Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
From an interview with Lester Brown, founder of the Earth Policy Institute, a man of whom Bill Clinton said “We should all heed his advice”:
You’ve talked before about the civilizational challenge that climate change poses, how confident are you that the human race is up to meeting that challenge?
We don’t know and there is no guarantee that we will. But we do know that change can come very quickly. Look how quickly the US restructured its whole economy in 1942. At beginning of 1942, the automobile companies were producing automobiles. By the middle of 1942 they were all producing tanks and planes. It didn’t take decades or years, just a few months and they totally converted. If they could do that then, certainly we can restructure the world energy economy today. What Roosevelt did was ban the sale of cars. He didn’t say they couldn’t produce cars. He just banned the sale of cars.
Would you like to see President Obama do that?
I’d like to see him ban the sale of coal and oil.
Dear heavens, the Imperial President should “ban the sale of coal and oil”? Oh, yeah, that’s the ticket. Some 40% of US electricity, lots of our industrial energy, and ~ 100% of our transportation fuel comes from coal and oil, so I’m sure that other than the small matter of impoverishment, suffering, death, and economic ruin, banning them wouldn’t cause any disruption at all … while I want to ask “is this Imperious Idiot for real?”, the sad truth is that Lester Brown is totally serious.
But even more frightening than the horrendous economic disruption and human suffering from such a suicidal course of action is that Lester Brown is advocating tyranny, and given his history, our Imperial President Obama would likely be more than happy to accommodate him.
As a candidate, Obama spoke out strongly against expanded executive power, saying in October of 2007:
These last few years we’ve seen an unacceptable abuse of power at home. We’ve paid a heavy price for having a president whose priority is expanding his own power.
and
I taught constitutional law for ten years. I take the Constitution very seriously. The biggest problems that were facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all, and that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m President of the United States of America.
After watching George Bush, Obama’s position on limiting executive power was one of the reasons I voted for him in 2008 … back before I realized that if Obama’s lips were moving, there were non-zero odds that he was lying, as in this case. Which is one of the reasons why I voted against him in 2012.
Now that he’s in power, and particularly now that he’s in his second term, he’s decided that he gets the last say on everything under the sun, and has presided over a huge increase in executive power, viz:
Whenever this Congress refuses to act in a way that hurts our economy and puts our people at risk, I’ve got an obligation as president to do what we can without them.
Despite being a “constitutional scholar”, he seems to misunderstand the separation of powers. He has no such obligation. It’s not his job to decide what “hurts the economy and puts the people at risk”, and more importantly, he has no such power. If the Congress decides not to pass a law, that’s their choice. The President’s job is to be the “Chief Executive”, and as such, the Constitution says he is to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed”. Nowhere is he given the power to make or interpret the laws. That is the job of Congress on the one hand and the Courts on the other … and if Congress won’t act, well, tough. If you don’t like the Congress, vote them out of office.
However, obviously, neither President Obama nor Lester Brown see it that way. As we just saw with the new regulations involving coal plants, President Obama is more than happy to make new “environmental” laws by presidential edict. And I’m sure that both the Imperial President and the Imperious Idiot firmly believe that Obama has the power to ban the sale gas and oil.
The Founding Fathers were very concerned that the President should NOT have this kind of imperial powers, and for good reason. They’d seen the damage that strong-men had done in a variety of monarchies and tyrannies. So they devised a system of “separation of powers”—Congress makes the laws, the President enforces the laws, and the Supreme Court interprets the laws.
Sadly, we have fallen very far from that, and President Obama has done immense damage to that system by “solving” every problem, from glitches with Obamacare to interim appointments to immigration reform to destroying coal plants, by imperial proclamation. At this point, all I can do is fervently hope he doesn’t listen to Lester Brown …
Gotta say … 2016 can’t come fast enough for me.
w.
End Note: Please do not use this as a springboard for general political attacks on either side. There are lots of web pages for doing that. The issue here is the Imperious Idiot’s asinine proposal to ban the sale of coal and oil, and the Imperial President’s claim that he has the executive power to do just about anything, presumably including Lester’s proposed ban.
