re going to see a lot of things moving now,” Hilda Solis told employees in her last day as labor secretary. At the Labor Department, this could include regulations requiring that the nation’s 1.8 million in-home care workers receive minimum-wage and overtime pay.

Tougher limits on soot from smokestacks, diesel trucks and other sources were announced just over a month after the Nov. 6 election. These were foreseen: The administration had tried to stall until the campaign ended but released the proposed rules in June when a judge ordered more haste.

Regulations give teeth and specificity to laws are essential to their functioning even as they create bureaucratic bloat. Congress-skirting executive orders and similar presidential directives are less numerous and generally have less reach than laws. But every president uses them and often tests how far they can go, especially in times of war and other crises.

President Harry Truman signed an executive order in 1952 directing the Commerce Department to take over the steel industry to ensure U.S. troops fighting in Korea were kept supplied with weapons and ammunition. The Supreme Court struck it down.

Other significant actions have stood.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt (Photo Credit: AP)

President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued an order in February 1942 to relocate more than 110,000 Japanese-Americans living on the West Coast to internment camps after Japan’s attack on the Pearl Harbor naval base. Decades later, Congress passed legislation apologizing and providing $20,000 to each person who was interned.

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, President George W. Bush approved a series of executive orders that created an office of homeland security, froze the assets in U.S. banks linked to al-Qaida and other terrorist groups, and authorized the military services to call reserve forces to active duty for as long as two years.

Bush’s most contentious move came in the form of a military order approving the use of the military tribunals to put accused terrorists on trial faster and in greater secrecy than a regular criminal court.

Obama also has wielded considerable power in secret, upsetting the more liberal wing of his own party. He has carried forward Bush’s key anti-terrorism policies and expanded the use of unmanned drone strikes against terrorist targets in Pakistan and Yemen.

When a promised immigration overhaul failed in legislation, Obama went part way there simply by ordering that immigrants brought illegally to the United States as children be exempted from deportation and granted work permits if they apply. So, too, the ban on gays serving openly in the military was repealed before the election, followed now by the order lifting the ban on women serving in combat.

Those measures did not prove especially contentious. Indeed, the step on immigration is thought to have helped Obama in the election. It may be a different story as the administration moves more forcefully across a range of policy fronts that sat quiet in much of his first term.

William Howell, a political science professor at the University of Chicago and the author of “Power Without Persuasion: The Politics of Direct Presidential Action,” isn’t surprised to see commandments coming at a rapid clip.

“In an era of polarized parties and a fragmented Congress, the opportunities to legislate are few and far between,” Howell said. “So presidents have powerful incentive to go it alone. And they do.”

And the political opposition howls.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a possible contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016, said that on the gun-control front in particular, Obama is “abusing his power by imposing his policies via executive fiat instead of allowing them to be debated in Congress.”

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., speaks with The Associated Press in his Capitol Hill office in Washington, Thursday, Feb. 7, 2013. Rubio, a rising star in the GOP, will deliver the Republican response to President Barack Obama s State of the Union address on Tuesday. Credit: AP

The Republican reaction is to be expected, said John Woolley, co-director of the American Presidency Project at the University of California in Santa Barbara.

“For years there has been a growing concern about unchecked executive power,” Woolley said. “It tends to have a partisan content, with contemporary complaints coming from the incumbent president’s opponents.”

The power isn’t limitless, as was demonstrated when Obama issued one of his first executive orders, calling for closing the military prison at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba and trying suspected terrorists housed there in federal courts instead of by special military tribunals. Congress stepped in to prohibit moving any Guantanamo prisoners to the U.S., effectively blocking Obama’s plan to shutter the jail.

Here are some of the more recent actions taken by the president:

-Obama issued presidential memoranda on guns in tandem with his legislative effort to expand background checks and ban assault-type weapons and large capacity magazines. The steps include renewing federal gun research despite a law that has been interpreted as barring such research since 1996. Gun control was off the table in the campaign, as it had been for a decade, but the shooting at a Connecticut elementary school in December changed that overnight.

-The Labor Department approved new rules in January that could help save lives at dangerous mines with a pattern of safety violations. The rules were proposed shortly after an explosion killed 29 men at West Virginia’s Upper Big Branch mine in 2010, deadliest mining accident in 40 years. The rules had been in limbo ever since because of objections from mine operators.

