OPEN BORDERS AND A LOST REPUBLIC

            It has become almost trite to quote Benjamin Franklin's famous response to the lady who asked him what kind of government the Constitutional Convention had established in 1787, but it has never been more relevant than it is now.  Mr. Franklin tersely responded, "A republic, madam – if you can keep it."

            Judging by the feckless response to Obama's recent seizure of the legislative power by nullifying the nation's immigration laws, much of America has meekly submitted to the effective dissolution of our republican form of government.  As Franklin prophetically feared over two centuries ago, we have failed to "keep" our constitutional republic.  

               Franklin's Warning Resounds Ominously in the era of  government by decree

            This is not defeatist hyperbole.  It is harsh political and cultural reality – at least in the present sorry epoch of our history.

            A poll conducted by Quinnipiac University indicates that 45% of Americans actually support Obama's imperious grant of amnesty to millions of illegal aliens who he knows will support him and his degenerate party at the polls (48% opposed the action according to the poll).  In other words, nearly half of Americans apparently endorse the abandonment of a representative and responsive democratic republic in favor of quasi-dictatorship by an arrogant, racially biased leftist.

            This is the depth to which the unworthy heirs of Washington, Franklin, and Jefferson have descended under Obama's Caligulan misrule.

            The contemporary failure of the republican ideal does not lie in some flaw in the constitutional structure the Framers passed down to us.  There are ample remedies in the Constitution – including Congress's powers to control the purse and to impeach the President, and the courts' extensive powers of judicial review – to override Obama's imposition of government by executive decree.  There are also indirect supplemental remedies, such as the Republican Senate's ability to block any and all of Obama's executive and judicial nominations when the next Congress convenes in January.

            Sadly, however, most of those who exercise the legislative and judicial powers in America today either lack the will and courage to wield those powers against the President, or actually support and endorse Obama's seizure of unconstitutional powers.  The few righteous voices in the congressional wilderness who are willing to invoke the necessary potent remedies, such as the admirable Texas conservative, Senator Ted Cruz, have thus far been unable to rally sufficient support to mount a credible counter-attack.

            With appalling audacity, Obama has effectively decreed that the laws governing and restricting immigration into the United States have no meaning, force, or consequences; that the millions of aliens from the South who have violated our laws, invaded our nation, and brazenly seized our public resources are not only exempted from deportation or any other adverse consequence for their transgressions, but are to be rewarded with government benefits and largesse; and that the law-abiding Americans who have constantly  supported and defended this country must bear the cost and imposition of this lawless invasion across our national borders.

            This must be marked:  Not only are Obama's alien preference decrees blatantly and subversively unconstitutional because they usurp power that belongs to Congress alone under Art. I of the Constitution; but they are infused with scorn for all traditional Americans who rightfully oppose them, and who expressed that opposition  in nationwide elections less than one month ago. 

            The ink is barely dry on the November election returns registering the Nation's comprehensive rejection of Obama's main policies -- emphatically including his well-known intent to issue an executive decree legalizing the status of some five million illegal aliens.  In an unambiguous vote of "no confidence," the voters ousted the Democrats from control of the U.S. Senate and reduced their representation in the House of Representatives to the lowest level in over 80 years.  In a parliamentary system of government, Obama would have been rendered politically impotent and forced to call for new elections. 

            Although ours is not a parliamentary system like Japan's or the UK's, our constitutional and political structures contemplate that any responsible President would recognize the sentiment expressed in the election landslide by adjusting his policies – and his attitude – in response to the voters' expressed preferences.  Not so Obama, who is incurably egotistical and scornfully indifferent to the wishes of all but those of his own race (that is, the black half of it) or those of his leftist ideology.  Far from conceding any ground to the voters or the representatives they had just elected, Obama has brazenly reaffirmed his most unpopular policies and programs.

            The Great Virginian, Thomas Jefferson, once explained "Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition."

            The "subservience and venality" lamented by Mr. Jefferson not only permeates a substantial portion of today's American populace (as shown by the nearly 50% who apparently approve Obama's amnesty decree), but sadly is on full display among the leadership of the Republican majority that was just elected to forcefully oppose Obama -- rather than to appease him.  Neither Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell nor House Speaker John Boehner has displayed the forceful anger and determination that is required to counter Obama's unconstitutional edicts.  They both appear unwilling to adopt the hard measures that would provide the minimum response to Obama's arrogant usurpations. 

            But the Nation cannot afford such prevarication and timidity in the face of Obama's dangerous misrule.  McConnell and Boehner should announce that Congress will exercise its power over appropriations to deny funding for any government resources, personnel, or contracts that are needed to implement the lawless amnesty decree.  

            Yet an almost paranoid fear of adverse media reaction to the misnamed "government shutdown" that might follow from such targeted defunding deters the Republican leadership from taking the minimal necessary action.  That leadership seems oblivious to the fact that congressional Republicans have just achieved a massive election victory in defiance of arguments that last year's so-called shutdown crisis would doom them to defeat.

