Ukraine Then and Now and How

Sadly, the world witnessed a tragedy when almost 300 people perished at the border of Ukraine and Russia. Almost immediately there was looting by murders, thugs, arms smugglers, well just the exact model of terrorists.

The media continues to call these people in the Donetsk region of Ukraine ‘pro-Russian separatists. They are exactly not that. They are ‘Soviet Loyalists’, the old Soviet Union Tzarists that use precisely the same tactics commonly applied by KGB operatives. What is worse, not only has Putin assigned these people to Eastern Ukraine, but most were chosen for these specific tactics.

Ukraine territory going back to the 1700’s lived under two rules and struggles for control by both the Russian and Poles/Austrians. After the second World War, Eastern Ukraine slowly and fully assumed Soviet culture.

One the KGB faded with the break-up of the Soviet Union, the FSB was created along with GRU, the intelligence wing of the Kremlin and the Spetsnaz, hostile special forces were expanded. It is also noted that most of Eastern Europe and the Baltic States are all ruled by Communist parties. Authoritarian politics still exists. There are 29 post Communist countries but the remnants within rule has not eroded including religion, educationally,  civil liberties and even economically. These conditions leave major opportunities for fraud, corruption, conflicts of interest and activism.

 

Now it is also important to understand the history of the Eastern Ukraine region and why it is so easy for Putin to annex the area into his control.

  • The Donetsk was founded by a Welsh businessman who built a coal industry and a large steel business forming an industrial center.
  • During the Soviet days, Donetsk was actually named Stalin/Stalino, at one point the city was even named Trotsk, after Leon Trotsky.
  • There are 430 streets in the Donetsk and Luhansk named for Vladimir Lenin.
  • In the 1920-30’s Donetsk Oblast advanced and constructed a city wide water and sewage system and began exploring gas as an energy resource.
  • In 1939, Soviet annexation took place under a secret clause of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact which included the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.
  • The Nazi invasion for the most part destroyed the city and it was this time that an estimated 3000 Jews died and 100,000 people were killed in concentration camps.
  • Nikita Khrushchev later renamed the city Donetsk due to the Donets river.
  • Sometime later gangs took over the region and assumed control of industry and it was then that living conditions became so bad for residents that revolutions took place most recently the Rose Revolution in 2004 then the Orange Revolution in 2004.
  • At one point in 1994, Ukraine was the third largest nuclear power, which it inherited from the Soviet Union on a pledge not to use military force as an independent nation. Ukraine signed the Budapest Memorandum on security assurances that included signatories of U.S., Russia and the U.K..
  • The Budapest Memorandum was actually a mutual agreement where Ukraine would be protected by the West against an invasion by Russia. This document is binding by International law.
  • Nuclear weapons were also held in Belarus and Kazakhstan. These were removed by Russia in 1992.
  • The United States paid the largest part of the expense in removing the weapons from the region, delivering them to Russia, this included ICBM’s, silos, strategic bombers.
  • During these revolutions, philanthropist George Soros funded NGO’s training participants in the fueling of the revolutions and was quickly targeted by Ukraine and Russian leadership and it was at this time the anti-American attitudes were re-born.
  • Soros tried once again to do the same in 2010 using the Arab Spring as a newer model and for the most part failed.
  • There are over 100 ethnic groups in the Donetsk region, yet Russian is the common language.
  • In the Donetsk Oblast, the highest proportion of people claimed allegiance to Soviet Identity.
  • The Party of Regions (Soviet culture) was established in 2001 which has deep historical ties to Communist Party of Ukraine (KPU).
  • For some order and restoration, Ukraine in 2004 declared her intention of seeking NATO membership and the United States took advantage to build a relationship with Ukraine especially during the Iraq war making use of resources.
  • It was this time that once again Ukraine as a total become a larger divided house between pro-Western supporters versus that of the Eastern side of Ukraine that remained anti-West.

Russia today seeing the past weaknesses of Ukraine and the faithful loyalty of the Eastern region to the old Soviet model, it was with east that Putin was able to install his propaganda, military and fighters to begin his expansion of Soviet territory beyond his successful annexation of Crimea.

 

Ukraine has been a divided country that has been desperate in objectives attempting to satisfy ethnic groups for peaceful, economic, political and security standards. When this country or any country is experiencing split cultures, histories, religions, industries, separations, fraudulent political strife it is ripe for the take-over as witnessed in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine.

