Boehner’s Pointless Plan to Sue Obama for Abuse of Presidential Power

Political Kryptonite ^ | June 26, 2014 | Fred Dardick

[FredDardick]

After years of sitting on the sidelines while President Obama has run roughshod over our constitutional form of government, the one that used to employ checks and balances to prevent an overreaching executive branch, Speaker of the House John Boehner is planning on taking Obama to court for abuse of presidential power. But rather than nailing Obama on something specific, like the blossoming IRS scandal or sending high powered weapons over the border during Fast and Furious, Boehner is going to sue Obama for crimes ranging “from health care and energy to foreign policy and education”. The only thing missing from the complaint is Boehner whining that Obama only invited him once to go golfing.

Broad based philosophical debate over the reach of executive powers seems a rather pointless exercise in court. What does Boehner expect to happen? Federal judges pouring over each and every single action by the federal government over the past six years? It would literally take forever.

There are other ways to curb Obama’s lawlessness. The first step is to address to root cause of the problem – the lack of fear by government officials of going to jail for breaking the law. With the possible exception of hardcore Obamabots, not many question that Obama has practically written a roadmap for executive branch malfeasance. Sad thing is it’s outrageously simple: a compliant Attorney General who will never, ever under any circumstances appoint a special counsel.

Without any fear of prosecution, Obama and the rest of the liberal minions in government can pretty much do whatever they please – lie to investigators, lie to Congress, lose emails, write new laws, make up healthcare legislation, send arms to Al Qaeda, throw open the borders, murder Americans abroad, disenfranchise military voters, illegally fire inspector generals, defraud GM bond holders, intimidate abortion protestors, persecute Christians, betray America’s allies, and on and on. I literally got dozens more from where that came from.

Boehner has ignored the biggest lever influencing government policy that he has – the power of the purse. Boehner could compel Obama to respond to scandals, rather than getting run over by them, by simply refusing to fund the parts of government that are blatantly illegal.

Like Obama, Richard Nixon wasn’t keen on having a special prosecutors poking around his affairs. But rather than whine about it in court, the U.S. Senate refused to confirm Nixon’s appointment of Elliot Richardson as Attorney General until he agreed to authorize a special prosecutor. Nixon eventually caved to the Senate’s demand and the rest is history.

The house should put an immediate hold on funding for the Justice Department, EPA, IRS and any other out of control government agency until Obama agrees to appoint special counsels to investigate executive branch wrongdoing. Republicans will no doubt get excoriated for taking a stand against Obama, but at least that would be better than getting laughed at in the press for a pointless lawsuit that will likely accomplish nothing.

[Diogenesis]

"Just have your personal judge pick this up, my beloved King."

[Servant of the Cross]

It's a lot of folks who've been in office way too long, who stopped listening to their constituents -- and, as a result, we see lots of theater, lots of empty symbolic votes and very little willingness to actually stand up and fight on behalf of the American people.

I will tell you the single biggest surprise in arriving to the Senate is the defeatist attitude here. I mean, we don't even talk about how to win a fight. There's no discussion. We talk about, "Hey, let's get a show vote so we can go tell our constituents we're doing something." But I promise you, Rush, if you had to sit through one Senate lunch, you'd be in therapy for a month.

... they've been here a long time, and they're beaten down, and they don't believe we can win. They don't believe it can happen, and the answer they say on every issue is, "No, we can't do it. We can't do it."

[shalom aleichem]

Kavuto jumped all over Michele Bachman for Congress filing a lawsuit. Why are they so afraid of the courts? Is this not the last resort of Congress short of impeachment?

I am surprised that Boehner took so long. But it is probably timing to get maximum impact before the November election.

[Jim Noble]

Why are they so afraid of the courts?

It's not that.

There is a court, already constituted and sitting, designated by the US Constitution to deal specifically with a President who fails to take care that the laws be faithfully executed.

It's called the House of Representatives, and John Boehner is in charge of it.

No Article III court in the land will ever consent to provide the Weeper of the House with coverage for his cowardice.

