Back in September, Joy Behar of The View infamously declared that Senators Joe Manchin (D-W.V.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) were “enemies of the democracy” for preventing the Biden administration’s agenda from passing the Senate.
“Manchin and Sinema must be brought to task! They are the enemies right now of the democracy,” Behar added. “Yes, we have a great democracy, but it is really on life support right now because of these two people!”
Sadly, this is typical of the left, who see government checks and balances on absolute power as a problem with our constitutional republic. They are more than willing to use their power of impeachment on Trump twice over bogus allegations, but they can’t seem to fathom a scenario where the system doesn’t work for them 100% of the time. Democrats in the Senate routinely used the filibuster to obstruct judicial nominees of Republican presidents while they were in the minority before nuking the filibuster to prevent the GOP from doing the same thing,
Even Democrat presidents have been enemies of the system they swore an oath to abide by.
Barack Obama, for example, felt that it was his right to impose his agenda unilaterally if Congress couldn’t pass it. “We are not just going to be waiting for legislation in order to make sure that we’re providing Americans the kind of help that they need,” Obama said in January 2014, after Republicans took back control of the Senate. “I’ve got a pen, and I’ve got a phone,” he added. Obama ultimately created DACA via executive action after the DREAM Act wouldn’t pass Congress.
If that’s how our government was supposed to work, then why have a congress at all?
Unfortunately, Joe Biden seems determined to exceed Obama when it comes to abuses of power. On Monday, the White House urged businesses to go forward with its vaccine mandate even though a federal court blocked it last week.
“We think people should not wait,” White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Monday. “We say, do not wait to take actions that will keep your workplace safe. It is important and critical to do and waiting to get more people vaccinated will lead to more outbreaks and sickness.”
“We’re trying to get past this pandemic, and we know the way to do that is to get people vaccinated,” Jean-Pierre added.
So, the court ruling doesn’t matter to them. This isn’t a shocking move on their part, as the Biden administration has shown that it cares little about the judicial branch’s checks over their authority. In August, Joe Biden defied a Supreme Court ruling and issued a unilateral 60-day eviction moratorium via the CDC. The Supreme Court had ruled that any extension of the moratorium would have to be passed by Congress first.
This is how Biden thinks he can govern. Unilaterally. Congressional approval is not required. Constitutionality is irrelevant. As long as the Biden administration feels it’s doing the right thing, it can do whatever it wants. Not only does Biden have a pen and a phone, but court rulings are now obsolete.
The Constitution wasn’t designed to be convenient for the president. In fact, the Founding Fathers didn’t want the president to have too much power, hence the three branches of government and the system of checks and balances. By repeatedly flouting Congress and the courts, Biden is violating his oath of office.
