Barack Hussein Obama/Barry Soetoro’s latest power grab has his false opposites in the organized crime family of naturalism of the “right” as flummoxed now as they have been throughout the course of the past nearly six years since the committed Eurocialist was sworn in as President of the United States of America on January 20, 2009.
Republicans fumed and fumed over ObamaCare in 2009 and 2009, finding themselves powerless to do anything about it as they held legislative majorities in neither chamber of the Congress of the United States of America. The “Tax Enough Already” movement (“TEA Party) arose during the summer of 2010, prompting careerist Republicans to take note, however grudgingly, of the popular demands for a repeal of the so-called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which was replete with wholesale delegations of legislative power to the apparatchiks in the United States Department of Health and Human Services and in the Internal Revenue Service of the United States Department of the Treasury.
Republicans, of course, recapture control of the United States House of Representatives in the Congressional midterm elections on November 2, 2010. Although various symbolic votes were held by House Republicans in during both sessions of the 112th Congress, which met between January 3, 2011, and January 3, 2013, House Speaker John Boehner (R-West Chester, Ohio) and his then-Majority Leader, Eric Cantor (R-Virginia), knew that such repeal measures would not be taken up in the United States Senate under the control of one of Caesar Obama’s chief legislative enablers, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada). Boehner and his fellow enabler of statism and servant of all manner of corporate lobbyists, United States Senator Addison Mitchell McConnell (R-Kentucky), huffed and puffed while they punted. Boehner and McConnell hoped that two things would happen to take the responsibility of repealing ObamaCare out of their hands: (a) that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act would be declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States of America; and (b) that the man who gave us the Jonathan Gruber-designed RomneyCare, which Gruber boasted in 2012 was the prototype of ObamaCare, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Willard Mitt Romney, would be elected on Tuesday, November 6, 2012. Political cowards always hope for events to make it unnecessary for them to take firm stands that might alienate “swing” or “independent” or “moderate” votes.
By the way, exactly how did that strategy of punting work?
Well, Chief Justice John Glover Roberts, who was appointed to the Supreme Court of United States of America by none other than the supposedly “pro-life” former President of the United States of America, George Walker Bush, on July 19, 2005, to replace the retiring pro-abortion appointee of President Ronald Wilson Regan, Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, before being selected by Bush the Lesser on September 5, 2005, to replace Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who had on died on September 3, 2005, switched his vote in the combined cases of National Federation of Independent Business, et al. v. Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services, et al. and Department of Health and Human Services, et al. v. Florida, et al. on June 28, 2012, to declare the Patient Protection and Accordable Care Act to be constitutional despite its patently unconstitutional nature.
Indeed, Roberts, who had served in the administrations of Ronald Wilson Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush, punted the ball right back into the political process. Some believed that John Glover Roberts did not want to go down in history as casting the decisive vote against a sitting president’s signature piece of legislation, thus roiling the waters during the 2012 presidential election. It was up to the voters, Roberts, believed, to use the political process to effect any change in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The presumptive presidential nominee of the Republican Party, the aforementioned Willard Mitt Romney, essentially punted on the issue after the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States of America in the combined cases of National Federation of Independent Business, et al. v. Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services, et al. and Department of Health and Human Services, et al. v. Florida, et al. as he was afraid to scare away voters who might derive benefits from ObamaCare. Romney, who some are encouraging to run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016 so that he could join the ranks of former State of New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey (1944 and 1948) and former State of Illinois Governor Adali Stevenson (1952 and 1956) as two-time losers of presidential elections (William Jennings Bryan, a Democrat, though, holds the current record of three presidential election losses—1896, 1900 and 1908), was pretty much neutralized on the issue during election, especially after the Obama campaign started to use the architect of RomneyCare, Jonathan Gruber, in an advertisement to boast that he had used RomneyCare as the model upon which to base ObamaCare.