The Russian oligarchs have long invested in the energy resources in Ukraine and have bought influence there for the sake of lasting loyalty. For Putin to install his hostilities and proxy armies into Eastern Ukraine was an easy feat due mostly to attitudes, culture and historical ethnicity. These are Putin’s old school tactics he was once personally a part of and he and his ilk from the old Soviet Union have employed all the familiar characteristics where making it new again with aggressions such as employing Spetsnaz teams in Eastern Ukraine to shoot down commercial airlines.

Question is now, who will forcefully challenge Putin with on his next quest, there is no more global leadership and certainly none coming from the United States where the legacy of America has always been to provide some offensive measures to keep stability, equilibrium and a less messy world.

For further reading on the subject:

http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2011/05/trilateral-process-pifer

http://www.academia.edu/2041738/Post-Soviet_Authoritarianism_The_Influence_of_Russia_in_its_Near_Abroad_

 

 

The Personal Lives of ISIS leadership

While the United States is deep with scandalapalooza especially at the southern border, there are other foreign policy conditions and wars being waged. Yes, we must remember Sudan, Nigeria, Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.

We have come to know little about ISIS except that al Baghdadi is running a caliphate in Iraq unimpeded.

al Baghdadi and his family have a long history that included al Nusra and al Qaeda. So now we find out who al Baghdadi is married to and we know what she looks like.

Photos surface of ISIS leader Baghdadi’s wife

By Staff writer | Al Arabiya News
Thursday, 17 July 2014

Photos of the wife of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, have surfaced online, offering a glimpse into the private life of the so-called ‘caliph.’

Knowledge of Saja Hamid al-Dulaimi came to the fore shortly after the release in March of a group of nuns who were kidnapped months earlier in the historic Syrian town of Maaloulah.

An online video at the time of the release showed the nuns being transported by masked gunmen waving the banner of the Nusra Front, an al-Qaeda affiliate. Activists said the nuns were freed in exchange for the release of women prisoners held by President Bashar al-Assad’s government.

 

According to media reports, Dulaimi’s identity was first revealed by Abu Maan al-Suri, a Nusra Front member who said Baghdadi’s wife had been among the detained female prisoners who were released.

Dulaimi, according to al-Suri, had been detained alongside her two sons and smaller brother.

Details about her early life are sketchy.

Dulaimi’s first husband was an Iraqi named Fallah Ismail Jassem, a leading member of the Rashideen Army who was gunned down by the Iraqi army in the province of Anbar in 2010, according to media reports.

There are also unconfirmed reports that suggest Saja al-Dulaimi may have worked as a hair dresser. Others say she may have worked as a seamstress in Anbar province and Al-Amryiah in Baghdad.

Dulaimi’s family allegedly all adhere to the ideology of ISIS, including her father Ibrahim Dulaimi, a so-called ISIS “emir” in Syria who was reportedly killed in September 2013 during an operation against the Syrian army in Deir Attiyeh.

Her sister, Duaa, was allegedly behind a suicide attack that targeted a Kurdish gathering in Arbil, according to some reports.

Then there is the real cabinet assignments of ISIS.

By Staff writer | Al Arabiya News
Friday, 11 July 2014

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), has reportedly formed a cabinet to be in charge of his newly established “caliphate.”

Documents published by The Telegraph newspaper this week revealed for the first time in details the structure of the group, which has claimed universal authority throughout the Muslim world, declaring Baghdadi its caliph.

The British newspaper published an infograph that explains the leadership arrangement under Baghdadi, based on documents seized from an ISIS member’s house following a raid by the Iraqi army.

 

According to the illustration, Baghdadi appointed a “deputy to the emir. ” Fadel Abdullah al-Hiyali, nicknamed Abu Muslim al-Turkmani, serves as Baghdadi’s deputy and is in charge of overseeing Iraqi provinces under ISIS.

The spearhead also formed a “war office” to oversee warehouses and “martyrs.”

One of this department’s members is “in charge of operations using improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and rigging bombs,” the newspaper reported.

The ISIS chief has also selected a group of ministers for an array of tasks.

One minister was put in charge of prisoners and detainees, while another is responsible for managing the financial issues of Iraqi provinces under ISIS.

Cabinet member Abdullah Ahmed al-Meshedani, also called Abu Kassem, is tasked with managing “the arrival of foreign and Arab jihadists” and is in charge of “overseeing the running of guesthouses for them.”

