This has been a busy couple of months in politics. There are of course the various healthcare bills crawling their way through Congress. The House of Representatives managed to pass a short bill that may or may not get passed in the senate, and may or may not address climate change. And didn’t a Supreme Court justice retire not that long ago?
The point is, it’s been busy, and following everything that goes on, on a day to day basis, isn’t easy. There’s a lot to read, a lot to keep track of, and as much as anyone tries to stay ahead of everything, we all have our pet subjects or causes.
I think we can all agree that thus far, Obama has done and continues to do a reasonable job meeting our expectations, given the grand promises of change and progress the nation got behind so forcefully last November. He’s certainly doing his part from the bully pulpit to move healthcare through the gridlock of Congress. I for one was particularly happy with a few of the reversals his administration has made to last-minute Bush policies, such as the EPA’s denial of California’s automobile emissions waiver. He has dropped the ball in a couple of places, foremost on many minds in the area of civil rights for homosexuals. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell? Defense of Marriage Amendment? Yeah, I’m kind of surprised, and more than kind of peeved, that they’re still on the books.
But there’s something else that had been in the back of my mind, something I’d read a little bit on here and there, something that Ed Brayton has been on top of from day one. He called it out here most recently, and a number of diarists have mentioned the issue as well. I'm talking about the fact that that the Obama administration seems to be following in W’s footsteps when it comes to executive power. Most recently, they’re claiming power over supposedly independent oversight under the same theory of executive power, that of the "unitary executive," that the Bush administration espoused. There’s plenty more on the subject at the above link, so I won’t go into more detail on that here.
Allow me to get around to my point: Why isn’t anyone calling the Obama administration on this? Ok, that’s not a completely fair question, because there are obviously a few people that have been doing their homework, or else I wouldn’t have heard about it. What I really mean is, for a significant part of Bush’s second term, there was a constant hum, as low-volume as it may have been, of displeasure and unease revolving around his sweeping executive powers claims. As best I can tell, that has all but vanished with Obama in office, despite many of the same practices and claims remaining in place.
Full disclosure: I was a big old fan of criticizing Bush et al. for what I perceived (and still do) as abuses of power. Signing statements, noncompliance with oversight, disregarding Congressional subpoena power, there’s a lot to talk about. Furthermore, I’m of the opinion that it is absolutely imperative that these abuses are investigated, and if illegal acts were committed, as I and many others suspect, that the appropriate sentences be imposed. However, one can’t really expect administration B to prosecute administration A when administration B does the same things for which administration A would be prosecuted, or at the very least is using the same legal theories that would be invalidated should arrests be made.
I fully acknowledge that right now, there are probably more important things to focus on (the economy, climate, ending a war or two) than whether or not the past or present administrations were/are properly complying with Congressional oversight, and to some degree I believe that the "we have to look forward" line has just a tiny bit of merit. But, I do have to ask myself one question: If the Obama continues to claim executive powers above and beyond those constitutionally mandated, and acts on those claims, am I going to support the prosecution of members of his administration as much as I now support the prosecution of Bush’s?