Republican Congressional leaders are still punting on ObamaCare, hoping against hope that new court challenges to some of the deceptive language contained in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act concerning how the state insurance exchanges were to be established and operated, will convince Chief Justice John Glover Roberts to switch his vote once again. Such a switch would, presuming Associate Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, another pro-abortion appointee of the late President Ronald Wilson Reagan, votes as he did against ObamaCare in 2012, make it necessary for there to be a legislative rewrite, a “repeal and replace” bill. One, of course, is expected to ignore the inconvenient truth that a “repeal and replace” bill would still be an unconstitutional statist monstrosity that would do nothing to eliminate coverage for contraceptives or the surgical killing of the innocent preborn. Insurance coverage would remain for the vivisection of human beings under the medical industry’s manufactured, profit-making myth of “brain death,” which depends upon living human beings to “donate” their bodily members. (See ObamaDeathCare.)
Government entitlements are goodies that are never taken away, becoming sacrosanct over the course of time as various categories, whether large or small, of groups dependent upon the largesse of the taxpayers form to protect what they have and to demand annual increases in the amount of the goodies they receive. The institutionalization of such goodies also creates a close working relationship between the career civil servants who administer them and the recipients in order to put pressure on members of Congress, especially members of the United States House of Representatives who come from competitive districts, to lard out more and more pork each year.
It is important to keep this in mind as, despite the huffing and puffing of “conservative” Republicans, neither House Speaker John Boehner or future Senate Majority Leader Addison Mitchell McConnell intend to do anything substantive to overturn President Barack Hussein Obama/Barry Soetoro’s effort to legislate on immigration policy by means of executive fiat, which was actually issued in a form a memorandum, not a presidential executive order, by United States Secretary of Homeland Security, Jeh Johnson, on November 20, 2014, the Feast of Saint Felix of Valois. A memorandum in this instance is a legal term that refers to a set of directives by a governmental officer that are meant to have the binding force of law but are not the same things as executive orders or administrative rules. Secretary Jeh Johnson’s “memorandum” was not even filed in the Federal Register, which is the official government publication of all legally binding rules issued by the Federal government’s appartchiks. (Small business owners, including private family farmers, few that there are any longer, have to make sure that their attorneys go through the Federal Register on a regular basis in order to be aware of all “rules” that are relevant to their own business or enterprise.)
State of Texas Attorney General Gregory Abbott, who will be sworn in as the next Governor Texas on January 20, 2015, filed a lawsuit along with sixteen other states against the Obama fiat in which he clearly identified Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson as the individual who had issued the memorandum in order to, using Obama’s own words recently, “change the law:”
Defendant Jeh Johnson is the Secretary of DHS. Johnson and DHS are responsible for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”), and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”). Johnson authored the DHS Directive. . . . The President’s new policies were effectuated through Defendant Johnson’s DHS Directive. (Texas Attorney General.)
World Net Daily elaborated on Governor-elect Abbott’s lawsuit and how the presidential amnesty order was carried out by means of a Cabinet secretary’s memorandum:
The White House appears to have engaged in administrative sleight of hand, changing U.S. immigration law not by executive order but by a memorandum “exercising prosecutorial discretion” Johnson signed the day of Obama’s Nov. 20 nationwide address that so far has not been filed in the Federal Register.
Tom Fitton, president of Washington-based watchdog institution Judicial Watch, told WND in an interview the legal status of Johnson’s memo is a serious constitutional question that deserves to be adjudicated.
“The entire implementing authority involves a memorandum published by DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson that changes the immigration law, directing federal money to be spent that has not been appropriated by Congress,” he said.
“In my view, there is a serious question whether Jeh Johnson should be impeached for taking this action, and a criminal investigation should be initiated to determine how and why federal funds are being misappropriated,” he declared.
Fitton said DHS “is being hijacked to implement actions Congress has neither authorized nor appropriated funds to accomplish.”
“All remedy options need to be on the table when attacking this threat to the Constitution,” he said.