“He is also reportedly a ‘transporter of suicide bombers’,” The Telegraph said.

Six ISIS members were also reportedly tasked with overseeing the Iraqi provinces of Baghdad, Anbar, Salaheddin, Kirkuk, and provinces along the state’s borders.

Baghdadi sent out a public message earlier this month after ISIS proclaimed a “caliphate” on the territory it has captured.

ISIS militants and their allies among Iraq’s Sunni Muslim minority have seized large swathes of Iraq over the past weeks in a battle with forces loyal to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

The so called “Caliphate” aims to connect Muslim countries separated by modern-day borders.

Beyond Spying on You, What You See is Manipulated

First of all, beyond the NSA there is a consortium of 4 countries that collaborate on intelligence, data-mining of social media, and score their findings. The consortium is called GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters) located in Britain and is the flagship of all cyber transactions as well as telecom transactions.

GCHQ is also known as the four eyes, watching everything and everyone globally without exception, areas more robustly than others, all for unique reasons.

GCHQ’s dark arts: Leaked documents reveal online manipulation, Facebook, YouTube snooping

By for Zero Day

GCHQ has developed a toolkit of software programs used to manipulate online traffic, infiltrate users’ computers and spread select messages across social media sites including Facebook and YouTube.

Screen Shot 2014-07-14 at 08.11.51

 

The UK spy agency’s dark arts were revealed in documents first published by The Intercept, and each piece of software is described in a wiki document written up by GCHQ’s Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG). The document, which reads like a software inventory, calls the tools part of the agency’s “weaponised capability.”

Some of the most interesting capabilities of the tools on the list include the ability to seed the web with false information — such as tweaking the results of online polls — inflating pageview counts, censoring video content deemed “extremist” and the use of psychological manipulation on targets — something similar to a research project conducted with Facebook’s approval, which resulted in heavy criticism and outrage levied at the social media site.

A number of interesting tools and their short descriptions are below:

  • ASTRAL PROJECTION: Remote GSM secure covert Internet proxy using TOR hidden service
  • POISON ARROW: Safe malware download capability
  • AIRWOLF: YouTube profile, comment and video collection
  • BIRDSTRIKE: Twitter monitoring and profile collection
  • GLASSBACK: Technique of getting a target’s IP address by pretending to be a spammer and ringing them. Target does not need to answer.
  • MINIATURE HERO: Active skype capability. Provision of realtime call records (SkypeOut and SkypetoSkype) and bidirectional instant messaging. Also contact lists.
  • PHOTON TORPEDO: A technique to actively grab the IP address of MSN messenger user
  • SPRING-BISHOP: Finding private photos of targets on Facebook
  • BOMB BAY: The capacity to increase website hits, rankings
  • BURLESQUE: The capacity to send spoofed SMS messages
  • GESTATOR: Amplification of a given message, normally video, on popular multimedia websites (YouTube)
  • SCRAPHEAP CHALLENGE: Perfect spoofing of emails from Blackberry targets
  • SUNBLOCK: Ability to deny functionality to send/receive email or view material online
  • SWAMP DONKEY: A tool that will silently locate all predefined types of file and encrypt them on a targets machine
  • UNDERPASS: Change outcome of online polls (previously known as NUBILO).
  • WARPATH: Mass delivery of SMS messages to support an Information Operations campaign.
  • HUSK: Secure one-on-one web based dead-drop messaging platform.

The list, dated from 2012, says that most of the tools are “fully operational, tested and reliable,” and adds: “Don’t treat this like a catalogue. If you don’t see it here, it doesn’t mean we can’t build it.”

“We only advertise tools here that are either ready to fire or very close to being ready,” the document notes.

The release of these documents comes in the same week that the UK intelligence agency’s spying activities are being investigated by surveillance watchdog the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT). Civil liberty groups set a legal challenge against the GCHQ in order to question the legal standing of schemes such as Tempora — a project revealed in the NSA scandal that showed the agency placed data interceptors on fiber-optic cables that carry Internet traffic to and from the UK.

U.S. No Longer Land of the Free

Of course we all know this already, however you can also read a book titled ‘American Coup’, author is William Arkin. Within the first one hundred pages Arkin lays out the proven facts of why America is already under martial law, a term that has been battered around for several years. Just consider that yet another set of authors, Harvey Silvergate and Alan Dershowtiz wrote a book titled ‘Three Felonies a Day’ explaining how the Feds target the innocent.