            Absent forceful congressional counter-measures such as a sweeping denial of funding for any aspect of the amnesty program, the collapse of constitutional governance initiated by Obama's lawless decrees will only accelerate.

            Most critics of Obama's amnesty decree have focused on how it violates the constitutional separation of powers, by arrogating to the President the legislative power over immigration.  While this is true enough and disastrous enough, the decree goes beyond that and violates what may be the most fundamental and elemental provision of the Constitution:  the Guarantee Clause, found in Art. IV, sec. 4 of the Constitution, which provides in part:

                "The United States shall guarantee to every State in

                 the Union a Republican Form of Government, and

                 shall protect each of them against Invasion."

            In one fell swoop, Obama's amnesty decree violates both of the quoted  mandates of the Guarantee Clause.  A Republican Form of Government is one in which power is held by the people and their elected representatives, yet Obama's actions on alien amnesty, illegal recess appointments, and unilateral revision of laws like the Welfare Reform Act deprive all the States of the effective legislative representation that is the essence of a Republic.  And far from protecting the States against the alien invasion from Mexico and Central America, Obama has indisputably encouraged and facilitated that invasion by repeatedly rewarding and protecting the invaders.

            Benjamin Franklin warned us over two centuries ago that the Republic bequeathed to us by the genius, blood, and bravery of our Founding Fathers would not be easily maintained.  Unless more Americans and their representatives gather their resolve to resist Obama's ominous encroachments , the Guarantee Clause and the rest of the Constitution will soon be reduced to an empty and ineffectual parchment.

NO KUMBAYA CONFIRMATION FOR HOLDER 2.0

               The current Attorney General of the United States, Eric Holder, is an unabashed advocate of pro-black racial preference who does not include whites or Asian-Americans when he refers to "my people" – i.e., those particular Americans whose interests he most aggressively asserts and defends in his leadership of the Justice Department. 

                Holder has announced his resignation (effective upon confirmation of a replacement), and President Obama has just nominated another black-leftist attorney, Loretta Lynch of New York City, to succeed and emulate Holder.  Obama plainly expects Ms. Lynch to continue Holder's administration of federal law enforcement with an emphatic bias towards the interests of black Americans under the divisive doctrines of affirmative action, disparate impact, and 21^st century reparations for the racial wrongs of the nineteenth century.

                Although Ms. Lynch's embrace of Holder's race-based agenda is cosmetically muted under the guise of her relatively non-controversial tenure as United States Attorney in New York City, no one should be deceived by this disingenuous political camouflage.  Lynch has the strong backing and endorsement of not only the tendentious Mr. Holder, but also the ultra-radical racial agitator, Al Sharpton, who was directly engaged in the political consultations leading to Lynch's selection.

                In the wake of his overwhelming rejection in the just concluded congressional elections, Obama has rejected any notion of conciliation or compromise, but has instead decided to "double-down" in pushing ahead with the very policies and plans that the electorate so emphatically refuted.  There is little reason to believe that Obama would deviate from his unapologetic recalcitrance in choosing a moderate or conciliatory nominee for Attorney General.  On the contrary, it is evident that he is in comfortable accord with the confrontational attitudes of Holder, Sharpton, and others of their ilk in his choice of a suitable leftist to administer U.S. law enforcement for the final two years of his destructive administration.

                The Obama administration hopes to avoid detailed scrutiny of Ms. Lynch's background and legal philosophy by portraying her as an entirely respectable, "non-controversial" choice who should be quickly confirmed in the forthcoming "lame duck" session of Congress, while Obama's Democrats still cling to control of the Senate and its Judiciary Committee.  Obama and Holder know that if they cannot rush Ms. Lynch through an abbreviated and pro forma confirmation process in the lame duck Senate, a serious and intensive confirmation process awaits her when the Republicans assert control of the Senate in January, 2015.

               Likely transcript of Lame Duck Hearings on Loretta Lynch Confirmation

                Obama's media allies, Democratic senators, and at least one "useful idiot" on the Republican side have already begun painting Ms. Lynch with the false colors of respectability, with a view to forcing a speedy and ill-informed "Kumbaya confirmation."  Various news stories have already described Lynch,  without providing any supporting evidence, as a "popular prosecutor" who has "built a solid reputation" during her tenure as U.S. Attorney for the Easter District of New York.  This is feckless nonsense.

                Federal U.S. Attorneys are appointed by the President, and their largely bureaucratic position rarely involves the kind of visibility or public engagement that makes them either "popular" or unpopular.  There is thus no reason for describing Loretta Lynch as a "popular prosecutor" other than to lend support to the Administration's disingenuous efforts to portray her as moderate and respectable, when in fact she has earned the support of racialist agitators like Sharpton. 