On Wednesday, attorneys general in 17 states joined in a lawsuit filed by Texas attorney general and governor-elect Greg Abbott that charges the Obama’s immigration action violated the U.S. Constitution’s “Take Care” clause and failed to follow the Administrative Procedure Act’s guidelines for implementing new policies, including a comment period to outline the changes’ benefits, National Review’s Andrew Johnson reported.
Abbot said in a statement the president “is abdicating his responsibility to faithfully enforce laws that were duly enacted by Congress and attempting to rewrite immigration laws, which he has no authority to do — something the president himself has previously admitted.”
The 16 other states are Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, West Virginia and Wisconsin.
Showtime in Vegas
The White House drew attention to President Obama’s trip to Las Vegas Nov. 21, where he was expected to sign two executive orders that would revise his Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA. But a close examination of the executive actions Obama actually signed shows they had nothing to do with implementing the move he announced in his Nov. 20 White House address to the nation.
According to the White House website, on Nov. 21 Obama signed a presidential proclamation titled “Creating Welcoming Communities Fully Integrating Immigrants and Refugees” and a presidential memorandum titled “Modernizing and Streamlining the U.S. Immigration Visa System for the 21st Century.”
The first of the presidential actions, “Creating Welcoming Communities Fully Integrating Immigrants and Refugees,” filed Nov. 26 in the Federal Register at Vol. 79, No. 228, in the category “Presidential Documents” at page 70769, created a White House Task Force on New Americans to “engage with community, business, and faith leaders, as well as State and local elected officials.” The task force is designed to “help determine additional steps the Federal Government can take to ensure its programs and policies are serving diverse communities that include new Americans.”
The second of the presidential actions, “Modernizing and Streamlining the U.S. Immigration Visa System for the 21st Century,” filed Nov. 26 in the Federal Register at Vol. 79, No. 228, in the category “Presidential Documents” at page 70765, empowered the secretaries of State and Homeland Security, in consultation with the director of the Office of Management and Budget, the director of the National Economic Council, the assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism, the director of the Domestic Policy Council, the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the attorney general, and the secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, Labor and Education, to make a series of recommendations “to reduce government costs, improve services for applicants, reduce burdens on employers, and combat waste, fraud, and abuse in the system” of issuing immigrant and non-immigrant visas.
The only Obama administration document relevant to altering DACA to accommodate the legislative changes announced in Obama’s address to the nation Nov. 21 is a DHS memorandum signed by DHS Secretary Johnson titled “Exercising Prosecutorial Discretion with Respect to Individuals Who Came to the United States as Children with Respect to Certain Individuals Who Are the Parents of U.S. Citizens or Permanent Residents.”
The Federal Register lists 26 executive orders President Obama has signed this year, with the most recent being “Improving the Security of Consumer Financial Transactions,” signed Oct. 17 and published in the Federal Register Oct. 23.
The last item DHS filed in the Federal Register relevant to DACA was a form revision filed April 4 that had nothing to do with the actions Obama announced Nov. 20.
Who has the authority?
“What is clear is that Jeh Johnson was the vehicle chosen by the Obama administration to extend temporary residency status and work authorization to millions of illegal immigrants currently in the country,” Fitton told WND.
The “Guide to the Federal Rulemaking Process” published by the Office of the Federal Register specifies agencies “get their authority to issue regulations from laws (statutes) enacted by Congress.”
The guide states further:
In some cases, the President may delegate existing Presidential authority to an agency. Typically, when Congress passes a law to create an agency, it grants that agency general authority to regulate certain activities within our society. Congress may also pass a law that more specifically directs an agency to solve a particular problem or accomplish a certain goal.
An agency must not take action that goes beyond its statutory authority or violates the Constitution. Agencies must follow an open public process when they issue regulations, according to the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). This includes publishing a statement of rulemaking authority in the Federal Register for all proposed and final rules.