The point is we have lawyers that are speaking out and we must listen.

So today there was a four hour long house hearing by the Rules Committee where Jonathan Turley, a Democrat, but more importantly a Constitutional professor, practicing lawyer and speech giver testified. His presentation was remarkable.

It is important for this article to know he wrote a blog piece a few months ago that is a must read for everyone.

10 Reasons The U.S. Is No Longer The Land Of The Free

Every year, the State Department issues reports on individual rights in other countries, monitoring the passage of restrictive laws and regulations around the world. Iran, for example, has been criticized for denying fair public trials and limiting privacy, while Russia has been taken to task for undermining due process. Other countries have been condemned for the use of secret evidence and torture.

Even as we pass judgment on countries we consider unfree, Americans remain confident that any definition of a free nation must include their own — the land of free. Yet, the laws and practices of the land should shake that confidence. In the decade since Sept. 11, 2001, this country has comprehensively reduced civil liberties in the name of an expanded security state. The most recent example of this was the National Defense Authorization Act, signed Dec. 31, which allows for the indefinite detention of citizens. At what point does the reduction of individual rights in our country change how we define ourselves?

While each new national security power Washington has embraced was controversial when enacted, they are often discussed in isolation. But they don’t operate in isolation. They form a mosaic of powers under which our country could be considered, at least in part, authoritarian. Americans often proclaim our nation as a symbol of freedom to the world while dismissing nations such as Cuba and China as categorically unfree. Yet, objectively, we may be only half right. Those countries do lack basic individual rights such as due process, placing them outside any reasonable definition of “free,” but the United States now has much more in common with such regimes than anyone may like to admit.

These countries also have constitutions that purport to guarantee freedoms and rights. But their governments have broad discretion in denying those rights and few real avenues for challenges by citizens — precisely the problem with the new laws in this country.

The list of powers acquired by the U.S. government since 9/11 puts us in rather troubling company.

Assassination of U.S. citizens

President Obama has claimed, as President George W. Bush did before him, the right to order the killing of any citizen considered a terrorist or an abettor of terrorism. Last year, he approved the killing of U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaqi and another citizen under this claimed inherent authority. Last month, administration officials affirmed that power, stating that the president can order the assassination of any citizen whom he considers allied with terrorists. (Nations such as Nigeria, Iran and Syria have been routinely criticized for extrajudicial killings of enemies of the state.)

Indefinite detention

Under the law signed last month, terrorism suspects are to be held by the military; the president also has the authority to indefinitely detain citizens accused of terrorism. While Sen. Carl Levin insisted the bill followed existing law “whatever the law is,” the Senate specifically rejected an amendment that would exempt citizens and the Administration has opposed efforts to challenge such authority in federal court. The Administration continues to claim the right to strip citizens of legal protections based on its sole discretion. (China recently codified a more limited detention law for its citizens, while countries such as Cambodia have been singled out by the United States for “prolonged detention.”)

Arbitrary justice

The president now decides whether a person will receive a trial in the federal courts or in a military tribunal, a system that has been ridiculed around the world for lacking basic due process protections. Bush claimed this authority in 2001, and Obama has continued the practice. (Egypt and China have been denounced for maintaining separate military justice systems for selected defendants, including civilians.)

Warrantless searches

The president may now order warrantless surveillance, including a new capability to force companies and organizations to turn over information on citizens’ finances, communications and associations. Bush acquired this sweeping power under the Patriot Act in 2001, and in 2011, Obama extended the power, including searches of everything from business documents to library records. The government can use “national security letters” to demand, without probable cause, that organizations turn over information on citizens — and order them not to reveal the disclosure to the affected party. (Saudi Arabia and Pakistan operate under laws that allow the government to engage in widespread discretionary surveillance.)

Secret evidence

The government now routinely uses secret evidence to detain individuals and employs secret evidence in federal and military courts. It also forces the dismissal of cases against the United States by simply filing declarations that the cases would make the government reveal classified information that would harm national security — a claim made in a variety of privacy lawsuits and largely accepted by federal judges without question. Even legal opinions, cited as the basis for the government’s actions under the Bush and Obama administrations, have been classified. This allows the government to claim secret legal arguments to support secret proceedings using secret evidence. In addition, some cases never make it to court at all. The federal courts routinely deny constitutional challenges to policies and programs under a narrow definition of standing to bring a case.