The Usual: If you disagree with something that I or anyone has said, please QUOTE THE EXACT WORDS YOU DISAGREE WITH. This avoids many misunderstandings.
The Interview: The full interview is here.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Doug Allen says:
July 5, 2014 at 2:09 pm
“…mainly Democratics before Nixon’s southern strategy…”
Not this long debunked meme again:
The Democrats have not changed their stripes since pre-Civil War. The only thing that has changed is which group of people are designated to wear their chains.
In the 1920s the US Govt banned the sale of alcohol. The decade and a half that followed was not conspicuous by its temperance, but by the rise of criminal gangs dealing in bootlegging as a entrance to other criminal activities.
Currently the sale of heroin , crack, marijuana etc , is , I believe, illegal in US except under prescription. So how is the war on drugs going? In UK the illegal supply of drugs is believed to be the cause of a significant proportion of serious criminal activity.
In wartime Britain petrol and food were both heavily rationed and , from parent’s anecdotes , the control of the resultant black market consumed a large part of the Govt resources in money and personnel. Presumably Obama has both in abundance.
I would have voted for McCain, whom I referred to as McIdiot, if he hadn’t been such an – well, idiot. I mean, remember the McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Acts? So, yes, I held my nose and crossed my fingers and voted for Obama in ’08. So sue me.
“Look how quickly the US restructured its whole economy in 1942. At beginning of 1942, the automobile companies were producing automobiles. By the middle of 1942 they were all producing tanks and planes.”
Note that private citizens don’t spend money on tanks and warplanes. From 1942 on they couldn’t buy new cars, city dwellers couldn’t buy gasoline, or tires, – the average person was a lot POORER in 1942 than they were during the great depression. Lester Brown’s policies would ALSO make us poorer.
I don’t really blame folks for voting for Obama the first time [although I didn’t, even though I viewed McCain as a terrible candidate]. A lot of people voted for Obama as America’s Act of Contrition for slavery — even though Obama does not have a drop of slave blood in his body.
But his re-election is hard to understand. Gallup did an exit poll, which showed that more than half of all voters made up their minds on election day. Remember that Obama was on all the TV networks constantly, speaking gravely about the Hurricane hitting NYC. Romney was denied equal time on the pretext that Obama was acting as President.
Romeny was truly “The Fixer”, who brought back numerous companies that were headed for banruptcy, saving many thousands of jobs. He had inherited a fortune, then gave it all to charity, to make it on his own. He adopted lots of kids of every race. He was an excellent candidate. But he was mercilessly demonized by a Party that constantly reminded voters of G.W. Bush.
That is all in the past now, and we have to play the hand we’ve been dealt. I do not think Obama is stupid, or incompetent, or inept. I think he has a plan, and he knows exactly what he is doing. He is part of a team that uses him as a figurehead.
Listen to one of America’s founders, Patrick Henry, who appears to have been very prescient:
“This Constitution is said to have beautiful features; but when I come to examine these features, sir, they appear to me horribly frightful. Your President may easily become king. Your Senate is so imperfectly constructed that your dearest rights may be sacrificed by what may be a small minority; and a very small minority may continue forever unchangeably this government, although horridly defective. Where are your checks in this government? Your strongholds will be in the hands of your enemies. It is on a supposition that your American governors shall be honest, that all the good qualities of this government are founded; but its defective and imperfect construction puts it in their power to perpetrate the worst of mischiefs, should they be bad men; and, sir, would not all the world, from the Eastern to the Western Hemisphere, blame our distracted folly in resting our rights upon the contingency of our rulers being good or bad?
“Show me that age and country where the rights and liberties of the people were placed on the sole chance of their rulers being good men, without a consequent loss of liberty! I say that the loss of that dearest privilege has ever followed, with absolute certainty, every such mad attempt.