-The government proposed fat, calorie, sugar and sodium limits in almost all food sold in schools, extending federal nutritional controls beyond subsidized lunches to include food sold in school vending machines and a la carte cafeteria lines. The new proposals flow from a 2010 law and are among several sidelined during the campaign.

The law provoked an outcry from conservatives who said the government was empowering itself to squash school bake sales and should not be telling kids what to eat. Updated regulations last year on subsidized school lunches produced a backlash, too, altogether making the government shy of further food regulation until the election passed. The new rules leave school fundraisers clear of federal regulation, alleviating fears of cupcake-crushing edicts at bake sales and the like.

-The Justice Department released an opinion that people with food allergies can be considered to have the rights of disabled people. The finding exposes schools, restaurants and other food-service places to more legal risk if they don’t accommodate patrons with food allergies.

US President Barack Obama speaks during an Armed Forces Farewell Tribute in honor of outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta at Joint Base Myer-Henderson in Arlington, Virginia, February 8, 2013. Panetta will retire once his likely successor, former Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel, is confirmed by the US Senate. Credit: AFP/Getty Images

-The White House said Obama intends to move forward on rules controlling carbon emissions from power plants as a central part of the effort to restrain climate change, which the president rarely talked about after global-warming legislation failed in his first term. With a major climate bill unlikely to get though a divided Congress, Obama is expected to rely on his executive authority to achieve whatever progress he makes on climate change.

The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to complete the first-ever limits on carbon pollution from new coal-fired power plants. The agency also probably will press ahead on rules for existing power plants, despite protests from industry and Republicans that such rules would raise electricity prices and kill off coal, the dominant U.S. energy source. Older coal-fired power plants have been shutting across the country because of low natural gas prices and weaker demand for electricity.

-In December, the government proposed long-delayed rules requiring automakers to install event data recorders, or “black boxes,” in all new cars and light trucks beginning Sept. 1, 2014. Most new cars are already getting them.

-The EPA proposed rules to update water quality guidelines for beaches and control runoff from logging roads.

As well, a new ozone rule probably will be completed this year, which would mean finally moving forward on a smog-control standard sidelined in 2011.

A regulation directing federal contractors to hire more disabled workers is somewhere in the offing at the Labor Department, as are ones to protect workers from lung-damaging silica and reduce the risk of deadly factory explosions from dust produced in the making of chemicals, plastics and metals.

Rules also are overdue on genetically modified salmon, catfish inspection, the definition of gluten-free in labeling and food import inspection. In one of the most closely watched cases, Obama could decide early this year whether to approve the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to Texas.

In CONTROL, Glenn Beck presents a passionate, fact-based case for guns that reveals why gun control isn’t really about controlling guns at all; it’s about controlling us. Find out more HERE.

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Comments (123)

Ghandi was a Republican
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 11:59am
Obama is evil, and there is no other word for it.

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- publicas
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 1:03pm
  2012 Presidential Election by County
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2012_Presidential_Election_by_County.svg
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2012
  
  Now, what is funny is that there were more maps on the wiki page that also showed entitlement payments (welfare of one type or another) by county, and another showing social security ‘disability’, and another for ‘no longer filing’ for unemployment, etc, etc, etc.., Gosh they were all taken down by an wiki admin, several times. The person uploading those other maps that cited ‘ Official U.S. Gov’t. Stats’ was hitting too close to home? The welfare types have mastered the ‘system’ and are electing pols willing to keep the money flowing to them.
  
  Simple fix.
  No ID, NO VOTE!!
  Voting age moved to 27.
  Only employed or retired allowed to vote.
  You lost your job for whatever reason, you don’t vote.
  You find yourself a job, you get to vote again.
  If you take public money of any type (employed or not), other than Social Security for Retirement you do not get to vote. No WIC, no SNAP, no UNEMPLOYMENT, no SSD, no nuthin!!
  IF YOU DO NOT FISCALLY CONTRIBUTE TO SOCIETY, YOU DO NOT VOTE.
  
  “…the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship…”
  This is the Hard Core of Freedom” by Elmer T. Peterson in The Daily Ok
  
  Report this comment
- smv803
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 1:49pm
  The question is, is congress ( with a small “c”) keeping track or are they just going along for the ride? Obama must be the most hated man in America……he is disrespecting the entire nation and no one is doing a thing about it! What will this country look like in three years, ten months and eighteen days from now?
  