War crimes

The world clamored for prosecutions of those responsible for waterboarding terrorism suspects during the Bush administration, but the Obama administration said in 2009 that it would not allow CIA employees to be investigated or prosecuted for such actions. This gutted not just treaty obligations but the Nuremberg principles of international law. When courts in countries such as Spain moved to investigate Bush officials for war crimes, the Obama administration reportedly urged foreign officials not to allow such cases to proceed, despite the fact that the United States has long claimed the same authority with regard to alleged war criminals in other countries. (Various nations have resisted investigations of officials accused of war crimes and torture. Some, such as Serbia and Chile, eventually relented to comply with international law; countries that have denied independent investigations include Iran, Syria and China.)

Secret court

The government has increased its use of the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which has expanded its secret warrants to include individuals deemed to be aiding or abetting hostile foreign governments or organizations. In 2011, Obama renewed these powers, including allowing secret searches of individuals who are not part of an identifiable terrorist group. The administration has asserted the right to ignore congressional limits on such surveillance. (Pakistan places national security surveillance under the unchecked powers of the military or intelligence services.)

Immunity from judicial review

Like the Bush administration, the Obama administration has successfully pushed for immunity for companies that assist in warrantless surveillance of citizens, blocking the ability of citizens to challenge the violation of privacy. (Similarly, China has maintained sweeping immunity claims both inside and outside the country and routinely blocks lawsuits against private companies.)

Continual monitoring of citizens

The Obama administration has successfully defended its claim that it can use GPS devices to monitor every move of targeted citizens without securing any court order or review. It is not defending the power before the Supreme Court — a power described by Justice Anthony Kennedy as “Orwellian.” (Saudi Arabia has installed massive public surveillance systems, while Cuba is notorious for active monitoring of selected citizens.)

Extraordinary renditions

The government now has the ability to transfer both citizens and noncitizens to another country under a system known as extraordinary rendition, which has been denounced as using other countries, such as Syria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan, to torture suspects. The Obama administration says it is not continuing the abuses of this practice under Bush, but it insists on the unfettered right to order such transfers — including the possible transfer of U.S. citizens.

These new laws have come with an infusion of money into an expanded security system on the state and federal levels, including more public surveillance cameras, tens of thousands of security personnel and a massive expansion of a terrorist-chasing bureaucracy.

Some politicians shrug and say these increased powers are merely a response to the times we live in. Thus, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) could declare in an interview last spring without objection that “free speech is a great idea, but we’re in a war.” Of course, terrorism will never “surrender” and end this particular “war.”

Other politicians rationalize that, while such powers may exist, it really comes down to how they are used. This is a common response by liberals who cannot bring themselves to denounce Obama as they did Bush. Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), for instance, has insisted that Congress is not making any decision on indefinite detention: “That is a decision which we leave where it belongs — in the executive branch.”

And in a signing statement with the defense authorization bill, Obama said he does not intend to use the latest power to indefinitely imprison citizens. Yet, he still accepted the power as a sort of regretful autocrat.

An authoritarian nation is defined not just by the use of authoritarian powers, but by the ability to use them. If a president can take away your freedom or your life on his own authority, all rights become little more than a discretionary grant subject to executive will.

The framers lived under autocratic rule and understood this danger better than we do. James Madison famously warned that we needed a system that did not depend on the good intentions or motivations of our rulers: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”

Benjamin Franklin was more direct. In 1787, a Mrs. Powel confronted Franklin after the signing of the Constitution and asked, “Well, Doctor, what have we got — a republic or a monarchy?” His response was a bit chilling: “A republic, Madam, if you can keep it.”

Since 9/11, we have created the very government the framers feared: a government with sweeping and largely unchecked powers resting on the hope that they will be used wisely.

The indefinite-detention provision in the defense authorization bill seemed to many civil libertarians like a betrayal by Obama. While the president had promised to veto the law over that provision, Levin, a sponsor of the bill, disclosed on the Senate floor that it was in fact the White House that approved the removal of any exception for citizens from indefinite detention.

Dishonesty from politicians is nothing new for Americans. The real question is whether we are lying to ourselves when we call this country the land of the free.

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University.

Washington Post (Sunday) January 15, 2012

 

So Sue Him or Impeach Him, that is the Question

Alright, several things are in play in Washington DC when it comes to the Federal government operating in full-blown lawlessness. So, words like impeach, treason and high crimes and misdemeanors have flying in corridors. The question is, what is the solution to stop the destruction?

