Friday, May 9, 2014

Is It Always Unconstitutional for the President to Refuse to Enforce the Law?

by Gerard Emershaw
As discussed in a previous column, Senator Ted Cruz has recently published a list of 76 alleged abuses of power by President Barack Obama. Among these alleged abuses of power is President Obama’s refusal to prosecute violations of drug laws involving certain mandatory minimum sentences. This raises the question of whether it is always wrong for the President to refuse to enforce a lawfully enacted act of Congress. Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution states that the President “shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” While the federal government seems to have forgotten that it is the Congress and not the President, the executive regulatory agencies, or the federal courts which may legislate, it is clear that the major role of the President domestically is to enforce duly enacted federal laws.

However, the President takes an oath which states: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. What happens if the President views a duly enacted act of Congress as being unconstitutional? What if his mandate to execute laws and his oath to defend the Constitution are at odds?

Imagine that Congress passes a law that bans Christianity. Or passes a law that requires the military to confiscate all guns held by American civilians. Or passes a law that mandates the confiscation of all land owned by civilians in the United States. Does the President have a duty to enforce such laws? Is it only the Supreme Court which has the power to declare a law unconstitutional? Is it only the states which have the right to nullify laws passed by Congress?

In the case of the refusal to prosecute certain federal drug crimes involving mandatory minimum sentences, what if President Obama is doing that because he views it as an unconstitutional violation of the separation of powers to allow the legislative branch to usurp the authority of the judicial branch regarding specific criminal sentencing? Is this any different than if he would rightly refuse to uphold the hypothetical despotic and unconstitutional laws mentioned previously?

Is there anything in the Constitution which mandates that the President or any other elected federal official must do something which is unconstitutional? Are the Constitution and the Republic which it serves both not safer if all elected federal officials defend the Constitution even if it means not carrying out a law which they believe—rightly or wrongly—to be unconstitutional? Is it even possible for the President to faithfully execute every law even if none are unconstitutional? Does the federal government have the money or manpower to do so? Are all duly enacted laws necessarily consistent? Can they all even be faithfully enforced?

A much bigger problem with the Commander-in-Chief in recent decades has been the President doing things which he knows are unconstitutional rather than refusing to do things which he believes are unconstitutional. If President Obama and all future presidents would concentrate on defending the Constitution, even if their Constitutional interpretations turned out to be erroneous, if these interpretations are sincere and in good faith, then the country and its citizens would be much better off.

Thursday, May 8, 2014

Does Ted Cruz Consider President Obama’s Military Action in Libya Unlawful?

by Gerard Emershaw


Republican Texas Senator and likely presidential hopeful Ted Cruz recently released a report in which he details 76 alleged abuses of  power by President Barack Obama. Many of the items on Cruz’s list are undeniable abuses of executive power such as the extrajudicial killing of Americans overseas by drones without due process, the continuation of aid to Egypt despite it being against American law to give aid to military juntas involved in coups, and treating secured creditors worse than unsecured creditors in the Chrysler bankruptcy.

What is most shocking is not what appears on Senator Cruz’s list but what does not appear anywhere on it. Despite mentioning President Obama’s reference to the Fort Hood shooting as workplace violence rather than as an act of terrorism, Senator fails to mention President Obama’s unconstitutional military action in Libya. If the biggest issue with the President was a matter of semantics, things would sure be peaceful. However, President Obama egregiously violated the Constitution which mandates that only Congress may declare war. President Obama launched his so called kinetic military action in Libya without the approval of Congress. The War Powers Resolution of 1973—which is itself likely unconstitutional—gave the President the limited power to introduce American military force overseas “in the absence of a declaration of war”:

The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to (1) a declaration of war, (2) specific statutory authorization, or (3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.

Qaddafi and the Libyan government had not declared war against the United States. Congress did not give specific statutory authorization for President Obama’s kinetic military action against Libya. And there was no national emergency or anything even resembling an imminent attack planned by Libya against the United States. Therefore, President Obama’s military intervention in Libya—which was the catalyst which caused the blowback that led to the tragic murder of four Americans in Benghazi—was unconstitutional. In fact, if any actions performed in office by President Obama have been deserving of impeachment, his actions against Libya have.

