31 July 2013 –
“With an endless parade of distractions,
political posturing and phony scandals, Washington has taken its eye off the
ball,” President Obama
said during his 24 July economic speech given at Knox College,
Illinois. What is phony about these scandals: the Benghazi debacle and
cover-up; the IRS’s partisan abuse of tax collection authority; the NSA’s rapid
expansion of the collection, collation, and storage of Americans’ private phone
data; or, Fast ‘n Furious n’ Foolish gun running to Mexican drug cartels?
These are not phony, and they are seriously damaging our republic.
These “distractions”
are riding on a current of government expansion and intrusion flowing out from
the White House through many federal agencies. Whether the president launched
these expansions and intrusions deliberately, or whether federal agencies have
set their own courses is irrelevant. The results are murdered Americans,
abused First, Second, Fourth and Tenth Amendment rights, and a growing
recognition among normal Americans that there are even larger scandals: Partisanship,
placing group interests above the common good, and pursuing control for
control’s sake—all of which now seem to supercede honest impartiality in
cabinet and regulatory agency policy and action.
Governments accumulate
power, and government leaders always find ways to use that power. The
Founders wisely did not trust government, but tragically admitted that is was
necessary; they knew that individuals and groups would attempt to control government
in order to promote their interests. Therefore,
the Founders devised a governing structure that protected individual rights and
prevented one branch of the government—one particular interest group—from first
dominating the other two branches and from then dominating the nation. And,
our great democratic experiment began.
How are these checks
and balances functioning today? A big-government
liberal as president does not necessarily threaten our democracy or
our individual rights; the Founders ensured that Congress and the Court
could hobble his attempts at forcing big government into Americans’ lives. But, for the last century, Congress and the
Court have enabled the rise of a massive, permanent, regulatory bureaucracy in
the Executive Branch. Its power to restrict the actions of individual
citizens has expanded and intensified as it has pulled away from the
restraining controls of the other branches of government. What has made this a one-sided political
force is that the majority of employees in federal agencies have long been liberals
whose commitment to impartial, limited government is filtered through their
allegiance to their agency and often to the labor unions that ensure their
continued livelihood.
This independent,
liberal government within the executive branch is more dangerous to Americans’
personal liberties and to democracy than are any threats from outside our
borders. Sadly, an ensconced, self-serving government agency, such as the
IRS, NSA, or any other initialed group that comes with thousands of employees
and a funded mission, makes it almost impossible for any president to resist the
abuse of power. Sadly, President Bush’s
legacy of Compassionate Conservatism, for example, ultimately expanded the
regulatory state and added five trillion more dollars to the federal debt.
Recent events also show
that these agencies actually need little direct guidance from a liberal
president to intrude into Americans’ lives. Their day-to-day work—what
gives agency employees an identity and a mission—will almost always tend toward
a liberal, big government approach to dealing with the issues of the day. If many of these employees can intrude into
our lives, they will want to do it, and they will find a way to do it.
The fact that so many people in the IRS are being implicated in the targeting of
conservative groups for increased scrutiny, for example, tells me that the
agency does not honorably or impartially fulfill its charter and that it needs
to be overhauled.
Congress—both houses, both
sides of the aisle—must realize that its power as the legislative branch of
government is severely diminished by what has become a self-serving, fourth
branch of government. Members of Congress must spatially profile the
constitutional situation around them and must reestablish Congress as the preeminent
branch of government—the branch representing the people and the states.
They need to run the IRS scandal, the Benghazi scandal, the NSA scandal, and
the Fast ‘n Furious scandal down to their bitter ends. These efforts will
help restore individual rights, states’ rights, and limited federal intrusion
into our lives. That is what the Founders, in their pragmatic, tragic
view of the world, intended for our safety. Congress must act now—in our
interests and in its own.
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