Many pundits are pushing back on any aggressive solution to stop the fraud, collusion and law-breaking of top stakeholders in the Barack Obama regime, none more so than Barack Obama himself, where is has without a doubt abused the power of the office of the Presidency using in fact his pen and phone.

Speaker of the House, John Boehner has announced his intention to sue Barack Obama and on July 16, the early stages of the process begins. While Barack Obama pokes fun at the intent to sue him, Boehner is serious and frankly after 5 1/2 years of proven abuse in all corners of the Obama regime, it is time to take a bold move.

Speaker Boehner has engaged some heavy-hitters that are Constitutional lawyers, none more so than that of Jonathan Turley, Professor of Public Interest Law at The George Washington University Law School who is a supporter of Barack Obama’s policies but fully is opposed to his extra-legal/Constitutional methods to achieve those ends.

Experts Support House’s Action to Defend the Constitution

July 15, 2014|Speaker Boehner’s Press Office

Tomorrow, the House Committee on Rules will conduct a hearing on the House’s lawsuit against President Obama’s executive overreach, specifically, his unilateral rewrites of the health care law’s employer mandate. As Speaker Boehner said, “this isn’t about Republicans versus Democrats; it’s about the Legislative Branch versus the Executive Branch, and above all protecting the Constitution.”

Among those scheduled to testify at the hearing are Jonathan Turley, Professor of Public Interest Law at The George Washington University Law School, and Elizabeth Price Foley, Professor of Law at Florida International University College of Law. Excerpts of their prepared statements to the committee, along with links to their full testimony, are below.

Turley:

[S]ome of President Obama’s statements come strikingly close to assertions by King James I that he could apply “natural reason” to the alteration, and even the suspension, of federal laws. … There may be good reasons for such changes. However, this is not a question of what to do but how should such changes be made and, more importantly, who should make them? Some of the changes unilaterally ordered by the President were previously sought from Congress. After Congress did not approve such changes, President Obama announced that he would go it alone. He proceeded to order the changes that he felt Congress should have made. He simply resolved the division with Congress by ordering changes on his terms as a majority of one. There is no license in the Madisonian system to “go it alone.” …

Rather than continue this unresolved and worsening controversy over the separation of powers, the House is seeking authority to bring the matter to the courts. That is precisely where such lingering questions should be resolved. …

Some of the changes ordered by President Obama did, in my view, cross the constitutional line in violation of the Separation of Powers. …

The Obama Administration has advanced constitutional arguments on presidential power that can only be described as both extreme and largely devoid of limiting principles that characterize our constitutional system. …

What we are witnessing today is a crisis of faith in our system despite its unparalleled and proven success. People have grown impatient with the constraints of the constitutional system, constraints which can seem quaint or antiquated when compared to pressing problems of health care or immigration or the environment. It is tempting to embrace rule by a single person who offers to govern alone to get things done. However, this is the very Siren’s call that our Founders warned us to resist. We remain a nation of laws and we have a court system designed to resolve such controversies. That is precisely where this authorization would take us and it is where these questions should be answered.

Foley:

[W]hat Congress wants is what the Constitution entitles it to:  faithful execution of the law by the executive branch, so that the American people can make accurate assessments about the law.  If the constitutional duty of faithful execution is fulfilled, the law goes into effect as written—both good parts and bad parts—and the American people are fully informed about whether it works, and what may need fixing. …

There is a good reason why the founders granted “all” lawmaking power to Congress, and not the unitary Executive: As history teaches us, it is not wise to entrust the power of lawmaking—and its inherent potential to negatively impact individual liberty—to a single person.

When a law—even a complex and poorly drafted one—is faithfully executed, it enables fully informed consent, and a robust debate in the legislative branch. …

By unilaterally waiving, suspending or delaying the most unworkable, problematic portions of the ACA, the President makes this robust, pluralistic political debate and compromise impossible. Yet it is precisely by having a complex law go into effect as written that the political process—democracy itself—can function, and compromises regarding how to fix its problems can be achieved.

The House of Representatives is working very hard to regain legally and Constitutionally the power granted to them. They are seeking advise, remedies and perhaps even legislation to reassert that which has been dismissed by Cabinet secretaries and the White House. Here is a hearing where Turley speaks truth to power.

One may fault Speaker Boehner for many reasons, however a threshold has been crossed such that he is seeking a remedy. It may be a fool’s errand yet, it does send a shot across the bow of the White House, which is long over-due.