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Turley upholds the … republic?
This showed up this morning [emphasis added]:
TURLEY AGREES TO SERVE AS LEAD COUNSEL FOR HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES IN CONSTITUTIONAL CHALLENGE
November 17, 2014 by jonathanturleyAs many on this blog are aware, I have previously testified, written, and litigated in opposition to the rise of executive power and the countervailing decline in congressional power in our tripartite system. I have also spent years encouraging Congress, under both Democratic and Republican presidents, to more actively defend its authority, including seeking judicial review in separation of powers conflicts. For that reason, it may come as little surprise this morning that I have agreed to represent the United States House of Representatives in its challenge of unilateral, unconstitutional actions taken by the Obama Administration with respect to implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). It is an honor to represent the institution in this historic lawsuit and to work with the talented staff of the House General Counsel’s Office. As in the past, this posting is meant to be transparent about my representation as well as my need to be circumspect about my comments in the future on related stories….
To which I left the following response:
There is the right cause, and there is the right timing. By taking on this issue at this time, you may believe that you are ironing out the wrinkles in the Constitution, but, Mr. Turley, I assure you that you are, rather, shining the jackboots of the far greater threat.
Principled to a fault, some would call it.
While I applaud your principles, in light of the most vicious legislative castration of a sitting president on record, and the greatest abrogation of congressional duty ever seen in our Republic, your tunnel vision leads to the inescapable conclusion that I am utterly disgusted by the principals you would aid and abet.
Nearly as disgusted as I am at your myopic rationalizations.
But hey, you’re a lawyer. What else could be expected? Sanity?
You see, I can agree with Mr. Turley in the abstract, but in the present, pragmatic universe, this is Republican Confederate piling on, reinforcing the false impression that “Obama is shredding the Constitution” when his predecessors — going back AT LEAST to St. Ronald of Ray Gun, have engaged in far more egregious behavior, and far more blatant trampling of congressional prerogatives.
The “co-equal” branch of government can’t, evidently, protect itself, and needs the Scalia Court to return us to the pastoral wonderland that was pre-Industrial America.
Those realities TRUMP the “principles” that Mr. Turley espouses, especially when you consider that he will be representing the SINGLE WORST CONGRESS EVER, and the single most PURCHASED congress ever in its breach of faith of ITS duties.
But legal minds are trained to ignore these fascist realities in favor of narrow and pie-in-the-sky “principles” that can be rationalized to the dying day of the shyster who believes that this serves the cause of justice ….
By piling on in the governmental lynching of the GOP’s enemy, the N-word in the White House. (their quiet characterization, not mine).
Shame on you, Jonathan Turley. Eternal shame and your consolation prize is that, no matter what the outcome of the “historic” case, your place is history will be assured.
Not fair, perhaps, but guilt by association can end up being just guilt.
Launder them sheets, boys. Turley’s on the case.
Oh, save our purchase of the government
by muzzling and hobbling the President, Mr. Turley!
Or, you can turn coat on the nation while thinking that the untimely defense of ONE of its principles is acting in a patriotic manner.
[Now, before you comment, please understand that it is possible to do the right thing at the wrong time. (Consider Lindberg’s leading the movement to keep us out of World War II.) An inability to understand this distinction will be deemed an inability to make a comment that requires response. Thx.]
Courage.
A writer, published author, novelist, literary critic and political observer for a quarter of a quarter-century more than a quarter-century, Hart Williams has lived in the American West for his entire life. Having grown up in Wyoming, Kansas and New Mexico, a survivor of Texas and a veteran of Hollywood, Mr. Williams currently lives in Oregon, along with an astonishing amount of pollen. He has a lively blog, His Vorpal Sword (no spaces) dot com.