I like the way the President has come out since his defeat. I'm a big fan of Harry Reid and hopes he wins Minority Speaker of the Senate as he deserves it but his preference on how Obama handles immigration reform now is simply wrong.
"Harry Reid supports Obama’s action on deportations, but wants him to wait for strategic reasons:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/15/reagan-bush-immigration-deportation_n_6164068.html
It's true that this could be seen as different as Congress was in wide agreement with the executive action at that time unlike today.
"It's a striking parallel," said Mark Noferi of the pro-immigration American Immigration Council. "Bush Sr. went big at the time. He protected about 40 percent of the unauthorized population. Back then that was up to 1.5 million. Today that would be about 5 million."
"Harry Reid supports Obama’s action on deportations, but wants him to wait for strategic reasons:
“The president has said he’s going to do the executive action — the question is when he can do it. It’s up to him,” Reid told reporters on Capitol Hill. “I’d like to get the finances of this country out of the way before he does it.” Reid added that he has expressed his view to Obama, but ultimately “it’s up to him.”
"The goal: To get Republicans to agree to fund the government for a year, so that if Obama acts, using government shutdown fights to roll it back is no longer an option. As best as I can determine, the White House has made no decision on timing."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2014/11/14/morning-plum-democrats-want-compromise-republicans-dont-thats-bad-for-democrats/
First of all, Obama has accepted many delays on immigration reform, and he had delayed it in June at the request of congressional Democrats who claimed if he did it then it would hurt their election chances. It turns out that him waiting till now helped their elections about as well as their decision to act as if the President suffers form cooties in their campaigns. I mean how much worse could it have been if Allison Grimes admitted to voting for Obama-or even knowing him-and Obama had taken executive action then rather than now?
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2014/11/democrats-find-operation-chicken-falls.html
I mean if he had taken action in June like he wanted how would things have been worse? In not one way I can think of. On the positive side of the ledger, millions of innocent children of immigrants would have been relieved of their suffering and our whole immigration system would be in much better shape-we could get accurate records of who's in our country, just for starters. You can add to that the benefit to GDP this would entail.
The choice turned out to be between losing the Senate and no immigration reform and losing the Senate but at least getting immigration reform and the Dems pushed Obama to take door number 1.
At this point, the President can't and shouldn't wait anymore. Is the GOP going to shut down the government or impeach him if he does this? Let them. I think this is a political argument the Dems should relish going into 2016. If the GOP breaks the promise of Mitch McConnell and does shut down the government, much less impeachment proceedings it's on them. I think if they do it I must assume they would have done it anyway, but, in any case it's great politics for Democrats going forward as the Latino community will have no doubt who their friends are and who they aren't.
So I hope Obama doesn't listen to Reid here, but what I do like is the President's whole posture post-election. Indeed, I call the IBD's piece about his 'defiance' as back handed praise-after all, they are his implacable enemy so for them to call him defiant I'll take as a compliment even though they link it to some imaginary resemblance of his to Saul Alinsky. Obama is about as radical as Donald Duck in reality.
http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/111414-726628-obama-embraces-anything-goes-decade-after-deploring-it.htm
I mentioned right after the election that the Very Serious Media-who's been nipping at his heals for years on his alleged 'failure to lead'-was very unhappy when he didn't beat his breasts and rub his own face in the dust over the election results.
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2014/11/what-washington-post-wants-from-obama.html
A week in the President is still doing no breast beating and this is being broadly noticed-just as IBD is noting it.
"Peter Baker looks at three big decisions (a climate deal with China; embracing Net Neutrality; and executive action on deportations) and concludes the White House is moving quickly to reassert Obama’s relevance after the electoral debacle:
Aides said Mr. Obama has concluded that he cannot let opposition from the other party stop him from advancing his priorities, and in his post-election comments, Mr. Obama predicted he would take actions that Republicans would not like. While White House advisers interpreted the election results as a mandate to work across the aisle, they said that cannot simply be a prescription for more gridlock where the president does nothing without Republican approval.
"Also see John Cassidy on how Obama is defying the media script, which requires him to respond to the election results by humbling himself and “publicly acknowledging his grave character flaws.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2014/11/14/morning-plum-democrats-want-compromise-republicans-dont-thats-bad-for-democrats/
Keep up the good work Mr. President.
UPDATE: Obama;s planned executive action of course is not unprecedented. When Reagan and then Bush Sr. took such action there was no political explosion. What's changed this time? The President is a Democrat, that's about all.
It's true that this could be seen as different as Congress was in wide agreement with the executive action at that time unlike today.
"It's a striking parallel," said Mark Noferi of the pro-immigration American Immigration Council. "Bush Sr. went big at the time. He protected about 40 percent of the unauthorized population. Back then that was up to 1.5 million. Today that would be about 5 million."
"But a lawyer who worked on the 1986 law and the 1990 follow-up as an aide to then-Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo., said Bush's action wasn't controversial because it came after lawmakers had made it clear they were going to tackle the issue."
"That's not the case now."
"Bush Sr. took the action that he did but it wasn't as if Congress was legislating anything to the contrary," said Carl Hampe of Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy. "What's different now is that there is no clear path to legislative relief for the class of beneficiaries for which the president's order would provide relief.
True. Still this doesn't make Obama's executive action any less legal. No matter how mawkish and shrill the GOP screams get here, the fact is that executive actions by the President are no less legal because Congress disagrees. Our system of government is checks and balances-to argue that there can be no checks on the GOP House is hardly democratic. Yes, they are very shrill by the way:
"The audacity of this president to think he can completely destroy the rule of law with the stroke of a pen is unfathomable to me," said GOP Rep. Steve King of Iowa, an outspoken opponent of relaxing U.S. immigration law. "It is unconstitutional, it is cynical, and it violates the will of the American people."
Again, it is not the least bit unconstitutional. Of course, the GOP never tires of crying wolf.
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