Johnson’s Nov. 20 implementing memo is technically the announcement of a decision to exercise prosecutorial discretion, not a change in rules.
“Deferred action is a long-standing administrative mechanism dating back decades, by which the Secretary of Homeland Security may defer the removal of an undocumented immigrant for a period of time,” Johnson’s memo noted.
Fitton said an important question is whether or not the Johnson memo is subject to public comment provisions.
“This is a legal question given the impact of the Johnson memo is to stop effectively deportations of illegal immigrants that have been in the United States prior to Jan. 1, 2010, and are parents of children who are U.S. citizens or legal U.S. residents,” he said.
Johnson’s memo attempts to make the deferred prosecution decision announced for the DACA program equivalent to an executive action taken by two recent Republican presidents.
“A form of administrative relief similar to deferred action, known then as ‘indefinite voluntary departure,’ was originally authorized by the Reagan and Bush administrations to defer the deportations of an estimated 1.5 million undocumented spouses and minor children who did not qualify for legalization under the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986,” the memo said “Known as the ‘Family Fairness’ program, the policy was specifically implemented to promote the humane enforcement of the law and ensure family unity.”
The memo then attempted to further distinguish deferred action from rulemaking by noting the temporary aspects of the prosecutorial discretion involved:
Deferred action is a form of prosecutorial discretion by which the Secretary deprioritizes an individual’s case for humanitarian reasons, administrative convenience, or in the interest of the Department’s overall enforcement mission. As an act of prosecutorial discretion, deferred action is legally available so long as it is granted on a case-by-case basis, and it may be terminated at any time at the agency’s discretion. Deferred action does not confer any form of legal status in this country, much less citizenship; it simply means that, for a specified period of time, an individual is permitted to be lawfully present in the United States. Nor can deferred action itself lead to a green card.
Finally, the memo acknowledges that the actions taken with respect to the DACA program are not specifically authorized in any legislation passed by Congress and signed into law by the president.
Although deferred action is not expressly conferred by statute, the practice is referenced and therefore endorsed by implication in several federal statutes.
Fitton told WND that while Obama has maintained that his administration has issued executive orders just as prior administrations have done,” he’s now saying the memo signed by Johnson ‘”changed the law.”
In a speech in Chicago after his Nov. 20 announcement, Obama told hecklers, “I took action to change the law.” Confronted with the statement by reporters, White House press secretary Josh Earnest insisted the president was “speaking colloquially.”
But Fitton said there is nothing comparable to Obama’s admission in recent presidential history.
“Obama’s statement is an admission of tyranny.” (Head fake? Obama never signed amnesty order.)
Perhaps calling for the impeachment of Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson is both understandable as well as being good for Judicial Watch’s fund-raising efforts, the truth is, of course, that the Republican-controlled 114th Congress will not impeach the lawless Jeh Johnson or his lawless superior, Barack Hussein Obama/ Barry Soetoro. Indeed, the leadership Republican-controlled 114th Congress will not even run the risk of a shutdown of the Federal government next year in order to stop funding Casear Obama’s and Procurator Johnson’s amnesty directives.
No, as they did in the past—and are doing at the very moment—with ObamaCare, the Republican leadership of the incoming Congress is going to hope that the Supreme Court of the United States of America takes this hot chestnut out of their hands by declaring the Obama-Johnson actions to be unconstitutional and in violation of existing Federal law. Such a decision, if rendered, would give the Republicans an opportunity to do legislatively most of what Obama seeks to do by means of his decision to invoke “prosecutorial discretion” in a way that “changes the law.” Obama will get most of what he wants in such an instance, and he will ignore whatever legislative demands are made to increase and enforce border security.
As noted in part one of this commentary, the entire issue of immigration was covered in a two-part commentary on this site fifty-two months ago now. There is going to be no revisiting of that commentary except to note once again that corporate donors to the campaigns of “mainstream” Republicans do not want any real border security or that any effective measures be taken against the government of Mexico for tolerating conditions of crime, corruption and poverty in Our Lady’s country that drive many desperate souls to leave their native land for the United States of America.