  Report this comment
- Sosorryforyou
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 2:52pm
  @PUBLICAS
  
  How completely unConstitutional your little “Simple Fix” is. Haven’t you ever heard of the 15th, 19th, 24th, & 26th Amendments.
  
  Report this comment
- katmom4358
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 3:25pm
  You’re absolutely right! I’ve thought so since before his first so called election
  
  Report this comment
- red_white_blue2
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 3:30pm
  Correct–anyone who thinks its disrespectful to stand by him just because he is the President is an idiot. It means they haven’t taken their heads out of their butts long enough to see the reality of what is going on. I will not comply with Hitler!
  
  Report this comment
- Globe
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 4:18pm
  I have to agree wholeheartedly with the decisions he made on food quality and nutrients in our schools.
  It’s no mistake that we are the fattest, most unhealthy developed nation on the planet, and our children deserve better than growing up to be grossly overweight, sick, prone to an exhaustive list of potential health issues, and ultimately a massive drain on am already crippled healthcare system.
  Allowing fat cat processed food companies to make billions by feeding our kids junk needs to stop.
  I’m constantly shocked by the sheer number of obese people in this country, and the alarming number of obese kids who have nothing more to look forward to than being ridiculed at school, low self esteem and health issues at an early age. I think that the system add it stand right now has been purposely setup this way, processed food companies making billions and then passing along their ruined human rats to papa pharmaceutical company who will bleed every last cent out of their family, then cast them off to one of the worst social medicine systems on the planet. There are much less developed countries with far better healthcare than the USA. We have the #1 most expensive healthcare system on the planet and ranks dead last out of over 12 developed countries in terms of quality of service.
  Without good employer insurance you are dead in this country if you have a serious disease. And employers are cutting back on policies every year. We must think beyond or own situations – ugly fu
  
  Report this comment
- Globe
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 4:30pm
  If parents can’t be trusted to tell their kids what to eat to avoid becoming bloated, slow, sick and with depressing futures, then maybe we do need some help?
  It’s just plain arrogant ignorance to lash back at an effort to help when your kid can’t run to catch a ball without breathing issues. You need to look in the mirror and ask yourself some real tough questions, and contemplate whether you are leading by good example?
  If change can’t happen at home, then it needs to be enacted elsewhere. Out kids deserve bright, healthy, happy futures and that is more important than a parents choice, when those choices are setting our kids and the future of our country up for failure.
  Get responsible with your kids heath and eating habits or be treated like children…. You don’t get to destroy young lives through your own laziness and bad example.
  
  Go ahead and flame me down…. Try to justify that it’s your right to drive your kid straight towards disease, suffering and premature death…because you live in the land of the free. With freedom comes responsibility.
  
  Report this comment
- wisdomgiver
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 4:38pm
  Obama is like a kid in a candy store…a really mean kid.
  
  Report this comment
- UncommonlyCommonSense
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 5:20pm
  @PUBLICAS–That would put us ALL in a fix, to be sure. The SSI is even more ridiculous than the rest. You assume that if one receives SSI, they have never been employed and/or have somehow cheated the system. Not so. I am one of those receiving SSI due to overwhelming health problems resulting from childhood cancer treatments over 45 years ago ( I was 3 1/2 and am turning 50 this year). I have returned to school to to become qualified to work again in a job that will allow for my disabilities and, yes, I do receive Medicaid for myself and my to children as a single mother. I have a history of caring for myself and my children — an am even a better consumer for prescriptions and medical providers than most others I know: If someone else is paying the tab, I feel I am obligated to do all I can to make sure they get their money’s worth!
  
  And, gasp, I still vote for smaller government, constitutional and independent thinkers in government. Too bad they usually never win.
  
  As an aside, when I finally resolved that I needed a disability attorne to collect SSI, he asked me why I had waited so long, because he could see that I probably needed it 10 years sooner. I said, “Because I believe in work!”
  
  Bottom Line: We don’t get to pick who votes based on if we like their politics or not. That’s what makes it America. I still believe in America–I just think it will get much worse before EVERYONE understands what we have to lose — and fix!
  
  Report this comment
- UncommonlyCommonSense
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 5:44pm
  @Globe –
  Well, that’s where you don’t get to choose whether or not you like my politics, again.
  
  School lunches now have a policy of “Less Entre’” and “More Fruits and Vegetables.” Sounds great–until you look at the state of the cooked veggies if you have last lunch or have trouble with irritable bowel and juice and/or raw fruit. If you have first lunch or a work-out in PE, you better bring some kind of protein snack because you will NEVER make it on a silver dollar-sized portion of pasta and mystery meat.
  
