It’s an awe-inspiring moment to see the scrawniest kid on the playground finally standing up to the schoolyard bully. We all yearn to see the fight, because we know that he will win because he is right.
This is what it looks like to see President Barack Obama finally using executive orders to push his policies.
As long as he uses discretion, he could finally start making the change that he promised. His executive orders will be a more legitimate expression of the wishes of the American people than our deadlocked Congress.
Congress has done nothing in the preceding years; virtually no substantive policy has been pushed through, and even mundane policies are being held up. The problem is that the government has a multitude of functions that it must fulfill and these are not being accomplished.
They were elected to office to run the country and instead they are stepping on the brake and gas pedal at the same time. To get things done, President Obama has to use his executive powers to make policy decisions. Overwhelmingly, the people of America are frustrated with the lack of action, and they want something to be done about our dismal economy, no matter what it is. Therefore, I believe, the executive orders are justified in this instance.
The president skipping Congress brings back bad memories of the Bush and Cheney presidency, when executive orders were used to do horrible things out of the public eye. Many are afraid that President Obama will similarly abuse the power.
The difference is that he is being incredibly transparent about what he is doing. Ever since the start of his presidency, one only needs to go to www.whitehouse.gov to read the full text of every executive order that President Obama signed. For the past several years, he has used them only to affect internal issues and implementation and has refrained from using them for substantive policy decisions.
The time has come, and he is wielding them wonderfully. If anyone is curious, they have the ability to read everything he is doing and understand it.
Others fear about the legitimacy of executive orders. The President can, theoretically, do whatever he wants even if it is against the will of the people.
During Obama’s term the preferred policy of the people, from comprehensive healthcare reform to financial regulation, has been twisted by Congress into an ugly morass of corruption.
If you think that is more legitimate than Obama following the polls and doing what the people tell him to do, then you really ought to move to a plutocracy. Furthermore, if the people do disapprove of what Obama is doing, executive orders are much more easily reversed than legislation is repealed. A future Republican president can easily reverse all of President Obama’s executive orders. This way of doing things is a much more valid expression of the wants of the people rather than the desires of a polarized congress.
In the end, the partisan nature of politics has forced Obama to this measure.
Hopefully good will come of it, and student loans for all of us will be reduced. Personally, I think he could have done more, but I applaud the step in the right direction. Maybe in the remaining year of his first term, President Obama will start bringing about real change to America.