                As to Ms. Lynch's supposedly "solid reputation," there is no reason to ascribe the slightest significance to this throw-away assertion.  Although stories making this claim provide no genuine evidence or data to support it, it is most likely based upon statements of support from New York lawyers and political figures – people who have everything to gain, and nothing to lose, by cultivating the approval or gratitude of a powerful U.S. Attorney and her even more powerful backers in the White House and at Main Justice.  In short, the ritualistic and boilerplate assertions of Ms. Lynch's purportedly solid reputation as a "tough but fair" prosecutor are utterly worthless.

                The critical issue is not whether Lynch has the pro forma, self-interested support of New York lawyers and political figures, but whether she is likely to continue the utterly disastrous and racially divisive policies and practices of the Obama-Holder Justice Department.  Among other things, her disturbing statements endorsing Holder's race-based approach to law enforcement, and the suspect circumstances of her selection – i.e., the apparent imprimatur of Holder and Sharpton – indicates that she will adhere closely to the Holder Line if confirmed as Attorney General.  Indeed, Sharpton himself has stated, "I think Loretta Lynch certainly satisfies all of us that she will continue in the same vein that Eric Holder had began." - See more at: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/kyle-drennen/2014/11/10/nbc-hails-obamas-historic-choice-attorney-general-touts-sharpton#sthash.dk3WtrFX.dpuf

                The arguments made by Obama's media allies urging swift and submissive confirmation of Ms. Lynch are beyond hilarious in their extreme absurdity and illogic.  An article in the New Republic by a so-called "fellow" at the leftist Yale Information Society Project named Sam Kleiner, for example, offers the following conclusory incoherence:  "The Obama administration has extended an olive branch to the Senate Republicans by choosing someone whose independence and apolitical judgment are beyond reproach."  See http://www.newrepublic.com/article/120214/attorney-general-loretta-lynch-republicans-question-obamas-pick. 

                "Beyond reproach?"  Who does he think he's talking about, Caesar's wife?

                Kleiner's flippantly partisan article assumes that Lynch will somehow be "independent" because, unlike several other persons mentioned as possible nominees for Attorney General, she did not have "experience in the White House or at Main Justice."  This illogical contention is patently flawed on several levels. 

                First, countless leftist Democrats who "lack experience in the White House or at Main Justice" would be perfectly ready and willing to dance on the puppet strings of Obama and his White House gang if given the position of Attorney General.  The law firms and non-profit legal groups of America are filled with senior liberal-Democrat attorneys who would love nothing more than to slavishly implement the dictates of Obama, Valerie Jarrett, and John Podesta if named Attorney General.  An Attorney General's lack of inner circle experience provides absolutely no assurance, or even any likelihood, of so-called "independence" from the President's political policies and directives.  Indeed, Lynch's elevation from the comparative obscurity of her pedestrian U.S. Attorney position to the Corner Office at Main Justice renders her all the more likely to do the bidding of those who elevated her.

                Secondly, Ms. Lynch in fact enjoyed extensive access to the Justice Department's inner circles when Holder appointed her as the Chairwoman of the Attorney General's Advisory Committee of U.S. Attorneys, which advises the Attorney General on legal policy issues.  So not only does Lynch, contrary to Kleiner's misleading assertions, have high-level experience at Main Justice; she is also heavily beholden and linked to Attorney General Holder.  More importantly, it is apparent that she has been advising him on the very divisive and unconstitutional policies which have made Holder a national byword for lawlessness in the Attorney General's office.  To promptly confirm a known disciple of the man whose reckless and discriminatory policies have made him anathema to the American public – Holder's approval rating as Attorney General is a pathetic 24% according to a Rasmussen poll – would be a betrayal of both the Constitution, the rule of law, and the expressed wishes of the voters who emphatically rejected Obama's policies in the recent elections.              

                Notwithstanding all this, Democrat and media partisans, and at least one Republican political Quisling, have been calling for the rubber-stamp confirmation of Ms. Lynch in the forthcoming lame duck session of the Senate.  Inasmuch as the lame duck Senate was just unceremoniously repudiated by the electorate, however, elementary notions of responsive and prudent government would place the responsibility for evaluating the suitability of such an important nomination upon the accountable new Senate, rather than the unaccountable old one.

                Almost on cue, however, the invertebrate Republican senator from South Carolina, Lindsey Graham, blurted out a signal of premature surrender on the Lynch nomination even before the ink was dry on her nomination papers.  With as much sober consideration as a teenage girl squealing "OMG, awesome," on seeing a new star on "The Voice," Graham reportedly volunteered that Lynch "seems to be a solid choice," is qualified to be Attorney General, and that he has no problems with confirming her in the abbreviated lame duck session.