“If your American chief be a man of ambition and abilities, how easy is it for him to render himself absolute! The army is in his hands, and if he be a man of address, it will be attached to him, and it will be the subject of long meditation with him to seize the first auspicious moment to accomplish his design; and, sir, will the American spirit solely relieve you when this happens?
“I would rather infinitely — and I am sure most of this Convention are of the same opinion — have a king, lords, and commons, than a government so replete with such insupportable evils. If we make a king, we may prescribe the rules by which he shall rule his people, and interpose such checks as shall prevent him from infringing them; but the President, in the field, at the head of his army, can prescribe the terms on which he shall reign master, so far that it will puzzle any American ever to get his neck from under the galling yoke.
“I cannot with patience think of this idea. If ever he violates the laws, one of two things will happen: he will come at the head of his army, to carry every thing before him; or he will give bail, or do what Mr. Chief Justice will order him.
“If he be guilty, will not the recollection of his crimes teach him to make one bold push for the American throne?
“Will not the immense difference between being master of every thing, and being ignominiously tried and punished, powerfully excite him to make this bold push?
“But, sir, where is the existing force to punish him? Can he not, at the head of his army, beat down every opposition? Away with your President! We shall have a king: the army will salute him monarch: your militia will leave you, and assist in making him king, and fight against you: and what have you to oppose this force? What will then become of you and your rights? Will not absolute despotism ensue?”
~ Virgina Ratifying Convention, June 5, 1788
President Lincoln suspended habeus corpus and invoked martial law, so those precedents are already set. Various federal departments have been stockpiling billions of rounds of hollow point ammunition and armored personnel carriers. Mysterious camps are being constructed. Numerous top generals and admirals who do not pass Obama’s litmus test are being forced to retire. There are many other disturbing signs.
We have two and a half more years in Obama’s current term. All it would take during that time is a crisis du jour, and we could literally have a tyrant. Think it’s impossible?
Forget the talk of wind farms….
Wheat farms, corn farms, dairy farms, hay farms, oat farms, vegetable farms —
ALL farms depend upon oil and its derivative products to plow, seed, harvest, and market their products.
Ban oil and gas? The end result is a ban on food.
Idiot^2
Stephen Rasey says:
July 5, 2014 at 3:19 pm
We have two and a half more years in Obama’s current term. All it would take during that time is a crisis du jour, and we could literally have a tyrant. Think it’s impossible?
—————————————————————————————————————————
Sadly no.
I have been saying for a while that the 22nd amendment has a real possibility of being toast. Neither the POTUS, Congress or the SCOTUS has heeded the constitution for the last 20 years in particular (but since Teddy Roosevelt in particular to one degree or another with Woodrow Wilson and Roosevelt II pushing the envelope to the edges) so what makes anyone think there won’t be a crisis real, imagined or contrived that will throw the whole lot out. The “immigration crisis” is just another brick in the Progressive wall. I wish, hope and pray I am being paranoid. Yet I still have faith in the concept of America. This coming from a Canadian.
This from Willis:
“””””…..After watching George Bush, Obama’s position on limiting executive power was one of the reasons I voted for him in 2008 … back before I realized that if Obama’s lips were moving, there were non-zero odds that he was lying, as in this case. Which is one of the reasons why I voted against him in 2012……”””””
As I recall, George Bush was not a Presidential candidate in 2008.
So whatever he did to incur your wrath; would have no effect after the end of his second terms.
It is very easy to get tyrants into office; nearly impossible (historically) to remove them from office.
We have to endure more than two more years, of this one, who was voted into power by people who chose him over George Bush, in 2008. A simple reading of “Rules for Radicals” by Saul Alinski, should have educated anybody to just who exactly Barack Obama is.
US citizens get the government they deserve. But their children, and grand children Won’t be thanking them for what they’ve been saddled with.
Its is an American trait to long for presidents who are outsiders… to the point that we are susceptible to the candidate with no history who is presented with great fanfare. An excellent fictional exposition of this phenomena by an observant “outsider” would be novella and movie of the same name: “Being There”.