No, the point of this commentary is that men such as John Boehner and Addison Mitchell McConnell, quite unlike their counterparts in the false opposite of the naturalist “left” who take no prisoners as they advance more and more statism and more and more social evil, care about one thing alone: the retention of their own power base and the increase of their party’s size in Congress as ultimate ends in and of themselves to which everything else must be subordinated and by which everything else must be measured.
Margaret Carlson, a commentator who supports Barack Hussein Obama/Barry Soetoro’s violation of the United States Constitution and of existing Federal law, made a very accurate of John Boehner’s intentions with respect to “hardline” “conservatives” who take little things like the Constitution seriously:
With a couple of moves that save face more than they change anything, Boehner has co-opted his Cantoring caucus, for now. House Republicans will vote Thursday on a resolution proposed by Rep. Ted Yoho of Florida that, he says, takes the "ink out of" Obama's pen by declaring the president lacked the authority for last month's executive action. Then they will pretend to take a surgical strike at the budget by punishing Homeland Security, which oversees immigration, with only a continuing resolution that funds it until March. This is an even limper tack because the agency carrying out Obama's executive order to end deportations for millions is the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which is financed by user fees. There's no way to cripple that.
Bohener was willing to play along, as long as the gestures are symbolic and the grandstanding remains theater.
"We don't believe that the president has the authority to do what he did," Boehner said at a news conference. "This is a serious breach of our Constitution. It is a serious threat to our system of government."
But members of the conservative caucus said his idea of passing a resolution condemning Obama's executive action while nipping at Homeland Security's funding was a punt and they made clear they would want to see more when Republicans take control of both chambers of Congress in January.
Still this is a victory for the speaker, who couldn't keep his members in line in past budget battles.
Yes, Boehner is much better off than he was a month ago. He talked his restive troops into feeling good about nothing. This fits the election about nothing (according to a CNN/ORC poll, only 16 percent of the public believes Republicans were handed a mandate by the midterms, and 74 percent believes the election was a rejection of Democrats for their more recent mistakes and weaknesses).
So, Boehner gets his first victory by getting his caucus to go along with an empty one. This clears the way to act like the speaker he's waited years to be. He can now move to real business: renewing expired tax breaks for individuals and businesses, approving a defense policy measure that has passed for more than 50 years, appropriating funds to combat Islamic State militants and to battle Ebola.
Some will miss the drama. In recent years, nothing has said Christmas in the Capitol like shuttered monuments and forced vacations. This year, Boehner can relax on the Speaker's balcony, drinks and smokes on him. (Boehner's fake red meat for angry Republicans.)
It’s always a dog and pony show in the nation’s capital. Always.
Remember, it was one hundred one years ago this month that the unconstitutional Federal Reserve System (The “Fed”), which is governed by a Board of Governors was created. No one within the ranks of “mainstream” Republican careerists has ever talked about repealing this draconian means of controlling the nation’s money supply and its “value,” such that has, of course. Indeed, most of the Republican careerists have a vested interest in serving as enablers and lapdogs of “The Fed” as their financial portfolios profit handsomely from the decisions made by the unelected Board of Governors.
The Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board at any given time has more power to shape the course of economic life in the United States of America than anyone else, including whoever happens to be serving in the White House as President. “The Fed” does the bidding of bankers and Wall Street, and it is the bankers and the Wall Street investment houses that control both of the organized crime families of naturalism in this country.
It’s always “business as usual” for the Republicans. Always.
The money is all that matters to the Republicans, ladies and gentlemen.
It is always about the money, something that Senator Addison Mitchell McConnell made clear on December 2, 2014, the Feast of Saint Bibiana:
"We need to quit, you know, kind of rattling the economy with things that are perceived by the voters as disturbing," he told a Washington conference. (House Speaker Boehner floats plan to avert shutdown.)