                Graham's irresponsible remarks confirm once again why the routine re-election of unprincipled appeasement-oriented incumbents like him makes meaningful conservative reform in Congress so difficult.  There is absolutely no valid reason for a Republican senator to preemptively concede the confirmation of a suspect Obama nominee for a crucial post like Attorney General before the review of her background has even begun, let alone before the Judiciary Committee has conducted thorough hearings on the nomination.  Graham is evidently so anxious to curry favor with the liberal media and political establishment – now that he is safely re-elected and beyond the reach of insurgent conservatives – that he is willing to preempt the scrutiny that is required for any important cabinet nominees, let alone one who promises to perpetuate the destructive policies of an Eric Holder, with the smiling approval of Al Sharpton.

                Those who advocate a quick, pro forma confirmation of Ms. Lynch insist that she is indisputably well-qualified to be Attorney General solely because she has served as a relatively uncontroversial U.S. Attorney for about six years.  This is pure nonsense.  There are approximately 93 U.S. Attorneys, and it is a safe bet that most of them could be described as respectable, "well-regarded," and "tough but fair" – the same meaningless endorsements bestowed upon Ms. Lynch by the same beholden attorneys, colleagues, and fellow Harvard Law School Network cronies who would bestow them on almost any U.S. Attorney in their incestuous professional and political circle. 

                None of these boilerplate encomiums provide any meaningful evidence that a given U.S. Attorney is qualified to be Attorney General – especially at a time when the tyrannical conduct of the President and the current Attorney General have undermined the integrity of constitutional governance and the rule of law.

                Having served as a senior Senate Judiciary Committee Counsel during the Reagan and Bush 41 years, SR is deeply familiar with the Senate's vetting and confirmation process for Presidential nominees.  The vetting of U.S. Attorneys is generally cursory and pro forma, owing to the fact that these officials are generally confined to straightforward legal enforcement operations, rather than matters of politics, policy, or sensitive constitutional interpretation.  Thus, the fact that Ms. Lynch has twice been confirmed as a U.S.A. without controversy says very little about her ability to satisfy the quite different and far more exacting standards that apply to the confirmation of an Attorney General.

                A close, skeptical, and thorough vetting of the Lynch nomination is even more critical than usual because the Obama Administration, aided and abetted by the Holder Justice Department, has flouted and undermined the U.S. Constitution with a hubris unmatched in modern  history.  In particular, Obama has flagrantly usurped and violated the legislative power expressly assigned to Congress in Art. I of the Constitution; he has both declined to enforce or defend duly enacted laws, even while purporting to impose laws and amendments to laws that Congress never enacted.  A prime example, of course, is Obama's arrogant insistence that he will unilaterally alter U.S. law to "legalize" the status of millions of illegal aliens, in direct contravention of the laws passed by Congress. 

                Given these realities, it is imperative that the next Attorney General have a strong mastery of constitutional law, and a commitment to defending the Constitution's integrity even when the President's policies and politics press in the other direction.

                There is no indication in Ms. Lynch's unremarkable experience as a U.S. Attorney that she has dealt extensively with difficult issues of constitutional law, let alone seminal separation of powers issues like that posed by Obama's proposed usurpation of congressional authority over immigration and deportation.  Perhaps she does possess a level of constitutional mastery that is not evident on the face of her credentials, but that can only be determined by a thorough vetting of her background and probing interrogation in a full hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee.  

               Such a hearing must also require Ms. Lynch to declare whether she supports the constitutionality of Obama's proposed unilateral amnesty fiat, as Senators Cruz and Lee have properly insisted.

                Finally, the Lynch advocates' ultimate trump card is to gush breathlessly that she would be the first black woman Attorney General, and that only racist Republicans would oppose such an inspirational breakthrough by denying her instantaneous confirmation by the lame duck Senate.  This tiresome exploitation of vestigial white-male guilt provides no rational basis whatsoever for according preferential treatment to black female nominees; it is nothing more than an argument for pro-black and pro-female discrimination in the guise of obsolete racial and gender justice platitudes. 

                We have now had a black Attorney General (Mr.Holder) for nearly six years (early 2009 to the present).  We recently had a woman Attorney General, Janet Reno, for eight years (1993-2001), and an Hispanic AG for three years (2005-2007).  In short, a racial minority or a woman has served as Attorney General during 17 of the past 22 years. 

                Under these circumstances, the appointment of a black female to this post hardly constitutes some kind of novel or historical breakthrough for blacks or for women.  This is especially apparent at a time when a black President is already surrounded by a powerful coterie of influential black women such as primary Presidential Counselor Valerie Jarrett, National Security Adviser Susan Rice, and the increasingly political First Lady, Michelle Obama.  Against this revealing reality – which most people in politics or media are too timid to notice, let alone mention – the appointment of yet another black woman to the President's inner circle of power represents a reinforcement of the status quo, rather than a vindication for the underrepresented.