Now that we have no objective mainstream press, the country is as susceptible to the “invention” of a candidate from whole cloth… and the unwarranted destruction of a candidate with the potential for good works… as any cold-war era Soviet bloc country. It happened in 2008 and 2012 and could well happen again.
Idiot ^ Infinity
“””””…..RobRoy says:
July 5, 2014 at 1:40 pm
The defense against tyranny is THE reason We, The People enjoy the right to bears arms and form a militia. The second amendment exists to guarantee that we Americans can stand up to OUR OWN GOVERNMENT.
The second amendment to the US Constitution has nothing to do with hunting……”””””
It also has nothing to do with militias.
The second amendment simply says. “The right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed. ”
Nothing in the rules of English grammar, causes all that gobbledegook about “a well regulated militia” to alter the meaning (in any way), of the above simple statement.
At best the militia bit, is simply a reason the framers offered for the second amendment. It is not a conditional appendage.
They could have said: The sun rising in the East, in a free state, The right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” The meaning is exactly the same; the reason given is different. (and irrelevant).
And note the use of the word “infringed”. In the First Amendment they say “abridged.”.
In my world, “infringed” means don’t even mess with the edges of this directive.
“Abridged” means rewrite War and Peace, for the Classic Comics, but don’t change it too much.
Note also that the second amendment’s “the people”, is exactly the same “the people”, as are guaranteed the right to peaceably assemble, to petition the government for redress off grievances, in the first amendment; just a couple of dozen words earlier.
The first amendment doesn’t mean that a well regulated militia has freedom of speech and religion, etc. It’s …..THE PEOPLE….in both amendments.
Bart says:
July 5, 2014 at 2:34 pm
Bart’s revisionist history satisfies him. Not me. I remember the 50’s and 60’s. I remember telling Barry Goldwater personally (a friend of Dad’s who was chosen as one of the few journalists who accompanied him during the presidential campaign and of friend of mine through ham radio) that I would not vote for him because of his voting against the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Most of the bigot Democrats, the Dixiecrats, became Republicans. I lived through it Bart. Dad was a friend of Nixon’s too, and though I didn’t personally know him, I know a lot about the Southern strategy from my Dad as well as from much study.
The Republicans are not the good guys. The Democrats are not the good guys. Politicans are ambitious and like the rest of us, flawed. Power corrupts everybody. Many, like Lester Brown and Holdren and so many others in both parties and many here are fanatics who probably believe their half truths and their doomsday messages- about climate change, about government, about liberals, about conservatives. So what else is new!
“””””……Pamela Gray says:
July 5, 2014 at 7:36 am
Willis and I have this in common. We both voted for Obama in ’08 and for the exact same reasons (I am still not a fan at all of Bush the son primarily due to the fact he has no military acumen whatsoever). ……”””””
And you voted for Obama because he does ???
Bush sr was a Navy pilot (WW-II)
Bush jr was an ANG fighter pilot (F-102). You don’t get to wash the tires on one of those, without some military acumen.
This thread is just too depressing; and unbelievable too.
Doug Allen,
Barry Goldwater had the right idea. A couple of his quotes:
And:
We need someone like that now.
dbstealey
Yea team!
Pity that Goldwater got pulled down over his comments about using nukes.
Nowadays I recognise that really he probably got pulled down because the left felt he was too dangerous to their cause.
It has happened a lot in my country as well, especially recently.
Cheers
Roger
http://www.thedemiseofchristchurch.com
Let him ban the sale of oil and coal and start the countdown to the end of his presidency.
Do it right now. 5, 4, 3….