  I say we go back to home lunches, what about you? That way, you can put what you want in your kids’ lunches and I can put what I want in my own kids lunches. You don’t bother my kids’ lunch and I won’t bother your kids’ lunch, OK? AND we can keep the Federal Government out of the whole thing because we don’t accept Title 1 money. (Did I mention that I am student-teaching at 49?)
  
  Report this comment
- desertspeaks
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 7:13pm
  executive orders “which are not a power granted by the constitution” that affect those that are not employed by the US government are UNCONSTITUTIONAL and are null and void!
  
  Report this comment
- mastice
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:31pm
  @Globe
  
  Oh wow, where to begin… first and foremost, we (I say we because I am a parent like many here) don’t need a babysitter. Have you ever read the communist manifesto? In it, and I paraphrase, it details how parents are to be removed from the equation and every child is the responsibility of the State (community). The community decides what is best for the child, not the parent. This is what you are proposing… and that is not America. That is not how America is supposed to be. I will raise my child how I see fit, not how you envision my child growing up.
  
  The secondary point is that your “solution”, of government intervention, is one of the root causes of why many parents today are “dependent” on outside help. Many parents today either can not, or will not, fend for themselves because of the increased ease of access to public assistance and government “guidelines” on how to raise your child.
  
  People like you have nearly hammered away the notion that parents can decide what is best for their child… and where has that gotten us? Take a look at the stats on broken homes, divorces, test scores in schools, dropout rates, teen drug usage… or better yet, go to your local mall and just listen to some of the kids talk today. Used to be, you would wash their mouths out with soap… but you can’t even do that anymore without someone like you crying child abuse.
  
  The point is, your intervention policies are the root of these problems.
  
  Report this comment
- MCGIRV
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:49pm
  He’s a Marxist pr#ck!
  
  Report this comment
- Quester55
  Posted on February 12, 2013 at 12:13am
  EVIL? try, ” DEMONIC!, POSSESSED, SOULLESS, ETC……..”!
  DID I LEAVE ANYTHING OUT!
  
  Report this comment
- KJ
  Posted on February 12, 2013 at 9:01am
  You are so right, I was trying to tell people that before he was elected the first time.
  A little research on him easily proves this, yet people still support him. I guess the indoctrination in the school system has worked. A sad day for America.
  
  Report this comment
BehindTheMouth
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 11:54am
I can’t believe that anyone supports this piece of crap!!!!

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- Tickdog
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 1:25pm
  I am with you!!!
  
  Report this comment
- tonypro
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:34pm
  More appropriate title for this article would have been,
  
  ” Ocommie shows what it takes, and how to, become a dictator,”
  
  Report this comment
SidneyDave
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 11:43am
Adolf got rid of (murdered) all his generals that were loyal to Germany and replaced them with generals that were loyal to him. He also turned German citizens against one another to the point they would turn in a neighbor for speaking against Hitler. He also confiscated all firearms, controlled the media, and disregarded German constitutional laws.

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- truthnstuff
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 12:06pm
  Exactly! The POSOTUS is following the script step by step. The Fabian Socialists, on both sides of the isle, figure they will rule and benefit with him. Now is the time for a true party, true to the people, to emerge and rally the freedom loving, if there are enough of us left.
  
  Report this comment
- german_viewer
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 12:12pm
  You’re right. But there is something more Hitler did:
  
  The German Reichstag (Congress) gave him power to rule with executive orders. This provision was meant to be short lived. But the Reichtag forgot about one thing: Hitler could use his executive powers given to him by the Reichstag against it. And so he did. By executive power he postponed all elections indefinitely and and caused the Reichstag cease to exist.
  
  Obama, or any American president, has no power in himself unless given to him by Congress. Congress could stop this charade right away. But they won’t. Congress’ future can be seen in what happened with the Reichstag in Germany between 1933 and 1945.
  
  Report this comment
- The_Jerk
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 12:23pm
  The Treaty of Versailles plowed the field. The rest was pretty much predictable. Inflation, depression, starvation, war.
  
  Report this comment
- Witness1974
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 1:14pm
  Jerk: Our previous contentiousness aside, I would be interested in knowing what you mean here. Can you expand on it?
  
  Report this comment
- Witness1974
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 2:55pm
  Jerk: Sorry. I get your reference now.
  
