Obama continues to disregard laws he finds objectionable, unless the laws discriminate against gays

[Bluebear]

Then he's fine with them...

by John Aravosis

Today's NYT notes that not only does the Obama administration continue to disregard laws that it finds objectionable, but it's doing so in a manner that's even less transparent than what George Bush did, and for which Bush was routinely castigated by, among others, candidate Obama.

At the same time, the Obama administration, and its apologists in Congress (Frank, Baldwin, Polis) and the Democratic Party (Tobias), have the temerity to lecture the gay community on how the President simply couldn't put a temporary stop to the two-a-day discharges of gay service members, couldn't provide federal employees with health benefits for their family members, couldn't permit the foreign partners of gay Americans to enter and stay in the United States, couldn't even argue against DOMA and DADT in a court of law - all because we simply must respect the rule of law, to hell with how 'wrong' we think that law is.

Now we know that this was a lie. From the NYT:

The approach will make it harder to keep track of which statutes the White House believes it can disregard....

The administration will consider itself free to disregard new laws it considers unconstitutional....

Mr. Obama, whose advisers sided with the latter camp, has characterized Mr. Bush’s use of signing statements as an abuse and pledged greater restraint.

Mr. Obama nevertheless challenged dozens of provisions early last year. The last time was in June, when his claim that he could disobey a new law requiring officials to push the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to adopt certain policies angered Congress....

Last year the Obama administration disregarded a statute that forbid State Department officials to attend United Nations meetings led by nations deemed state sponsors of terrorism. Congress has included that restriction in several recent bills.

http://gay.americablog.com/2010/01/president-obama-continues-to-disregard.html

[David Zephyr]

1. K&R.

Regardless of how may unrec's this receives, it is the truth.

[Bluebear]

2. 'even less transparent than what George Bush did' - caramba,

Those who are apologists for this crap just because Obama is a Democrat/one of us/has sexay sexay abs should be ashamed of themselves.

[jonnyblitz]

3. i have about as much respect for his IDIOT apologists as I have

for the freepers. :puke:

[Bluebear]

6. They have nothing to apolgize for!

:hide:

[QC]

8. They are not apologists! n/t

[Bluebear]

12. .

[noamnety]

4. Another k&r.

I brought this up in a different context when people were upset that someone (I guess, I didn't see it) was advocating a signing statement on health care. The sentiments I saw expressed were that Obama should/would never use a signing statement because it's inherently a threat to our democracy. But he has been using signing statements all along to (rightfully or wrongfully) subvert the will of congress. Apparently some of those are a threat to democracy and some aren't, depending on if we agree with the signing statement.

If he's going to use them at all, then I don't see what sort of signing statement could be more democratic than one that does away with discrimination.

[donco6]

5. Yep. Perfectly fine to disobey when he WANTS to.

Otherwise, I guess we can all eat shit.

[highplainsdem]

7. K&R

[jsampson]

9. I think he will repeal DADT next year

Not excusing his delay but I think he's waiting for the health care laws to be passed and implemented. Then I think he will tackle DADT and immigration too.

[Bluebear]

10. Welcome to DU, but why wait? The two can be done at the same time?

[LooseWilly]

11. It occurred to me the other day that Obama really *does* have a "magic wand" to wave if he wants.

It's called "a complete lack of accountability for presidents". He's obviously using it to ignore laws he doesn't feel like obeying, and he could just as easily do so to simply stop enforcing DADT... and to simply sign an exec order declaring DOMA unconstitutional and stating that there will be prosecution by the DoJ of anyone who tries to enforce it at any state or local level.

Who's gonna stop him? If there weren't enough votes to impeach Bush, there sure as shit aren't enough votes to impeach Obama. If there are no after the fact investigations of Bush's war crimes, how would investigations of Obama's "equality crimes" be justified?

Hell, maybe he should do it just to see if he can spark a future administration to actually investigate "abuses of authority by the President"... but at this point I just don't think it'll ever happen.

It's not the executive branch any more. It's an elective emperorship. Of course... just because he could do all that... we all know he won't...

Priorities, and all that.

[johnaries]

13. Not his bullshit again. Someone posted something similar

making all kinds of claims of what each signing statement did. But when you went back and actually READ each statement, they were nothing like the claims in the post and were absolutely harmless.

And Obama has already stated that it will take Congress to repeal DADT (he's right) and has asked them to do it.

[Name removed]

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