Divider-in-Chief (29 page)

Obama nominated former Ohio attorney general Richard Cordray to direct the bureau in December 2011.
²⁶
Concerned about the amount of power Cordray would wield, the Senate refused to confirm him. This prompted Obama to make a recess appointment—only the Senate was not technically in recess at the time. Asked about his non-recess appointment of Cordray, Obama replied, “I refuse to take no for an answer. When Congress refuses to act and—as a result—hurts our economy and puts people at risk, I have an obligation as president to do what I can without them.”
²⁷

Obama's unconstitutional appointment of Cordray was not his only dubious appointment. Obama also installed three members to the National Labor Relations Board, the government agency charged with investigating and remedying unfair labor practices, without senatorial consent.

Former attorney general Edwin Meese wrote in a
Washington Post
op-ed that the non-recess recess appointments were a “breathtaking violation of the separation of powers and the duty of comity that the executive owes to Congress.”
²⁸
Meese also predicted that Obama's “flagrant violation of the Constitution not only will damage relations with Congress for years to come but will ultimately weaken the office of the presidency. There eventually may be litigation over the illegal appointments, but it will be a failure of government if the political branches do not resolve this injustice before a court rules.”
²⁹

Republican senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa accused Obama of acting “more and more like a king that the Constitution was designed to replace.” Grassley implored colleagues of both parties to fight against Obama's “power grabs.”
³⁰

A June 2012
Politico
story's headline summed up the Obama approach: “Obama's policy strategy: ignore laws.”
³¹
Liberal constitutional law scholar Jonathan Turley said:

What a transformation! Only four years ago, Obama presented himself as a reformer and a uniter, and as America's first post-partisan president. “I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for too long,” Obama announced just after winning the 2008 presidential election.

But after three and a half years in office, Obama has been exposed as just another self-interested Washington politician, and the most partisan and divisive president in our nation's history.

What would a second Obama term bring? Some liberals are concerned that Obama would move to the center to try and achieve as much as possible
with what is sure to be a fairly evenly divided Congress. But I suspect that, if re-elected, Obama will pursue a more ideological agenda, free from the moderating influence of a looming election.

In a June 2012
New Yorker
article, Ryan Lizza spoke with many top aides both in the Obama White House and in the re-election campaign and concluded, “Obama has an ambitious second-term agenda.”
³³
Lizza reports that Obama “has said that the most important policy he could address in his second term is climate change, one of the few issues that he thinks could fundamentally improve the world decades from now.”
³⁴

Lizza speculates that other items on Obama's second-term agenda include addressing nuclear proliferation, foreign aid, and, perhaps foremost, immigration reform.

If Obama wins, he'll be poised to make many critical decisions right away. As Lizza puts it, “His immediate task will be to settle more than a decade's worth of deferred arguments about how big the government should be and who should pay for it.”
³⁵
And make no mistake about it: he will settle it.

On January 1, 2013, a number of tax increases—the largest tax increase in American history—are scheduled to take place. A month later there will be a replay of the summer 2011 debate over the federal debt ceiling, as the president and Congress will again debate whether or not to raise the amount of money the federal government can borrow.

If Obama wins re-election, he will have won as a divider, not a uniter. As Lizza acknowledges:

But whether Obama wins or loses, the country he promised to unite, the nation he pledged to heal, will be far more deeply divided than on the day he took office in 2009. Obama's presidency has exposed the utter fraud of his once inspiring mantra of “hope and change.”

F
or her confidence in me, I would like to thank Marjorie Ross—a role model, mentor, and friend. Thank you to all the wonderful professionals at Regnery Publishing, particularly Harry Crocker, Mary Beth Baker, Alberto Rojas, and Karen Woodard.

My great thanks go to Daniel Allott, whose help has been instrumental in making this book a reality. He is a brilliant conservative who is making major contributions to traditional values and freedom in this country. He has been a joy to work with on this project.

I am truly thankful to Ron Robinson, one of the greatest unsung heroes of the conservative movement, and all my friends and colleagues at Young America's Foundation. This group is doing the heavy lifting of passing on a genuine understanding of liberty and free markets to the next generation. After working with this valiant organization in various capacities for the past twenty-two years, I can say without reservation that there is no group of individuals more dedicated to expanding liberty in our nation than the staff and board of Young America's Foundation and the Reagan Ranch. I
am thankful to Ron in particular for his wisdom, support, and most especially, his friendship.

Thank you to Michelle Easton and the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute for all their support. CBLPI encourages and promotes conservative women in the face of never-ending attacks, and I am the grateful beneficiary of their efforts. It has been a joy to work with Michelle and to witness her courageous work on behalf of women such as myself, enabling us to spread our message—that women can indeed be conservative, traditional, and strong—to young women on college campuses and beyond.

For their encouragement and advice, thank you to Dr. Burt Folsom, Peter Schweizer, Wynton Hall, Tim Phillips, Audrey Jackson, Stephen K. Bannon, Dan Fleuette, Jason Mattera, S. E. Cupp, and Alyssa Cordova.

Thanks to Sean Hannity, Neil Cavuto, and all the great Americans at Fox News who have allowed me a forum.

Thank you to my precious circle of friends and prayer warriors—Leigh Ann, Christine, Allison, Nicole, Elizabeth, Dana, Angie, Nancy, and Andrea. Thank you to Michael for encouraging me to take the plunge.

