Two Centuries After Declaring Independence from England, Americans Again Live Under the Tyranny of a Totally Unrestrained Executive

A List of Obama's Abuses Straight from the Declaration of Independence

July 4, 2011

The Humble Libertarian - So let me get this straight: America declares its independence from England because of how much it sucks to live under the tyranny of a totally unrestrained executive, and now two centuries later we are again living... under the tyranny of a totally unrestrained executive?

Yes it's that bad. To prove it, I've taken selected excerpts from the litany of charges against the king in the Declaration of Independence and listed them below along with modern examples of President Obama doing the exact same things that led America to rebel against England:

Unchecked, Unaccountable Bureaucracy

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

One significant change that will forever characterize the Obama administration is its radical and unprecedented expansion of a policy that started in the Nixon administration -- the unconstitutional appointment of "czars" as "principle officers" of policy within the administration who answer solely to the president without the advice and consent of Congress. By most recent estimates, Obama has appointed 41 of these "czars" to high level posts within his administration.

It is exactly this kind of centralization of executive power, isolated from the advice, consent, and oversight of the people via their representatives that our Founding Fathers condemned the king for in the charge above. Before he died, even the Democrats' most senior senator, Robert Byrd, condemned Obama "czar strategy" as an unprecedented and illegal power grab that centralizes power in the executive, evades congressional oversight, and violates the separation of powers required by law in the Constitution.

Violating the Constitution, Ignoring the Law

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

President Obama's systematic dismantling of our form of government as duly-constituted in the supreme law of our land, the U.S. Constitution, is an incontestable matter of record.

In a lawless society, the powerful -- especially the government's reigning executive -- are free to abuse others at will for their own benefit. By the time of the American Revolution, English law had developed a set of constraints on executive power and a system of law perhaps unprecedented in human history to protect the people from such abuses. Our Founding Fathers had no patience for the king's dissolution of the rule of law and exercise of autocratic power.

Since assuming office, the president has illegally and unconstitutionally:

• loaned billions to the auto industry,
• unconstitutionally appointed dozens of czars as detailed above,
• illegally gave the czars the power to oversee and set policy for private enterprises,
• violated the Constitution with his appointment of Hillary Clinton,
• ignored both law and Constitution with his illegal bombing campaigns in Libya and other countries,
• violated multiple amendments in the Bill of Rights with his extension of the unconstitutional Patriot Act,
• suspended habeas corpus, and
• passed an unconstitutional law requiring citizens to purchase insurance policies against their will.

Eroding National Sovereignty

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

By his determined globalist efforts, President Obama has committed the very crimes listed above as a charge against the King of England. Though he did not seek Congressional approval for his illegal war in Libya, the president felt justified in his actions because he received consent from the United Nations and NATO. His words and actions exhibit an alarming contempt for our national sovereignty and a bold willingness to "subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution."

Wikileaks cables have also revealed how Obama's State Department -- led by its unconstitutional appointee, fmr Sen. Hillary Clinton -- has secretly intimidated other countries into signing the Copenhagen accords to radically restrict economic productivity by creating a global carbon regulation regime and subjecting Americans to its foreign and unconstitutional machinations.

Taxation Without Representation

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

President Obama's unprecedented spending binge is not merely indebting us, but future generations. He and the United States Treasury are taking out loans and incurring obligations at a rate that necessarily entails that future generations will be required to pay back those loans. Without their consent (or even their existence), President Obama is incurring tax obligations for future Americans. That is not a stretch; it is a mathematical reality and a political injustice. By spending so much borrowed money, the Obama Administration taxes and spends without consent.

We are also suffering taxation without representation or consent because so many of our large spending bills are now being crafted in secret, behind closed doors, by lobbyists and unelected bureaucrats, and then put to a vote mere hours after completion, before our representatives even have a chance to read the many hundreds of pages in them, which include placeholders for lobbyists, bureaucrats, and legislative aids to pencil in changes after the bills have been passed!

The Vast, Militarized Police State

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
...

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

The creation under President George W. Bush of the Department of Homeland Security was an astonishing development in American history. In addition to the introduction of the word "homeland" into the American political lexicon, a word borrowed from fascist states like Nazi Germany, this new department would represent an unprecedented expansion of the national police state. And under Obama, the TSA which it oversees, would ramp up the abuse to startling levels, serving as the regime's uniformed thugs to intimidate, humiliate, and habituate the American populace to unwarranted searches, unnecessary police actions, and unquestioning submission to government agents.

Our Founding Fathers rightfully feared and hated the king's use of military force on an unarmed populace to police and control them. Under Obama, this is happening all over again. Not only are unarmed, non-suspect civilians being searched, harassed, and abused just for daring to travel, but the FBI is increasingly carrying out armed drug raids (with one drug bust every 18 seconds in the U.S. according to FBI statistics) with militarized police, terrorizing families and households for violating Washington's unconstitutional and failed War on Drugs.

Increasingly, these militarized police are searching the wrong houses, serving incorrect warrants, and murdering the subjects of their searches with impunity.

Executive Usurpation of The Power to Wage War

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
...

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

A key complaint of our Founding Fathers against the King of England, was his increasing usurpation of the people's representatives in assuming for the executive, the power of waging war and ordering the military as he saw fit. Their wisdom would become evident in the next two centuries of human history, as those regimes with the power of war vested solely in the executive have been the most corrupt, oppressive, and violent. The people and their representative bodies should have the sole prerogative of taking a nation to war and employing the use of its military.

President Obama has actively undermined this important political principle (and constitutional imperative) with his illegal war in Libya, which violates Congress' War Powers Resolution and the U.S. Constitution itself, which gives Congress the power to declare war, not the president.

He has steadfastly refused to get Congressional authorization for this military action and has meanwhile launched a second air war in Somalia without the consent of Congress. In both cases, there was no clear and urgent threat to national security, and as a Senator, Obama himself said that taking such an action is illegal and unconstitutional.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.