[Bulwinkle]

I believe it was a ‘preemptive’ announcement, so it is in the public record if Obama uses executive order for immigration or ObamaCare, epa, etc.

[Boonie]

Way too little, way too late...It’s just CYA...

[2nd Amendment]

You complain and moan because Boehner does nothing. When he does this out of frustration, you’re still not happy. The fact is we have a manchurian tyrannical President and every attempt must be employed to stop the “chicago way” Presidency!

[Rides_A_Red_Horse]

You complain and moan because Boehner does nothing. When he does this out of frustration, you’re still not happy.

---

Unfortunately, this all looks like a poorly written soap opera. It’s clear Boehner, along with the establishment GOP, shares the democrats hatred of conservatives.

He’s not about to take action against his soul-mate!

[A. Morgan]

This talk of suing.. merely a fig leaf to make it seem like he is doing something.. when in fact what the Speaker has been doing is working with Obama and the inside Washington elite.

[Texas resident]

Boehner tossed the hot potato to the courts.
The suit might come up sometime in the next 5 years.

Thanks repubs.
Oh and by the way, all the house is up for re election in 5 months. We won’t forget.

[Arlis]

This idiotic move proves that Boehner is as stupid as Obama.

Impeach Boehner...........

[Diogenesis]

We agree.
The Obama enabler, EXEMPT John Boehern, DOES NOTHING.
DID NOTHING. DOES NOTHING. but preen.

This is talk.

So typical for the treasonous EXEMPT.

[skinkinthegrass]

!

[Jim Noble]

Boehner tossed the hot potato to the courts.

And they will refuse delivery. In some ways, Boehner sleazing out of his clear constitutional duty is an abuse of power as bad as Zero's.

[MrB]

As I posted pictorially yesterday - this is Boehner being a chicken-5h!+.

[tennmountainman]

Bonehead has the power of the purse. But he is unwilling to use it.
This court thing is nothing but a Kubuki dance by Bonehead.
It is meaningless.

[Protect the Bill of Rights]

We are 6 years into the Obama era. Boehner did mot wait 6 years to express his disdain/punish Tea Party members of the House.

He did not wait 6 years to remove 4 members of Congress associated with the Tea Party from influential committee seats.

---

from Dec 2012:
https://news.yahoo.com/gop-leaders-remove-4-plum-house-committees-195415482—finance.html

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker ‘s decision to take plum committee assignments away from four conservative Republican lawmakers after they bucked party leaders on key votes isn’t going over well with advocacy groups that viewed them as role models.

Reps. of Kansas and of Michigan will lose their seats on the House Budget Committee chaired by Rep. next year. And Reps. of North Carolina and of Arizona are losing their seats on the House Financial Services Committee.

The move is underscoring a divide in the Republican Party between tea party-supported conservatives and the House GOP leadership.

“This is a clear attempt on the part of Republican leadership to punish those in Washington who vote the way they promised their constituents they would — on principle — instead of mindlessly rubber-stamping trillion dollar deficits and the bankrupting of America,” said Matt Kibbe, president of the tea party group FreedomWorks....”

---

Of course it was denied at the time, but history has proven otherwise. Boehner hates the Tea Party, even though the Tea Party made it possible for him to be Speaker of the House.

Had Boehner spent as much time fighting Obama rather than those nasty Tea Party groups, we might be in a different place.

He bears as much blame as Obama.

[Tallguy]

“No Article III court in the land will ever consent to provide the Weeper of the House with coverage for his cowardice.”

There will be a lot of words wasted about this lawsuit. In the end a circuit court judge is going to chuck this suit so fast...

Harry & Nancy will be crowing about it.

[afsnco]

Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner. There’s a Constitutional means of dealing with an executive that’s overstepping his Constitutional bounds. This is an entirely political question first, where they need to find the political courage to do what must be done. Then it becomes a legal question of his gross and repeated high crimes and misdemeanors.

They’re terrified of impeaching the first half-black president and he’s capitalizing on that fear. But that’s the ONLY Constitutional remedy. Just because there’ll be no conviction in the corrupt dimmo-controlled Senate is no excuse for the House to go whining to a federal court.