The GOP is Getting Hysterical Over Impending Immigration Executive Action

It has been reported that President Obama is ready to use his executive authority to overhaul the immigration system in order that millions of immigrants be allowed to stay in the country. The Republicans are taking Obama’s assertion of his lawful authority as a slap in the face.

We have already seen a tearful Boehner cry he will “fight the president tooth and nail.” An unholy trinity composed of Ted Cruz (R-TX), Mike Lee (R-UT) and Jeff Sessions (R-AL) has also arisen, vowing a childish “oh yeah?” which means passing a budget that will bring a halt to “executive amnesty.”

C’mon man. When have Republicans passed a budget that didn’t bring a halt to something? They’ve even talked about defunding the executive branch, for crying out loud.

Cry us a river already.

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This is a group of Republicans who determined, on the very day Obama took office in January 2009, to ensure that he be completely hamstrung. That he be a one-term president.

Since that day, on every day they have bothered to work (which haven’t been many), they have obstructed the president. And on every day they have had off (which outnumber the days they have worked by a wide margin), they have insisted the president not be allowed to carry on his lawful duties as the head of the executive branch of the government.

The funny thing in all this is listening to Derrick Morgan, Vice President of the ultra-right wing Heritage Foundation and former special counsel to war criminal and war profiteer, Vice President Dick Cheney, tell CNN,

“One thing is for sure. If the president does do an executive amnesty like he’s been promising, he’s going to poison the well for any kind on cooperation on immigration and probably a lot of other things.”

COOPERATION??? Seriously? When have Republicans offered the president any cooperation? They don’t even have a passing familiarity with the word “cooperation.”

They don’t think that the well was already poisoned when Republicans called for the obstruction of the president’s agenda even before he took office? When they called for making Obama a one-term president?

And after all, isn’t it Speaker Boehner who claimed that the American people don’t want a congress that passes laws? What value is there in an un-poisoned well when Republicans refuse to pass laws? That’s like insisting that it’s important to remain on good terms with a corpse. It’s just an absurdity.

That well was poisoned already – by the GOP – But CNN is more than willing to give it unrefuted airtime.

Republicans, freed by the mainstream media of any moorings to our shared reality, are so angry about the president doing his job that they are prepared to be at least as effective in suing him over immigration as they have been over Obamacare, and they even talking about looking equally foolish over impeaching the president over his completely lawful and constitutional actions.

Rep. Steve King (R-IA), hobnobbing with the Religious Right crowd, said he is willing to shut down the government over the president’s plans, that immigration action would cause the country to “abruptly into an abyss that we have never seen in the history of this country.”

Like another government shutdown wouldn’t accomplish the same thing.

According to King,

Our constitution will be torn asunder if we let the president do this.”

What he’s contemplating doing is the equivalent of standing up in front of America, opening up the Constitution, taking ahold of Article 1 — all of the congressional legislative authority — tearing that out and putting it in his shirt pocket and saying, ‘I’ll do the lawmaking in this country, it’s not your business, Congress.’ If we let that happen, our constitutional republic is descending abruptly into an abyss that we have never seen in the history of this country.

This from a representative of a party that thinks Congress has the right to tell the president what to do.

Speaking of the Religious Right crowd, Rick Joyner of the Oak Initiative, pulling himself away from fantasies about being enslaved by sodomites, issued a “special bulletin” on November 14 claiming that while immigration “is a very important issue” and that “we need immigration reform,” the damage from the president taking issue “can be devastating” and “could very well lead to the impeachment of the president.”

He then proceeds to demonstrate that he does not understand what the president’s executive order means:

Executive Orders are for use with the Executive Branch of government, not for legislating the law of the land. The Constitution does not give the President the authority to legislate; this is reserved for Congress. The President can propose legislation, and he can veto it, but Congress must pass any law of the land. The kind of Executive Order he is proposing would basically change the law that we already have on the books, which he has refused to uphold and is in basic violation of his Constitutional duties. This kind of blatant disregard of the Constitution would need to be confronted or we will have discarded it.

This from a guy who says only a military coup can save the United States. Military coups, for the record, are not allowed in the Constitution. It’s simply not an option. An unlawful military coup that destroys the Constitution, is going to somehow save a country founded on the Constitution. He thinks that makes sense.

And then there is right wing religious zealot Tony Perkins, singing to a choir full of liars and hypocrites, when he claims,

What the president is about to do on amnesty is essentially tell, using his authority as the chief executive, the president, to the executive branch, Homeland Security, immigration, not to enforce the law, which is a violation of his oath to uphold the law. I think there is already, but clearly with this, if he takes this approach on amnesty and immigration — if the president does not uphold the law then that’s an impeachable act. Now you don’t impeach somebody because you don’t like their policies, it’s when they fail to uphold or abide by the law.

But here is the thing: Obama will not be legislating. He has the authority, as the New York Times puts it, to “enforce the laws with discretion,” leaving King and Joyner both out in the cold jousting at windmills, and just generally looking as stupid as they are.

According to the Times, Obama’s order will “significantly refocus the activities of the government’s 12,000 immigration agents. One key piece of the order, officials said, will allow many parents of children who are American citizens or legal residents to obtain legal work documents and no longer worry about being discovered, separated from their families and sent away.”

None of this comes as a surprise. The Republican Party has made it clear from the very beginning that they will go to any lengths to destroy Barack Obama. If obstruction will not work, they will invent lies and scandals. If none of that works, they will sue him or impeach him. All of this should be transparent in its intent, if only the mainstream media did not help Republicans out by failing, at every opportunity, to mention facts.

The Republican Party declared war on President Obama even before he took office, and since Election Day 2014 they have been like sharks scenting blood in the water. They can’t wait to get back to Capitol Hill and do absolutely nothing at all. Again. Well, and hate on Obama while he soldiers on, doing the job we elected him to do.

The White House is remaining mum on all this immigration talk until the president returns from his trip to Asia on Sunday. The real frothing at the mouth will begin then. Stay tuned.

Hrafnkell Haraldsson

Hrafnkell Haraldsson, a social liberal with leanings toward centrist politics has degrees in history and philosophy. His interests include, besides history and philosophy, human rights issues, freedom of choice, religion, and the precarious dichotomy of freedom of speech and intolerance. He brings a slightly different perspective to his writing, being that he is neither a follower of an Abrahamic faith nor an atheist but a polytheist, a modern-day Heathen who follows the customs and traditions of his Norse ancestors. He maintains his own blog, A Heathen’s Day, which deals with Heathen and Pagan matters, and Mos Maiorum Foundation www.mosmaiorum.org, dedicated to ethnic religion. He has also contributed to NewsJunkiePost, GodsOwnParty and Pagan+Politics.