BY CHRISTOPHER G. ADAMO – One nightmarish chapter of the Obama/Reid/Pelosi has mercifully ended. The “lame duck” debacle is at last at an end. And America waits expectantly to see if all of the efforts of the grassroots to begin the work of restoring the nation hold any promise of paying off.
Admittedly, the options of the incoming Congress are limited, since both the Senate and the White House remain in the clutches of the left, at least for the next two years. However, some promising signs indicate that soon-to-be House Speaker John Boehner (R.-OH) and his decisive majority of House Republicans are acutely aware of the forces that propelled their political fortunes last November. And if they continue in their present course, they may well set the stage for another rout of the remaining leftists in 2012. Real America would do well to actively support them or, if necessary, occasionally remind them to stay fixed on the principles that rallied the nation’s heartland in 2009 and 2010.
For starters, Speaker Boehner intends to implement a policy that will require any new proposed legislation to reference the portion of the United States Constitution which authorizes it as a legitimate governmental function. Without such an explanation, it will not be considered for further advancement through the legislative process.
It may be much more difficult than Boehner currently expects to implement a policy of this nature and magnitude. Once enacted, its implications reach far beyond the House of Representatives. Undoubtedly, the Democrat controlled Senate would despise and disdain any such limitation on their regular abuses of power. Seeing one of their own duly passed bills declared “dead on arrival” in the House for lack of constitutional standing would both outrage and humiliate them. But how could they openly admit as much if evaluating proposed legislation by such an unassailable standard were indeed official House policy? Their only recourse would then be to attempt to make the case that it should pass, regardless of an unconstitutional nature
In a similar vein, the new Congress intends to have the Constitution read in its entirety at the opening of the session. While this move may be largely symbolic, it represents a clear admission by the Republican majority that much (if not all) of the current catastrophe of creeping socialism, and the economic disaster that has predictably accompanied it, are symptomatic of a government that has willfully ignored the restraints wisely placed on it by the Founders.
More significantly however, after having made such a gesture, Speaker Boehner would face enormous repercussions, were he to then backtrack on those constitutional principles he committed to after having them proclaimed from the well of the House. In essence, he is knowingly cutting off any avenues of “escape,” for himself and his Republican coalition, if they are ever again tempted to revert to Washington “business as usual.”
By the inherent worthiness of Boehner’s action, Republicans in the Senate are offered an effective weapon, and an opportunity by which to overcome their lingering minority status, if they have a mind to do so. As laws are proposed and judges and cabinet members nominated for Senate consideration during the remaining two years of Barack Obama’s current term, Republican Senators will be enabled to remind their Democrat counterparts of the immutable standard which they have taken an oath to uphold and defend.
Thereafter, no judicial nominee should receive a single Republican vote of confirmation, if he or she does not have a provable track record of venerating and supporting constitutional law. And none of Obama’s “hope and change” should enjoy Senate support without likewise remaining within the framework on which the nation was established.
This policy would, of course, deal an immediate death blow to Obamacare, along with “Cap and Trade” and a host of other illicit actions by the current administration that were sanctioned by the former Congress, often with too much “Republican” participation. So now, let them attempt to continue brazenly advocating a continuation of these excesses despite their being constitutionally unsupportable.
No doubt, a few hard-leftists may still do so (Nancy Pelosi’s unreserved contempt for the whole concept was a major deciding factor for many Americans who voted her party out in last fall’s elections). Others, who are not so ideologically obsessed, will recognize how far out of the mainstream they appear, and as with the Bush tax cuts that were recently extended by a Democrat dominated Congress, under pressure from a Democrat White House, they will be forced to shift to the right.
Of course this whole exercise may quickly degenerate if the House GOP leadership is not diligent to maintain it, or if its current champions were never serious about doing so in the first place. Look for a likely cadre of “RINO” Republicans to join Democrats in justifying more outlandish behavior, by offering tepid and oblique “constitutional” references to “promoting the general welfare,” the Interstate Commerce Clause, and other select passages of the document that have been excessively and perversely employed to justify government actions that were never initially intended or authorized. Such antics, if they do occur, need to be immediately and stridently called out and stopped.
Republicans will either get serious about preserving and protecting their nation from the liberal onslaught that threatens it, or they will cower and hide from such difficult issues in the face of media ridicule, only offering transparent attempts at pandering to the conservative base during the waning days of the 2012 election cycle. But the time for empty promises has passed. America will no longer accept last minute platitudes if the GOP does not come through in the next twenty-four months.
Meanwhile, three cheers for Speaker to be John Boehner, the new Republican House majority, and their determination to put the United States Constitution back where it belongs at front and center. If they stay true, Obama and the Democrats will spend this session completely on the defensive. It is a good start.