The Right's Newfound Fear of Executive Orders.

If you still listen to conservative talk radio (despite its rapidly decreasing relevance in the American political scene), you've probably noticed that guys like Limbaugh, Hannity, and Savage are beside themselves in the wake of the Democratic takeover of the federal government. This is all easy to understand when you consider how far and how fast the GOP has fallen since the election of 2006. It's difficult to believe that the Republican Party had attained a complete consolidation of national power as recently as little more than three years ago. Things have definitely changed, and many pundits are having difficulty making the proper adjustments. That may be a shame for their followers, but it can also be quite entertaining.

One topic of intense consternation on the extreme Right is the presidential power of executive order. Obviously, while George W. Bush presided, uber-conservatives were only too happy to welcome his heavy-handed governance, and Cheney's construction of "the unitary executive". This approach made the Bush administration one of the most overreaching political bodies in modern American history. With the complicity of much of the media, Bush and company were able to reign almost completely unchallenged in Washington. And indeed, much of their agenda was prosecuted via executive order. Obviously this category of proclamation that carries the force of law is an important tool in the presidential arsenal.

Regardless of your interpretation of the legitimacy of Bush/Cheney, there can be no arguing that they fully embraced the concept of ruling by fiat. For a complete list of executive orders passed from 2001-08 (broken down by category), you can consult this site. If that math is correct, Dubya issued 284 executive orders during his eight years in office. He put out eight in the first month of his first term. Even more telling, he wrote five during his last working week as the president. Of course this accounting doesn't apply to the other directives and signing statements he made while occupying the Oval Office. For guys like Limbaugh, Savage and Hannity to bitch about Obama's activity so far is laughable.

Obama's critics are frothing at their collective mouth because they know he is a formidable leader who will actively work to undo a lot of the damage of his predecessor. It's especially amusing to see them try to hide their assaults under the banner of concern for the US Constitution. But when they hyperventilate about the "unprecedented" total of Obama's executive orders (I count five on the official White House site), they rarely if ever get into the details of their opposition. Do you have any idea what type of policy that Obama is trying to execute with his directives? You certainly don't if you listen to Conservative hack radio. They'd rather try to frighten with lies than enlighten with facts.

Let me provide a quick breakdown so far, Three of our President's executive orders fall under the banner of defense policy objectives. He is closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (1). He is setting up new standards and practices for the interrogation of detainees in US custody (2), and he is establishing a Special Interagency Task Force on Detainee Disposition (3). Furthermore he has sought to hold executive branch appointees to certain new ethical requirements (4) and established a policy to make Presidential records more accessible (5). Make a quick analysis of this list and tell me which of these E.O.'s present a danger to our rights under the US Constitution...

Who Put That Summum in My Backyard?

Christians are feeling harassed nowadays. At every turn they are facing persecution, denial, and even hostility. Their religion is on the brink of irrelevance, and the historical role it has played in American history is being ignored. So say the loudest among the 77% of the nation that self-identify as Christians. Frankly, this is a refrain I'm losing patience with. For someone with roots within the religion, but a lifestyle in which that heritage takes a background role, the constant whining is starting to grate. The reality is that it's difficult to go an entire day without running into a series of "God's messages"- along the road, through traditional media, and even in the workplace. But for some adherents, too much will never be enough.

One more in a string of controversies over this issue is playing itself out in Pleasant Grove City, Utah, and in the US Supreme Court. Within that small community lies Rose Garden Park, which has been home to a sculpture featuring the Ten Commandments since 1971. In 2003 a group of believers from the Summum religion donated a statue containing "The Seven Aphorisms" (which contain the tenets of their faith) to Pleasant Grove with the intention of having it displayed alongside the other works at the park. Unfortunately for the faithful, the mayor and the other town fathers rejected the gift. But when the Summum group brought the matter to the courts, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in its favor.

At issue was the characterization of private speech in the public sphere. If the Judeo-Christian message of proscription is private, then those who decided to display it in Pleasant Grove, and to exclude "The Seven Aphorisms" of Summum, have violated the intent of our Free Speech guarantees. The Appeals Court judged the action to be content-based discrimination. Yet a dissenting judge in that decision claimed that the Ten Commandments sculpture represented "government speech" because the monuments in the park were subject to city control. Somehow the contestants in this case both cite Johanns v. Livestock Marketing Association, wherein American beef producers sued to defy a congressionally-mandated marketing campaign.

It seems odd to me that the basis of argument in this case is "free speech" rather than "freedom of religion". I have no qualms about saying that the action of the Pleasant Grove municipal leaders has violated the Establishment Clause. If this is (as they contend) "government speech", then they should not be allowed to favor the doctrines of one religion, while discounting those of another, more obscure faith. That seems obvious to me, and in fact this doctrinaire approach was something that our "founding fathers" were trying to escape when they distinguished us from European society. In the years since our promising start, Europe has evolved out of its reliance on religious law, and we have been "Left Behind", so to speak.

There's an inherent danger in prying open our government to the influences of any established religion. Even among Christian sects there are plenty of disparities that distinguish one from another. And there are still millions of citizens who subscribe to other faiths, or forego them altogether. Legal authority should be kept separate from spiritual authority. Objections that Christianity is indelibly connected to our history are beside the point- slavery, genocide, sexism, and exploitation are also tied to our past. If you open the door to one set of faith-based ideas in the public sphere, you must welcome (and even seek out) the balance of alternate views. It simply doesn't matter how odd you find them, or how much you disagree.