  Report this comment
Blazer58
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:42am
Perhaps the most disgusting thing about politicians. They will zealously and unquestioningly embrace policies and actions promoted by members of their own political party, and just as zealously question and condemn identical or similar policies and actions promoted by their opposition.

Recently, in fact, questions have been raised about why supporters of Barack Obama do not seem as eager to condemn his war crimes, his lawlessness, his illegal usurpation of power, and his destruction of the Bill of Rights as they did when these actions were perpetrated by George W. Bush. In fact, members of the Nobel Committee, weary of the warmongering Bush-era, so readily swallowed Obama’s con job that they awarded him the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009-an impulsive action that now mocks the deeds and sacrifices of past recipients, and taints the award for future ones.

The elite politicians will continue to lie to you, till we fight back. That is what the gun rights is about.
They have taking constitution and slowly take away your rights. Nobody seems to care, so they continue to remove all your rights. I wish that 100 million people would march on DC to stop this madness.

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- The_Jerk
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:48am
  Half of the people don’t care because half of the people live off of the largess of that government.
  
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- Bjorg
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 2:55pm
  So, clearly those of you who think the left doesn’t critique Obama only listen to FOX. Turn on Democracy Now, Grit TV, or listen to Cornell West any given day. If you don’t hear any critique you must be choosing to be insulated. That said, most of those I read here don’t critique their own either “gurus” either … thus you let Palin, Rove, Limbaugh, O’Reilly, and yes, even Beck, feed you info that is just inaccurate or fear mongering at times, and you swallow the propaganda whole. How is that any different than Obama supporters that do not challenge him?
  
  We all need to be vigilant … left, right, and center.
  
  Report this comment
- usedCZARsalesman
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 6:04pm
  lol BJORG…you point to groups of people that don’t think Obama is LEFTIST ENOUGH! Sure, there are a few hard core Marxists that say “Obama could do more” from time to time, but that’s only because they want to see a leftist driven, totalitarian state NOW…Obama is willing to move slowly for the next year or so before the final power grab.
  
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Letuspray
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:20am
The irreparable damage will be done before Obama’s 2nd term is over. I doubt there will be another election. His agenda is to create massive, forced debt and then collapse our currency when we are all destitute. I assume his Civilian Security Force will arrive then to take our weapons and round us all up.

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- AboveMyPayGrade
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:45am
  LETUSPRAY, WHO will comprise Obama’s Civilian National Security Force which will attempt to disarm us?
  
  By the mere mention of this organization, I’m presuming you believe that Obama will have to disarm the American people with personnel OUTSIDE of the military/National Guard/civilian law-enforcement (I have oft-stated that I believe that Obama would get at best MINIMAL cooperation from those in these bodies in any attempted dictatorial putsch).
  
  Gang members/criminals, you may suggest? Since such an “army” would be comprised of people who by definition would be both undisciplined and undisciplinable, I think Obama would have a VERY hard time getting such a motley crew to be able to act with purpose and cohesion to the fulfillment of a specified end. I don’t think most gang members are going to be willing to put their lives on the line to try to forcibly disarm Americans that they KNOW will shoot back. These guys are motivated by material gain, NOT ideology: there’s NOTHING in it for THEM to die just for Obama’s glorification.
  
  Those in government agencies like TSA, DHS, IRS, EPA, SS, DoE, and such? The vast majority of the workforce of any federal bureaucracy are PAPER PUSHERS (and FEMALE, to boot) who soil themselves at the mere THOUGHT of a gun. This is NOT exactly a promising class of people to be drawing from when you need WARRIORS. Once they start taking fatalities, and they WILL in very short order, I think the vast majority of them immediately quit.
  
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- JRook
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:47am
  “despite a law that has been interpreted as barring such research since 1996″ And how stupid is it that the CDC would be barred from studying gun violence. An executive order to reverse such stupidity should be applauded. And of course the vast majority of the other items are rule making within the federal agencies which is of course what they do. And rule making is always associated with laws that are on the books that provide the agency with such regulatory authority or specific laws that require the establishment of rules on the part of the agency. But nice try in placing them all on the PRESIDENT. Always refreshing to see a “semi-journalist” start with the conclusion or answer an back into the facts and references.
  
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- DAS_MOOCH
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 1:49pm
  GHANDI….it can’t come soon enough!
  