Why is it that Senator Cruz does not believe that President Obama’s Libyan actions were unlawful abuses of power? With Senator Cruz shaping up to be a serious future contender for the Republican presidential nomination, this is an important question. It suggests that Senator Cruz believes that the president has the constitutional authority to wage war without the approval of Congress. If so, that means that he may be no different in his outlook on foreign policy and the Constitution than President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama.

It seems unlikely that this was a mere omission on Senator Cruz’s part. After all, if his list includes the complaint that members of President Obama’s staff owe back taxes, then it is clear that he has pretty much cleared the decks and mentioned every complaint that he had with the Commander-in-Chief. This makes it appear likely that Senator Cruz may be a neoconservative posing as a Tea Partier. While Senator Cruz rightly opposed using the American military directly in support of Al Qaeda-affiliated Syrian rebels, he did propose that the United States military should invade Syria in order to secure and destroy its chemical weapons.

Unconstitutional interventionist foreign policy has been one of the most problematic parts of President Obama’s disastrous presidency. If Senator Cruz is ultimately an interventionist who believes in the unconstitutional neocon idea of the Imperial President, then he should admit it. If not, he should add President Obama’s Libyan misadventure as the 77th item on his list.   

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Why Does the Government Fear Deflation?

by Gerard Emershaw


Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen has said that the United States economy is still in need of stimulus because unemployment and inflation are well short of the Federal Reserve’s goals. Yellen claims that the inflation rate is below the Federal Reserve’s target of 2%.

Inflation hurts the average American consumer. The prices of goods and services became more expensive. The Federal Reserve’s “printing” of money has destroyed the value of the dollar over the decades, eroding up to 95% of its purchasing power. Why is this a good thing? Even if it is a good thing, is it true that there is virtually no inflation? The Federal Reserve uses the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Core CPI (Consumer Price Index) as its measurement of inflation. The Core CPI does not include prices of food and fuel. Without taking these important economic factors into account, how can anyone be sure what the inflation level is? If the rate of inflation were to be measured in the same way that it was calculated in 1990 before the federal government began hiding the true inflation rate, it would be 5% and not under 2%.

The Federal Reserve and the federal government in general are fans of inflation. Deflation is what they fear and dread. The worst thing that they can imagine is that the prices of goods and services should fall. Imagine the horror if all of a sudden the dollar could buy more. Imagine the evils that would arise if suddenly struggling American families could put more food on the table for the same amount of money. Nearly 15% of Americans are food insecure—including approximately 25% of black and Hispanic households. Imagine the apocalypse that would arise if the working poor could afford more food and worry less about their families being food insecure. The horror! The horror!

Deflation is bad. Or at least that’s what the Federal Reserve, the federal government, and economists like Paul Krugman tell us. Paul Krugman is a genius. At least that is what he and the left-wing media constantly tell us. Paul Krugman is such an enlightened Keynesian that he believes the magic bullet to save the economy is an alien invasion: “If we discovered that space aliens were planning to attack, and we needed a massive build-up to counter the space alien threat, and inflation and budget deficits took secondary place to that, this slump would be over in 18 months.” Given that Mr. Krugman has apparently read the graphic novel Watchmen or perhaps has watched a few too many “Twilight Zone” episodes, of course he knows what he is talking about.

Mr. Krugman believes that deflation is bad:

So first of all: when people expect falling prices, they become less willing to spend, and in particular less willing to borrow. After all, when prices are falling, just sitting on cash becomes an investment with a positive real yield– Japanese bank deposits are a really good deal compared with those in America—and anyone considering borrowing, even for a productive investment, has to take account of the fact that the loan will have to repaid in dollars that are worth more than the dollars you borrowed. If the economy is doing well, all this can be offset by just keeping interest rates low; but if the economy isn’t doing well, even a zero rate may not be low enough to achieve full employment.

And when that happens, the economy may stay depressed because people expect deflation, and deflation may continue because the economy remains depressed. That’s the deflationary trap we keep worrying about.