Thus it is that unconstitutional and illegal that Barack Hussein Obama/Barry Soetoro directives that Jeh Johnson has issued in the form of a memorandum, which has less legal authority than what is called a “Policy and Procedure Memorandum” of the Federal Highway Administration within the United States Department of Transportation that is actually filed and published in the Federal Register, will receive full funding from the hapless careerists in the Republican Party. These careerists are always so worried about the next election that they know how to do only one thing on a consistent basis: to huff and puff while most of them vote time and time again to increase the size, the power and the scope of the Federal government of the United States of America and to “authorize” one needless, immoral and unconstitutional military action after another without an actual declaration of war.
Remember, ladies and gentlemen, we live in a country full of boiled frogs, that is, citizens who have limited spans-of-attention and are easily distracted by the panoply of bread and circuses that our caesars use to keep the masses busy as they increasing their hold over us and the just exercise of legitimate liberties. Most people "get used" to their "government goodies." They got "used" to Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid. They got "used" to the increase of the size and scope and the power of the Federal government during World War I and the New Deal and World II and the Cold War and the Great Society/War on Poverty. They expected Republican administrations under Dwight David Eisenhower and Richard Milhous Nixon and Leslie Lynch King, Jr./Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. and Ronald Wilson Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush and George Walker Bush to keep the various unconstitutional programs, create and maintained by the confiscatory taxing power of the Federal government.
The expectations fell short every time. Yet it is that people still “believe” things will be “different” now than it has been in the past. This is delusional.
Indeed, President Dwight David Eisenhower merely amalgamated the various agencies that had been floating around in inter-galactic space for the twenty years prior to his taking office on January 1, 1953, that had been created under the New Deal of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He asked Congress to merge many of these agencies into what was called the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare, which became the United States Department of Health and Human Services in 1979 when the thoroughly unconstitutional United States Department of Education was created at the recommendation of President James Earl Carter, Jr. Ronald Wilson Reagan campaigned against Carter in 1980 on a platform of eliminating the Department of Education and the Department of Energy, which had been created at the initiative of the peanut man/appeaser of Communists worldwide from Georgia on August 4, 1977. He did neither.
Indeed, the Republican Party platform of 1980 included abolition of the Department of Education:
We understand and sympathize with the plight of America's public school teachers, who so frequently find their time and attention diverted from their teaching responsibilities to the task of complying with federal reporting requirements. America has a great stake in maintaining standards of high quality in public education. The Republican Party recognizes that the achievement of those standards is possible only to the extent that teachers are allowed the time and freedom to teach. To that end, the Republican Party supports deregulation by the federal government of public education, and encourages the elimination of the federal Department of Education.
We further sympathize with the right of qualified teachers to be employed by any school district wishing to hire them, without the necessity of their becoming enrolled with any bargaining agency or group. We oppose any federal action, including any action on the part of the Department of Education, to establish "agency shops" in public schools. (Republican Party Platform of 1980.)
Just talk. All talk.
It is never any more than. It is never any more than insane babbling because the naturalists of the "right" do not want to offend "swing" or "moderate" or "independent" voters in "swing" states, those that actually decide presidential elections who have, as mentioned earlier, gotten used to their "goodies."
It is actually worse than all of this if you recall that the "'compassionate,' 'pro-life' 'conservative'", President George Walker Bush, gave us the "Patriot Act" and "No Child Left Behind" and the over-the-counter sale of the "Plan B Emergency" baby-killing potion and the first "economic stimulus" under the Orwellian name of "Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) on October 3, 2008. He did not even make an effort to reverse the decision of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), a division of the Department of Health and Human Services, to permit the marketing of RU-486, the so-called "abortion pill," saying, quite infamously, in a debate with then Vice President Albert Arnold Gore, Jr., on October 3, 2000, that he would have no power to do as the FDA had determined that the baby-killing potion was "safe for women."