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zoro51
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:15am
IMPEACH IMPEACH IMPEACH IMPEACH IMPEACH IMPEACH.. this self procalimed SOCIALIST DICTATOR is DRUNK wiht power and has RAPED america since the last election.. NO REMOVE THIS RAPIST FROM AMERICA NOW… IMPEACH IMPEACH IMPEACH..NOW

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- The_Jerk
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:24am
  The black mamba is shredding our Constitution with his shyster handlers.
  
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- Cavallo
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 1:06pm
  In what universe do you get the Marxist Senate to convict their Messiah? Impeachment is political suicide without both houses of Congress willing to go along with it.
  
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AboveMyPayGrade
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:06am
What needs to happen in response to Obama’s attempted power grab, and we’ve already seen this trend commence in numerous states’ reaction to Obama’s gun-control vendetta, is simply that the individual states need to make it clear that they will neither abide by nor enforce flagrantly unconstitutional executive orders – and dare Obama to just TRY to enforce them in their states.

In fact, I may be hopelessly naive in believing this, but I believe that the backbone shown by numerous states with the prospect of Obama trying draconian gun-control measures by EO in the wake of Newtown, including open vows of defiance and refusal to partipate in any federally-mandated gun grabs, as the state of Wyoming did, was a major factor in the fact that Obama’s 23 executive orders related to gun control last month were very blather and buncombe. I have little doubt that Obama probably wanted to go a LOT farther than what he did on them, but that some around him, knowing the mood of the country, ordered him to back off.

My contention is that if Obama, or at least his handlers, thought they had sufficient support within the military and the law-enforcement community that they could pass draconian anti-2nd Amendment EO’s and would be able to count on those in these bodies to enforce them if so ordered by Obama, Obama WOULD have included very draconian provisions in those EO’s last month.

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- Letuspray
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 11:28am
  http://www.wnd.com/2013/02/why-is-government-stockpiling-guns-ammo/ Obama recently graduated the first class of his Americorp “soldiers”. These are kids 18-24 who he promised forgiven college loans and a paycheck if they go through his Americorp program, give up working in the private sector, and come to work for the government after graduation.
  
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Jim
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:03am
Question: Am I the only American seeing what is happening to our country? Everyone complains how bad this Nero is doing and yet we continue to let him rule with a rod and staff and this is only allowed for Jesus Christ and God. Are you all insane? When will you wake up and smell Justice and America as it was. This man is turning into a ruler not president and we all take it lying down. I hear the Fox News, Talk Shows and ignore the other left wing media but it is all talk and no action. I do not see this Giant (America) that awakened when Japan invaded Pearl Harbor. Keep you eye on the Vatican now (Petrus Romanus) and see how it relates to the failure of America and how this ruling person (Nero) will change history. Be ready America, we are dying! But look up, for your redemption draweth neigh… keep the faith my brothers and sisters… God Bless everyone of you who truly knows the real King! Hint: is is not your current American ruler for he is preparing for the end of America!

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- Blazer58
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:26am
  They the whole government knows the end of the game is very close to bottom of the ninth. The elite do not care about you or for anybody , anywhere in the world. Just look at history. The first inning started in the early 70′s. The U.S. Reserve System currently makes money on the difference between the nominal value of bills and the cost of its production. Let’s assume that the cost of a 100-dollar note is 10 cents, so the net profit from it will be 99 dollars 90 cents. Neither drug lords nor arms dealers could ever dream of such profits. For 48 years, people have been giving gold, oil, gas, timber and so on for pieces of American paper. That’s what the U.S. Federal Reserve does to the world.”
  
  “In other words, this is what the Americans are doing to the world?” Evil is greed,greed is our government.
  
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- smwk
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:41am
  so, Jim, what do you suggest we do about it??
  
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- DSTSS2010
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 3:06pm
  The America that defeated Germany, Japan and Italy in WWII no longer exists. We now live in Whiney/Welfare/Take Take Take America. Boys are purposely being raised to be Girly-Men.
  
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pookieamos
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:50am
Why can Blaze print the stories but keep Ovomits ugly face from the story ? How I despise having to see that evil man !

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noslave
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:46am
hes more like an emporor nero??he gives the thumb up or down on weather americans can be killed??pretty soon he’ll have arenas were enemys can fight to the death for his and his communist crews entertainment???don’t think we can take 4 more years of this looter??