My warmest thanks go to my family, Mark, Suzanne, Anne, Steve, Dodie, and Jim, and especially, to the quintessential example of gracious strength, Mom—who is forever encouraging me to “say something!” Ok, Mom. I did.

It's impossible to thank my father, since he's not here, but I do. With all my heart.

Finally, if my children didn't give the thumbs up for me to pursue this book, I never would have done it. They knowingly make the sacrifice of not having mom's full attention and time. But they are generous souls, my unwavering encouragers, and, I'm proud to say, emerging stalwarts for freedom. They “get” what's on the line: the future of their liberty. And they believe it is worth fighting for. So to Henry, Paul, Stone, and Lucy: Thank you. I love you.

1
Rick Klein, “Obama: I Think Same-Sex Couples Should Be Able to Get Married,” ABC News, May 9, 2012.

2
Jeff Mason, “Obama Talks Gay Marriage at George Clooney Fundraiser,” Reuters, May 11, 2012.

3
“Obama Slams GOP, Calls Tax Deal Politically Realistic,” CNN, December 7, 2010.

4
Janie Lorber, “The Early Word: Financial Forays,”
New York Times
The Caucus, April 26, 2010.

5
Ben Smith and Jonathan Martin, “Obama Plan: Destroy Romney,”
Politico
, August 9, 2011.

6
Ibid.

7
Ibid.

8
Noam Scheiber, “From Hope to Hardball,”
New Republic
, April 20, 2012.

1
President Barack Obama, “Inaugural Address,” January 20, 2009.

2
Illinois Senator Barack Obama, “Keynote address at the Democratic National Convention,” July 27, 2004.

3
Barack Obama,
The Audacity of Hope
(Random House, 2006), 11.

4
“Candidates Tout Their Electability in 2008,” Reuters, November 30, 2007.

5
Barack Obama, “Our Time Has Come” speech,
CQ Transcripts Wire
, February 6, 2008.

6
Barack Obama, “Obama's Victory Speech,”
New York Times
, November 5, 2008.

7
Lydia Saad, “Obama Starts with 68% Job Approval,” Gallup, January 24, 2009.

8
“The 2008 Official Presidential General Election Results,” Federal Election Commission, January 22, 2009,
http://www.fec.gov/pubrec/fe2008/2008presgeresults.pdf
.

9
Ibid.

10
“2008 voter turnout,”
FactCheck.org
, January 8, 2009.

11
“Most Liberal, Most Conservative: 2007 Vote Ratings,”
National Journal
, March 8, 2008.

12
WSJ Staff, “Obama: ‘If They Bring a Knife to the Fight, We Bring a Gun,'”
Wall Street Journal
Washington Wire, June 14, 2008.

13
Saul Alinsky,
Rules for Radicals
(Vintage Books, 1989), 118–20.

14
Stanley Kurtz,
Radical-in-Chief
(Threshold Editions, 2010), 127.

15
Ibid., 359.

16
Ryan Lizza, “Barack Obama's unlikely political education,”
New Republic
, March 19, 2007.

17
David Remnick,
The Bridge
(Knopf, 2010), 294.

18
Jodi Kantor,
The Obamas
(Little, Brown and Company, 2012), 164.

19
Charles Hurt, “PREZ ZINGS GOP FOE IN A $TIMULATING TALK,”
New York Post
, January 23, 2009.

20
“Partisan Gap in Obama Job Approval Widest in Modern Era,” Pew Research Center, April 2, 2009.

21
“Obama's Approval Most Polarized for First-Year President,” Gallup, January 25, 2010.

22
Andrew Rafferty, “Marco Rubio calls Obama most ‘divisive figure' in US politics,”
MSNBC.com
First Read
, May 20, 2012.

23
Artur Davis, “A Response to Political Rumors,”
ArturDavis.com
, May 29, 2012.

24
Kantor,
The Obamas
, 109.

25
Ibid., 110–11.

1
David Remnick,
The Bridge
(Knopf, 2010), 207.

2
Ibid., 209.

3
Ibid.

4
Peter Wehner, “The Great Divider,”
Weekly Standard
, April 23, 2012.

5
Peter Wehner, “Barack Obama Political Hack,”
Commentary
, December 8, 2011.

6
Jonathan Alter,
The Promise
(Simon and Schuster, 2010), 129.

7
Frank James and Ben Meyerson, “Obama, with stimulus underway, warns mayors about waste,”
Los Angeles Times
, February 21, 2009.

8
Michael Sluss, “Obama throws political muscle to Deeds,”
Roanoke Times
, August 7, 2009.

9
Ibid.

10
Jake Tapper, “President Obama: Tax Cuts for Wealthy Are Republicans' ‘Holy Grail,'” ABC News, December 7, 2010.

11
Stephanie Condon, “Obama: Time to ‘eat our peas' and pass debt deal,” CBS News, July 11, 2011.

12
“Great procrastinators in history,”
The Daily Beast
.

13
Perry Bacon, Jr., “Obama's budget speech has partisan tone,”
Washington Post
, April 13, 2011.

14
Ibid.

15
Geneva Sands, “Obama: GOP field ‘must have been founding members of the Flat Earth Society,'”
The Hill,
March 14, 2012.

16
“Barack Obama's Kansas speech targets ‘fend for yourself ' stance of Republicans and corporations,”
London Guardian
, December 6, 2011.

17
Peter Wehner, “The Great Divider,”
Weekly Standard
, April 23, 2012.

18
“Obama: Massachusetts' Anger,” ABC News, January 20, 2010.