Ah, but men continue to dream the dream of "settling" injustices without the true Faith as they trust in one "secular savior" after another despite all of the empirical evidence that demonstrates these men to be nothing other than craven careerists concerned only about "winning" (see Nothing Can Ever Be "Settled" Without The True Faith). These careerists are not even concerned about defending a document that is a defenseless in hands of legal positivists and moral relativists as Holy Writ is in the hands of a Protestant or a Modernist Catholic.
To expect that those, such as Obama/Soetoro, who defy the binding precepts of the Divine Positive Law and the Natural Law by their unwavering, unconditional support for the chemical and surgical execution of the innocent preborn and for the promotion of moral perversity under cover of the civil law will abide by the constitution and laws that they swore to uphold is absurd. And Obama/Soetoro has a ready cadre of enablers within the hierarchy of the counterfeit church of conciliarism to support the caesar’s illegal actions in the name of “mercy” and “charity” Need it be pointed out that the conciliar revolutionaries continue to travel along the paths of their own “brave new world” that came into being over fifty years ago now, making them very suitable for the job of enabling Obama/Soetoro? (Well, I will point this out again in an article sometime next week.)
Just as nothing is stable and nothing is secure in the philosophically absurd world of conciliarism, so is it the case that nothing is stable and nothing is secure in American politics where "finality" depends upon nothing more than the whims of those who hold power.
This is so eerily similar to what Antipope Emeritus Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI's repackaging of the "evolution of dogma" under his philosophically absurd and dogmatically condemned "hermeneutic of continuity" does to the very nature of the papacy by making each pope's pronouncements and even dogmatic statements made by Holy Mother Church's true councils nothing more than "contingent" reflections of a certain time in history that need to be "adjusted" over time. This is what must happen to the written document of a civil government in the hands of those who have no regard for the laws of God and men, individuals who are truly lawless laws unto themselves.
In other words, contingent beings unguided by any consideration of First and Last Things must become the prisoners of the arbitrary considerations of whoever happens to hold governmental power at any given point in time as law becomes what civil officials say it is regardless of written texts that are supposed to govern their actions. This is the path to tyranny, which must arise in preparation for the coming of the Antichrist, who will come only after "the people" have become completely docile and submissive in the secular ape of the Catholic Church that is the civil government of Modernity.
Nations need to be founded and governed according to right principles, starting with a due recognition of the Catholic Church as the one and only true religion and a due submission to her exercise of the Social Reign of Christ the King in all that pertains to the good of souls. Nations that are indifferent or hostile to this basic truth, which was reiterated by true pope after true pope in the Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries, must degenerate over the course of time as they become subject to the arbitrary whims of those who serve in the civil government and/or whatever happens to constitute "majority" opinion amongst the populace at any given time. Among others, Pope Pius IX explained this in Quanta Cura, December 8, 1864:
For you well know, venerable brethren, that at this time men are found not a few who, applying to civil society the impious and absurd principle of "naturalism," as they call it, dare to teach that "the best constitution of public society and (also) civil progress altogether require that human society be conducted and governed without regard being had to religion any more than if it did not exist; or, at least, without any distinction being made between the true religion and false ones." And, against the doctrine of Scripture, of the Church, and of the Holy Fathers, they do not hesitate to assert that "that is the best condition of civil society, in which no duty is recognized, as attached to the civil power, of restraining by enacted penalties, offenders against the Catholic religion, except so far as public peace may require." From which totally false idea of social government they do not fear to foster that erroneous opinion, most fatal in its effects on the Catholic Church and the salvation of souls, called by Our Predecessor, Gregory XVI, an "insanity," viz., that "liberty of conscience and worship is each man's personal right, which ought to be legally proclaimed and asserted in every rightly constituted society; and that a right resides in the citizens to an absolute liberty, which should be restrained by no authority whether ecclesiastical or civil, whereby they may be able openly and publicly to manifest and declare any of their ideas whatever, either by word of mouth, by the press, or in any other way." But, while they rashly affirm this, they do not think and consider that they are preaching "liberty of perdition;" and that "if human arguments are always allowed free room for discussion, there will never be wanting men who will dare to resist truth, and to trust in the flowing speech of human wisdom; whereas we know, from the very teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, how carefully Christian faith and wisdom should avoid this most injurious babbling."