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servant100
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:41am
That first picture of our ‘Dear Leader” in that aircraft hangar sized auditorium with the ranks upon ranks of marines at dress attention….takes me back to the second Star Wars movie…in which the Emperor lands in his shuttle in the hangar of the Death Star, is met by his minion Darth Vader in front of ranks upon ranks of Storm Troopers… That the Dear Leader is morphing into the Star Wars evil emperor…just as Octavius Morphed into Augustus Caesar the first Roman emperor…is now a substantiating reality.

As with Rome, Caesar was able to transform the consular triumvirate into a lifetime dictatorship through providing free bread and entertainment (circuses) to the subura and thus cowing the majority of both houses of the Roman Republic into absolute submission. He was assassinated by a few remaining senators of the boni (the good men) in an attempt to preserve the republic. Regardless, the roman republic had died already because people had become totally selfish…and not interested in anything other than their own self interest.

It strongly appears that America is repeating the Roman experience almost to the letter. With this understanding, the deathknell of the American Republic form of government appears to be the Nov. 6 election in which our modern subura voted the candidate that would ensure unlimited free food and circuses…

Now the president/emperor is merely clinching the deal by eliminating all opposition…

“Comrades…let us reason togeth

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high school drop out
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:37am
The Prez is’nt doing anything we ca’nt unravel after we dump his **** in 4 years…I only pray we can hold out that long!

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- e7705
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:53am
  Conservatives will never win another election because we are outnumbered. We have reached the tipping point. Also, voter fraud is out of control.
  
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- Witness1974
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 11:55am
  HSDO: It think Obama and the Democratic Congress has already dealt this nation the coup de grace. They have done irrepairable harm to the economy with the health care disaster they passed. The harm done by it alone, which we will see over the next four years, will take decades of sane and diligent governace to overcome–something that virtually no one denies, is in short supply. The conservatives are split along lines that are so stark that I doubt we can put up any meaningful political resistance. In addition, this nation is very weak. We have been fed the poison of progressivism for over one-hundred years now. We can have the largest, Army, Navy, and Air Force in the world, but if we are not thinking clearly what good are they? It looks to me that there is a possibility that they will be used to help us along in our suicidal destruction.
  
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perry1980
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:34am
He Wants to be King
He Acts like a King
He Rules like a King

Its time to take back the Throne

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ginger100
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:26am
fraudulent prezzy

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Depressed_American
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:21am
Congress can Stop this, fairly easily. The House controls the money. CUT THE FUNDING TO ALL THESE UNCONTROLLED AGENCIES AND THE EXECUTIVE ORDERS!!!

The President can issue all the Executive Orders he wants, if Congress doesn’t Fund it, it isn’t going anywhere…….

But they won’t because the Republicans are waiting for their turn to control the Presidency, and then look out. People WILL get tired of Big-Brother and the Democrats WILL loose the Presidency…….

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- paulusmaximus
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:32am
  You still believe in the tooth fairy too? Neither side is moving be cause both are in agreement Your Boy took a dive in the 9th round for the cause!.
  
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- Depressed_American
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:44am
  Sure, I believe in the Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny, Santa Claus…….
  
  Our Government is really SCREWED UP, I can see it….. BUT I still have to keep hope, even if it is fleeting…… To loose hope it to give up on everything that I believe. I still believe in America, the America I grew up with, NOT this version of America…….
  
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- truthnstuff
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 11:55am
  The GOP will not be any help. Rubio has been turned to the establishment side, if he wasn’t there already, and with his RINO proposals will loose. He has been selected just like Romney and McCain, watch him pander more and more. We need true patriots and a true party to lead us out of this destruction.
  
  The simple fact that the POSOTUS is getting away with this tyranny is proof that we have no opposition party.
  
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Sharon Rose
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:13am
Our Senators and Congressmen need to grow a pair !

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- widowofanAirForcevet
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 11:01am
  Everyone is complaining about what congress should do. I, for one, am done with congress. They are all useless and we the people are not helpless. Stop wasting time argueing with people you will never reach. Do not waste one second responding to any of the liberals that try to poke you in the eye every day on forums like this one. Completely ignore then. If they get ZERO response they will go away. We must band together with our like minded neighbors and communities to change things. Washington must realize they work for us; we do not work for them. Groups like Freedomworks are more important than congress at this point. Please join up with every like minded person you can.
  
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dadsrootbeer
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:10am
You mean to say that an industry the government is taking off if going to have drastic price increases and drastic quality decreases. That never happens.

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BlackCrow
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:05am
Tyrant!

