King Obama

Photo by TravelingMan

A couple of days ago, Tony Blankley performed one of those truly amazing logical contortions that only conservatives can pull off, using Barack Obama’s eminently reasonable statement that:

We can’t drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK.  That’s not leadership. That’s not going to happen.

…to argue:

Is there absolutely no curiosity… about the assertion… that letting Americans eat as much as they want is "not going to happen?" Doesn’t that shockingly dictatorial assertion deserve comment and inquiry?

Yes, it is true that Mr. Obama was explicitly saying that what wasn’t going to happen was "other countries [saying] OK" to Americans eating as much as we want. But a fair reading of the whole passage suggests that Mr. Obama agrees with those other countries. And as president, what exactly would he try to do regarding Americans who want to eat as much as they want (or drive SUVs or set their own thermostat)?

Dictator or democrat? Radical or liberal? Who in the world is this man? Where in the world is the responsible media? What’s going on?

So…  Blankley willfully misinterprets Obama’s statement to claim that Obama has dictatorial tendencies, then admits that he misinterpreted it, but then claims to be right anyway.  Breathtaking.

But Blankley is right about one thing: When he takes office, Obama will be a dictator.  Whether he wants it or not, all the unchecked, ill-gotten executive power that BushCo. has accumulated over the last eight years will flow to him like he’s Highlander beheading the last Immortal.  President Obama will begin his term as one of the most powerful executives since FDR, and with almost as big a mess to clean up.

And how did Dubya obtain all this power?  Congress gave it to him, freely and willingly, continuing to do so long after the toxic fog of 9/11 lifted.  And it wasn’t just Republicans, there were lots of Democrats pitching in, too.  Hell, some of them are still trying to help Bush out even now, when he’s the lamest of lame ducks and the unpopularest of unpopular preznits. Who knows, some of them may even help with his next attempt to legislate away habeas corpus.

But what if it’s not weakness?  What if the cunning Democrats actually planned all this out, knowing that no ordinary mortal president could fix everything BushCo. broke, and also knowing that Dubya and his minions would make such complete asses of themselves that a Democrat couldn’t possibly fail to get elected president this year.  So by pretending to be weak, the pro-executive power Democrats assured themselves of a mighty Superpresident in 2009, with the extraconstitutional superpowers necessary to right the wrongs, punish the wicked, and stop the country from going over the cliff.

Or they could just be a bunch of clueless chickenshits.

NOTE: The preceding is satire, and is not meant to endorse unchecked presidential power in any way.  If you are a Democratic president experiencing unchecked presidential power lasting more than four weeks, consult a constitutional scholar immediately.

(h/t Think Progress, by way of dakine)

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