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By my count, President
Obama has appointed about 20 Czars in
his five months in office. Obama’s czars
report directly to him. These people are
supernumerary to the usual make up of a
presidential administration and assigned
to oversee a variety of agencies that
already exist within the government
bureaucracy.
Previous presidents have
had one or two czars, but haven’t gone
hog wild with them like this guy. Unlike
cabinet officers, they are neither
required to be approved by the Senate
nor accountable to anyone but the
president.
So far, Obama has
appointed a drug czar, a U.S. border
czar, an urban czar, a regulatory czar,
a stimulus accountability czar, an Iran
czar, a Middle East czar, a czar for
both Afghanistan and Pakistan, an
Infotech czar, a Faith-based czar, a
Health reform czar, TARP czar, a
Non-proliferation czar, a Guantanamo
closure czar, a Great Lakes czar and is
planning to anoint a pay czar in the
near future. Obama has more czars than
Russia ever had. I expect there’ll be a
Misery Czar before long to enforce a
uniform sharing of fairness--and misery.
This president is all about what is
"fair."
Senator Robert Byrd, a
crusty old partisan who usually defends
the most indefensible activities of his
fellow Democrats, isn’t at all happy
with the new czar system. In a letter to
Obama he wrote, “The rapid and easy
accumulation of power by White House
staff can threaten the constitutional
system of checks and balances.” Byrd
quoted from a House study from the
Watergate era regarding Nixon
appointees, which stated:
"Whatever their other
duties and roles, each of these
individuals, as White House personnel,
held a high degree of political immunity
from accounting for their activities
before Congressional Committees. The
shadow of executive privilege beclouded
normal accountability
arrangements." Most people know that
Senator Byrd was a Grand Kleagle or
something like that in the KKK before
getting into national politics. It’s
possible that his previous affiliation
may have something to do with his
criticism of the dark one in chief.
Most of the other
Democrats are saying little and nodding
their heads in the affirmative direction
lest they say something that displeases
our new super-czar lest they appear to
disagree with his sweeping changes in
government. Perhaps they fear a new czar
will be appointed to keep track of
wavering Democrats that aren’t toeing
the mark.
The so-called Mainstream
Media are mostly quiet about all these
czars. To find critics of czarmania, one
must either go to the Fox News Channel
or the Internet where there are plenty
of political pundits that owe no loyalty
to the current administration.
Writing about a pay czar
in the Fox Forum, Dan Gainor, VP for the
Media Research Center’s Vice President
for Business and Culture said, “In
“Fiddler on the Roof,” the hero Tevye
sang of how he wished he were wealthy.
“If I Were a Rich Man” became a Broadway
and movie favorite as a catchy tune and
even catchier sentiment. As the
struggling Russian peasant explained,
“It’s no shame to be poor, but it’s no
great honor either.”
No, today, the shame is
being rich, and President Obama seems
determined to bestow the ‘honor’ of
poverty on as many as possible. Forget
the horrendous tax-and-spend policies
that gradually impoverish us all.
Obama’s new target is a direct one – the
evil, greedy CEO. To do so, he is set to
appoint Kenneth Feinberg as his new ‘Pay
Czar’….. The New York Times portrayed it
as a new offensive against CEOs earning
more than Obama likes, saying the
administration is taking action as ‘part
of a broad set of regulations on
executive compensation expected to be
announced by the administration as early
as this week.’”
Having people roaming
around and meddling with various aspects
of government, people with allegiance
only to the president, reminds me a
little of totalitarian regimes. Since
the Obama administration seems to have
an affinity for Russian job titles, it
would be more truthful if these czars
were renamed commissars.
This country was set up
as a way to escape the tyranny of kings
and dictators. The plan balanced power
between three branches of government.
This we call checks and balances. Czars
are not part of the arrangement.
Combining all this power into the oval
office appears to be bringing us
dangerously close to an all powerful
ruler, rather than a leader. None of his
former colleagues in congress have the
courage to stand up to this patent power
grab.
As a blogger who calls
himself “The Historian” wrote in “The
Real World” the other day, “Here is the
ugly truth: Barack Obama is nobody
special. He is proving to be a
self-serving, self-absorbed elitist who
very mistakenly believes he knows better
than the rest of us. But his ongoing
accumulation of power is just another
example of his Chicago "mob rule"
mindset. The wild eyed far left screamed
about this idea during the Bush years.
They are silent on the matter today.
If this nation is not
careful, all those little czars will
eventually lead to tyranny.”
I, for one, am more than
a little uneasy about what appears to be
too much power being accumulated by one
man, too fast.
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