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- barber2
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:13am
  Big Brother….now drones ?! Amazing. Welcome to Obama’s “Changing ” America…
  
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geo01
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:00am
.
And WHAT MAKES THIS WORSE . . .
.
Is the American Public has elected SPINELESS POLITICIANS to office.
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IMPEACHMENT is the only thing that will stop this man.
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AND IT WILL HAPPEN…..He truly thinks he can do ANYTHING HE WANTS.
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He WILL screw up and when he does . . . they must act upon his improper actions.
.

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squigs2004
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:44am
This article also fails to mention Obama’s executive order that allows for the full nationalization of every industry, food and water supply of the U.S. should an “emergency” arise.

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- turkey13
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:01am
  “Those in power need checks and restraints lest they come to identify the common good for their own tastes and desires, and their continuation in office as essential to the preservation of the nation.” – - Justice William O. Douglas
  
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- barber2
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:03am
  And with Obama’ executive over-reach and the ” Let’s Have A Revolution ” crowd of anarchists in his camp, have a feeling that ” emergency” is in the works. Think the anti-capitalist OWS camp-in obstructions in Democrat-controlled cities were the Obama radicals’ test wave for a future , more violent , ” emergency.” These guys are clever, devious but also transparent .
  
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- gryffn
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 10:49am
  So we are already Communist.
  
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- sammie77
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 2:33pm
  Can you say MANUFACTURED EMERGENCY? I would’t trust this POS as far as I could throw Moochell (and that ain’t very far!!!) – we’re just on hold until his ‘disaster’ happens and he can declare martial law, taking over everything he doesn’t already have! Our troops need to be ready to stand up and help take this country back. Odumbo, too, declare his loyalty to this country and the constitution -and he’s used it for 4 years to blow his nose on. Our troops will ACTUALLY stand up for we, the people! They don’t like this worthless imposter either!!!
  
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mikem1969
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:41am
We kept telling the liberal progressive morons that they needed to do the research to see what was truly going on instead of believing the propaganda they were being brainwashed with. Very few listened, and of those that did not listen, many of them voted several times each to keep this power hungry POS in power. WE THE PEOPLE MUST STAND TOGETHER IN THE FACE OF THIS TYRANY.

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- e7705
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 9:57am
  There’s nothing we can do. We are outnumbered! Just buy your emergency food, and a gun, if you can, and pray for a miracle.
  
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BWH
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:38am
Obama is proving that he believes the same as Hillary does, as we found out in a speech when she was running for the Senate. “We believe we know how better to spend your money than you do”, and she still won.

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- moreteaplease
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 1:15pm
  It’s like GONZO posted…when people become too ignorant or apathetic, they just let the government run them over and they are content to lay down for it. When your own government stands there and basically tells you that you are too stupid to poor water out of your shoes and you still vote for them- then that is a country that is ripe for the picking.
  
  Most of the Obama voters I have spoken to show a lack of information or willingness to do any in-depth research on their own. They seem content to take whatever the MSM shovels at them as gospel.
  
  I mentioned Agenda 21 to a co-worker a few weeks ago and her response to me was ” What’s that? ”
  
  I find that scary!
  
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SpankDaMonkey
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:37am
.
It’s time for a second Revolution to rid this country of the Free Lunch Slave in Chief and his minions once and for all……

And there are more than a few Republicans that need to go with them…..

I’m thinking we round them up and dump all of them in Afghanistan…….

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Gonzo
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:31am
When a country becomes too apathetic and or ignorant to know what is in it’s best interest, it gets the government it deserves.

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Snowleopard {gallery of cat folks}
Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:29am
Obama is gathering more and more power into the Presidency with each executive order/legislation he is allowed to get away with, thus undermining the authority of Congress (which is his intent), and has all but become a dictator whose every whim is all that matters.

Obama is insane and power-mad, when will people wake up and see what is going on?

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- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:44am
  SNOW, But, its good to be the king.
  
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- termyt
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:46am
  Not even when the secret police are dragging their neighbors out in the middle of the night. They will only wake up when it is their door being knocked down.
  
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- progressiveslayer
  Posted on February 11, 2013 at 8:58am
  Like the Kenyan said upon reelection he’ll be more ‘flexible’ and he’s proving it with each and every power grab the fraud in chief takes.The debt he’s expanding,the police state he’s expanding and the war on our coal industry he’s engaging in will result in tyranny.
  
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