It was bound to happen...

[Professor S]

So instead of arguing what I've presented, you've decided to defend the Administration by pointing out where others have failed. Repeating and magnifying mistakes does not suddenly make them correct decisions nor does it invalidate the document. Even George Washington broke with the Constitution once or twice, but yet it remains.

But lets take your argument at face value, even though I disagree with the premise of it, and point out the differences:

1) Speed. I've never seen so many breaches of constitutional intent (bordering on actual violations) in so fast a time. Even Bush didn't come into office and begin rewriting the founders immediately.

2) Scope. You can argue all you like about the patriot act and whether or not water boarding is torture, but the scope of what Pres. Obama is doing is about 1,000 time greater than what Bush ever did. Bush's accused violations and stretches of constitutional law were very specific, and tended to impact non-citizens and individuals the most. As for specific amendments violated in intent, you can only point to one: the 9th, and even that is a bit murky.

Pres. Obama is rewriting how the Federal government interacts with both business and states on a grand scale, and has trounced. So while tolerated some previous jockeying with constitutional intent, and disagreed with others, it's hard not to see such a difference between the two.

Also, Bush's violations of intent did not directly affect most people or the nature of our country's economic and governmental policy on a micro level. Pres. Obama's violations of intent have, and on a level that will affect everyone.

3) Intent. Pres. Obama has stated publicly and clearly before that he disagrees with the Constitution.

Ignore the biased commentary and concentrate on what he actually says in the first half of the interview. The redistribution part in the second half is a a discussion for another day.


So why do I have a reason to believe that the actions that he has taken, so very quickly, will cease in the future and not extend even further? He essentially dismisses the Constitution. The same one he agreed to uphold. And the disagreement isn't with specifics, it's with it's ACTUAL INTENT. So no, I don't expect any of his violations to be technical violations. He knows they'd be overturned by the court (until he can appoint new SC jurists). Instead he'll use money (and how he has control of money garnered by the legislative branch is another violation of intent) to beat local governments and businesses into submission.

Game, I have never doubted that Pres. Obama believes that what he is doing is right and honorable, but once again history shows that whenever power is taken from the people it leads to further suffering regardless of good intentions. And while they have the best of intentions, they suffer from the same diseases that all "greater good" politicians suffer from: Hubris and Ignorance.

Hubris in thinking they can make better decisions from afar than those close to and directly affected by societal issues (states, municipalities, businesses, individuals); and Ignorance in refusing to acknowledge how others have failed before them attempting to achieve the same goals the same way.