It takes a moron to fight a moron.
dbstealey says:
July 5, 2014 at 5:08 pm
Barry Goldwater was a very decent guy- yes. I wasn’t tearing Goldwater dowm, just showing Bart where the Republicans were in 1965 with their southern strategy. Barry Goldwater wanted to vote for the Voting Rights Act of 1965- he told me so- but couldn’t get nominated by the Republican Party if he did! I loved Barry. He put my Christmas American Flier train set together Christmas eve, 1947, when my folks couldn’t. But I had been to Birmingham, Alabama, a few years earlier. I loved civil rights more! Remember, there were poll taxes; there were Knights of the KKK cross burnings; there were kids being kept out of school and college; there were freedom riders being killed; there were linchings, and the party of Abraham Lincoln,-where was it? Tryying to prevent passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Both parties had extemists just as both parties do now, extremists who set the agenda. As for Barry Goldwater’s mostly libertarian leanings- yes, we need that now. We need both center right and center left.
What happended to my reply to dbstealey 5 minutes ago?
…was one of the reasons I voted for him in 2008 …
Willis,
Very disappointing. I thought you were a lot smarter than that. It did not take a rocket scientist to figure out what kind of person Obama was, even in 2007. But then again he did fool half of the voters in 2008.
Here come the rolling protest aginst Obama policy: http://www.businessinsider.com/conservatives-purposely-making-cars-spew-black-smoke-2014-7
Pamela Gray says:
July 5, 2014 at 7:36 am
You supposed that Obama had military acumen?
Interesting.
Acquired as the red diaper baby of Communists, or while a drug dealer in Hawaii, a radical student at Occidental or Columbia, a law student at Harvard, a community organizer in Chicago, a “present” state legislator in Springfield, a Marxist adjunct lecturer & owner of a house bought by Saddam’s bagman & his wife’s no-show “job” or a two year junior senator in DC, both years spent running for president?
The F-102 was far more dangerous to fly than today’s combat aircraft. Compared to the F-102’s lifetime accident rate of 13.69, today’s planes generally average around four mishaps per 100,000 hours. Compare the F-16 at 4.14, F-15 at 2.47, F-117 at 4.07, S-3 at 2.6, & F-18 at 4.9.
Even the Marine Corps’ AV-8B, regarded as the most dangerous aircraft in US service today, has a lifetime accident rate of only 11.44 mishaps per 100,000 flight hours.
The F-102 claimed the lives of many pilots, including a number stationed at Ellington during Bush’s tenure. Of the 875 F-102A production models that entered service, 259 were lost in accidents that killed 70 Air Force & Air National Guard pilots.
I have no love for the policies of either Bush, but respect their military service.
RobRoy says:
July 5, 2014 at 1:40 pm
“People” means the same thing in the 2nd Amendment that it does in the rest of the Constitution.
Marc says:
July 5, 2014 at 1:23 pm
My congratulations, go to the head of the class.
w.
Bryan A says:
July 5, 2014 at 9:08 am
“However, there is legislation being brought before the States by such groups as WOLF-PAC and Citizens for Self-Governance calling for an Article V convention (Constitutional Convention) to make alterations and additions to the existing 27 ammendments. Yes that is correct, all 27 would be up for grabs including the 3 listed above. An article V convention could be utilized to keep the currently seated executive in power.”
————————————————————————————————————————
First off, I do not know about WOLF-PAC so no comment on them.
Article V is not a “Constitutional Convention” as you call it. It is, quoting Article V: “a Convention for proposing Amendments”. Yes any amendment can be proposed, including amendments to cancel Amendments already ratified. So there appears to be a danger here. However, any proposed amendments must be first passed out of the Convention then 3/4 of State legislatures must ratify any of those proposed amendments in order for them to become part of the Constitution or to be stricken therefrom. There is too much disagreement on most of the proposed amendments for them to make it all the way to being approved by 3/4 of the States. I would not fear any cancellation of current Amendments by this Convention for the same reason. As I stated earlier, the main amendment proposed will be term limits on Senators and Representatives. That one is sure to make it out of the Convention and would most likely be approved by at least 3/4 of the States. And that is the most important thing we could do because we need to make sure members of Congress can no longer entrench themselves there for an extended period.
Placing unwarranted fear about “what if they cancel this or that Amendment” is just a propaganda pitch by those who are in power and do not want this to happen.
My information has it that Florida and Alaska both have passed the application. 3 down but still a long way to go.
.