November 6, 2014

What Republicans Must Do Now

Unlike the dog that chased the car until, to its consternation, he caught it, Republicans know what do with what they have caught. Having completed their capture of control of the legislative branch, they should start with the following six measures concerning practical governance and constitutional equilibrium: – Abolish the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This creature of the labyrinthine Dodd-Frank law violates John Locke’s dictum: “The legislative cannot transfer the power of making laws to any other hands. … The power of the legislative … [is] only to make laws, and not to make legislators.” The CFPB is empowered to “declare,” with no legislative guidance or institutional inhibitions, that certain business practices are “abusive.” It also embodies progressivism’s authoritarianism by being, unlike any entity Congress has created since 1789, untethered from all oversight mechanisms: Its funding, “determined by the director,” comes from the Federal Reserve.

Unlike the dog that chased the car until, to its consternation, he caught it, Republicans know what do with what they have caught. Having completed their capture of control of the legislative branch, they should start with the following six measures concerning practical governance and constitutional equilibrium:

– Abolish the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This creature of the labyrinthine Dodd-Frank law violates John Locke’s dictum: “The legislative cannot transfer the power of making laws to any other hands. … The power of the legislative … [is] only to make laws, and not to make legislators.” The CFPB is empowered to “declare,” with no legislative guidance or institutional inhibitions, that certain business practices are “abusive.” It also embodies progressivism’s authoritarianism by being, unlike any entity Congress has created since 1789, untethered from all oversight mechanisms: Its funding, “determined by the director,” comes from the Federal Reserve.

– Repeal the Independent Payment Advisory Board. This expression of the progressive mind is an artifact of the Affordable Care Act and may be the most anti-constitutional measure ever enacted. It certainly violates the first words of the first section of the first article of the Constitution: “All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress.” The IPAB’s purported function is to achieve the ACA’s purpose of cost containment by reducing Medicare spending. When the IPAB’s 15 presidential appointees make what the ACA calls a “legislative proposal” limiting reimbursements to doctors, this proposal automatically becomes law unless Congress passes a similar measure cutting Medicare spending. Under this constitutional travesty, an executive branch agency makes laws unless the legislative branch enacts alternative means of achieving the executive agency’s aim. The ACA stipulates that no measure for the abolition of the IPAB can be introduced before 2017 or after Feb. 1, 2017, and must be enacted by Aug. 15 of that year. So, one Congress presumed to bind all subsequent Congresses in order to achieve progressivism’s consistent aim – abolishing limited government by emancipating presidents from restraint by the separation of powers. This impertinence by the 111th Congress requires a firm rebuke by the 114th.

– Repeal the ACA’s tax on medical devices. This $29 billion blow to an industry that provides more than 400,000 jobs is levied not on firms’ profits but on gross revenues, and comes on top of the federal (the developed world’s highest) corporate income tax, plus state and local taxes. Enough Democrats support repeal that a presidential veto might be overridden.

– Improve energy, economic and environmental conditions by authorizing construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. The pipeline would reduce the risk of spills by reducing the transportation of oil in railroad tankers.

– Mandate completion of the nuclear waste repository in Nevada’s Yucca Mountain. The signature achievement of Harry Reid’s waning career has been blocking this project, on which approximately $15 billion has been spent. So, rather than nuclear waste being safely stored in the mountain’s 40 miles of tunnels 1,000 feet underground atop 1,000 feet of rock, more than 160 million Americans live within 75 miles of one or more of the 121 locations where 70,000 tons of waste are stored.

– Pass the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny (REINS) Act. It would require that any regulation with at least a $100 million annual impact on the economy – there are approximately 200 of them in the pipeline – must be approved without amendments by joint resolution of Congress and signed by the president. “In effect,” writes the Hudson Institute’s Christopher DeMuth, “major agency rules would become legislative proposals with fast-track privileges.” By requiring legislative complicity in especially heavy federal burdens, REINS is an ingredient in the recipe for resuscitating Congress, which has been far too eager to cede legislative responsibilities to the executive branch.

Such measures may be too granular to satisfy the grandiose aspirations of those conservatives who, sharing progressives’ impatience with our constitutional architecture, aspire to have their way completely while wielding just one branch of government. But if, as is likely, the result of Congress doing these and similar things is a blizzard of presidential vetoes, even this would be constructive. The 2016 presidential election would follow a two-year demonstration of how reactionary progressivism is in opposing changes to the nation’s trajectory. Congressional actions provoking executive rejections would frame the argument about progressivism. And as Margaret Thatcher advised, first you win the argument, then you win the vote.

© 2014, Washington Post Writers Group

Who We Are

The Patriot Post is a highly acclaimed weekday digest of news analysis, policy and opinion written from the heartland — as opposed to the MSM’s ubiquitous Beltway echo chambers — for grassroots leaders nationwide. More

What We Offer

On the Web

We provide solid conservative perspective on the most important issues, including analysis, opinion columns, headline summaries, memes, cartoons and much more.

Via Email

Choose our full-length Digest or our quick-reading Snapshot for a summary of important news. We also offer Cartoons & Memes on Monday and Alexander’s column on Wednesday.

Our Mission

The Patriot Post is steadfast in our mission to extend the endowment of Liberty to the next generation by advocating for individual rights and responsibilities, supporting the restoration of constitutional limits on government and the judiciary, and promoting free enterprise, national defense and traditional American values. We are a rock-solid conservative touchstone for the expanding ranks of grassroots Americans Patriots from all walks of life. Our mission and operation budgets are not financed by any political or special interest groups, and to protect our editorial integrity, we accept no advertising. We are sustained solely by you. Please support The Patriot Fund today!


The Patriot Post and Patriot Foundation Trust, in keeping with our Military Mission of Service to our uniformed service members and veterans, are proud to support and promote the National Medal of Honor Heritage Center, the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, both the Honoring the Sacrifice and Warrior Freedom Service Dogs aiding wounded veterans, the National Veterans Entrepreneurship Program, the Folds of Honor outreach, and Officer Christian Fellowship, the Air University Foundation, and Naval War College Foundation, and the Naval Aviation Museum Foundation. "Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one's life for his friends." (John 15:13)

★ PUBLIUS ★

“Our cause is noble; it is the cause of mankind!” —George Washington

Please join us in prayer for our nation — that righteous leaders would rise and prevail and we would be united as Americans. Pray also for the protection of our Military Patriots, Veterans, First Responders, and their families. Please lift up your Patriot team and our mission to support and defend our Republic's Founding Principle of Liberty, that the fires of freedom would be ignited in the hearts and minds of our countrymen.

The Patriot Post is protected speech, as enumerated in the First Amendment and enforced by the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, in accordance with the endowed and unalienable Rights of All Mankind.

Copyright © 2024 The Patriot Post. All Rights Reserved.

The Patriot Post does not support Internet Explorer. We recommend installing the latest version of Microsoft Edge, Mozilla Firefox, or Google Chrome.