He must be right. After all, The New York Times believes that Paul Krugman is a genius, so he must be. Plus, he came up with that brilliant idea to spend money to build up arms to defend against imaginary little green men. That idea is even more brilliant than Keynes’ idea to save the economy by paying workers to dig holes and then fill them in again. Given that Krugman is correct, it is true that American consumers have not bought laptops and tablets, flat screen TVs, or smartphones. These high-tech items have been getting both better and less expensive. Therefore, it is the case that most Americans are still using their Commodore 64s, still watching their black and white console televisions with rabbit ears, and still communicating with soup cans connected by strings. Since they know such high-tech goods will drop in price, they will defer such purchases. Perhaps indefinitely. Wait. These items are popular? Actually, they are becoming rather ubiquitous. Given that Krugman is such a genius and must be correct, it would be folly for a retail chain like Walmart to advertise a policy of falling prices. If widgets are advertised by Walmart as having “falling prices,” then consumers will put off buying widgets. After all, they’ll be cheaper tomorrow. So, of course, Walmart must be nearing bankruptcy since consumers will not spend money if they even suspect prices may be lower tomorrow. Somehow, Walmart earned $17 billion in profits in 2013.

It appears that Americans will spend money even if prices are falling. In general, the American consumer will nearly always spend money—whether he or she has it or not. If anything, lower prices will likely cause them to spend even more money than they normally do. After all, many Americans have the bad habit of buying things not because they need them, but simply because they are on sale. If anything, deflation would increase demand and increase spending.

Krugman also believes that deflation is bad because it increases the burden of debtors:

A second effect: even aside from expectations of future deflation, falling prices worsen the position of debtors, by increasing the real burden of their debts. Now, you might think this is a zero-sum affair, since creditors experience a corresponding gain. But as Irving Fisher pointed out long ago, debtors are likely to be forced to cut their spending when their debt burden rises, while creditors aren’t likely to increase their spending by the same amount. So deflation exerts a depressing effect on spending by raising debt burdens – which, as Fisher also points out, can lead to another kind of vicious circle, in which depressed spending because of rising real debt leads to further deflation.

Out of control spiraling deflation would certainly not be a good thing. That would cause debtors to be unable to service their debts, and this would lead to massive bankruptcies. However, nobody is talking about that. If one assumes that all deflation is dangerous deflation of this kind, then in fairness, one must also assume that all inflation is Weimer Republic wheelbarrow hyperinflation. With mild deflation, the increase in real debt of debtors will be offset in good part by the fact that the debtors will be able to purchase more with their money. This will allow them to have more money to apply to their debts since they need to spend less on goods and services. Mild deflation will also encourage investments of all sorts. Those who do defer spending are likely to invest their money—even if that investment is as simple as placing money in an interest bearing bank account. Some will win and some will lose in the end. But that is always the case. Some debtors will be burdened. However, creditors will earn more money and will have more money to spend and invest. Some of those lucky creditors may even be Kurgan’s alien friends.

Finally, Krugman worries about falling wages. This was a constant worry during the Great Depression. And in fact, it was President Herbert Hoover and President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s unwillingness to allow wages to drop along with prices that exacerbated the Great Depression. According to Krugman:

Finally, in a deflationary economy, wages as well as prices often have to fall—and it’s a fact of life that it’s very hard to cut nominal wages—there’s downward nominal wage rigidity. What this means is that in general economies don’t manage to have falling wages unless they also have mass unemployment, so that workers are desperate enough to accept those wage declines.

This assumes that the economy will be more or less stagnant. However, regular mild deflation will likely spur the economy as consumers have more money to spend and invest. Wage levels are always in great part affected by unemployment levels. When the economy has high levels of unemployment, wages will drop as there are more workers willing to do the job for less. However, at times of near “full employment,” wages inevitably rise because workers who can fill job openings become more scarce. Therefore, deflation is unlikely to harm workers. Any drop in wages will be offset by a drop in prices. As employers’ dollars have more buying power, it is also likely than many of them will hire additional workers. This falling wage fear is a delusional relic of the Progressive Era.

Why do the Federal Reserve, the federal government, and statist economists like Paul Krugman actually favor inflation? The answer is simple. Inflation allows the government to play its economic shell games. It allows the federal government to “tax” the people through the mechanism of the Federal Reserve. It allows the federal government to spend money on its welfare/warfare empire without actually having to openly raise taxes. Inflation makes banksters like those behind the Federal Reserve even wealthier by redistributing money from American citizens to the banks and their cronies. In the long run, as Keynes said, we are all dead. But in the slightly shorter run, inflation makes more citizens dependent on the state by draining the value of their dollars. This means that more Americans will rely on government largesse, and as a result, more Americans will be loyal. As this happens, fewer will protest against unconstitutional wars of aggression, mass illegal domestic surveillance, or any other type of tyranny. Inflation enslaves the people. All statists ultimately love that idea.