And, since where religion has been removed from civil society, and the doctrine and authority of divine revelation repudiated, the genuine notion itself of justice and human right is darkened and lost, and the place of true justice and legitimate right is supplied by material force, thence it appears why it is that some, utterly neglecting and disregarding the surest principles of sound reason, dare to proclaim that "the people's will, manifested by what is called public opinion or in some other way, constitutes a supreme law, free from all divine and human control; and that in the political order accomplished facts, from the very circumstance that they are accomplished, have the force of right." But who, does not see and clearly perceive that human society, when set loose from the bonds of religion and true justice, can have, in truth, no other end than the purpose of obtaining and amassing wealth, and that (society under such circumstances) follows no other law in its actions, except the unchastened desire of ministering to its own pleasure and interests? (Pope Pius IX, Quanta Cura, December 8, 1864.)
Nations that are not governed by leaders who understand First and Last Things thus will be at the mercy of various fleeting currents. There will be times when executives and legislators and judges take actions that are consonant with the common temporal good and are founded in solid jurisprudence and pose, at least minimally, no threat to the sanctification and sanctification of the souls of their fellow citizens (a goal that the Catholic Church teaches us must define the proper and just exercise of the authority possessed by civil rulers). There will also be times when executives and legislators and judges take actions that are manifestly opposed to a true conception of the common temporal good and serve as impediments to the sanctification and salvation of the souls of their fellow citizens. Such is the uncertainty of the modern civil state, founded upon false, naturalistic, semi-Pelagian and religiously indifferentist principles, that even trained scholars in constitutional law, a subject that I taught for a long time during my own academic career, are never quite certain what outcome might result from litigation challenging the constitutionality of a given executive action or legislative enactment.
As has been noted throughout the course of my writing in the past thirty years or so, the brave new world that is upon us not the result of any single court decision or legislative enactment.
No, the brave new world that is upon us was set into motion when a lecherous drunkard named Martin Luther posted those ninety-five theses on the door of Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, on October 31, 1517. It's been all downhill ever since.
Once again, repeat after me: Catholicism is the one and only foundation of personal and social order.
Saint Nicholas of Myra, whose feast we celebrate today, was a Successor of the Apostles who had a generous, loving heart in the pattern of the Most Sacred Heart of the Good Shepherd Himself, Christ the King, but who was also a firm and unequivocal foe of the heretic Arius and his heresy, Arianism.
The account of this great saint's life as found in the Blessed Jacobus de Voragine's The Golden Legend is what we should read to our children, not Clement Clarke Moore's '"A Visit from Saint Nicholas," in order to teach our children about Saint Nicholas's unfailing devotion to the cause of dogmatic truth, something that must inspire them to be as courageous as he was in this time of apostasy and betrayal as they grow up with figures of Antichrist all around them. It is appended below for your own meditation on this great feast day.
According an Athenian monk named Damaskinos, Saint Nicholas was imprisoned, albeit for a brief time, after he had slapped Arius at the Council of Nicea:
"The emperor was sitting on this throne, flanked by 159 bishops to his left and 159 to his right. Arian was presenting his views with great vigor and detail. As Saint Nicholas observed the scene, the bishops listened to Arius in complete silence without interrupting his discourse. Outraged and prompted by his saintly vigor, he left his seat and walked up to Arius, faced him squarely and slapped his face.
"At this, the assembly was shocked. Arius's supporters turned to the emperor, asking that he intervene and punish Nicholas. They said, 'Oh Just One, tell us, can it be fair that in your very presence someone should be permitted, without hindrance, to assault another? If he has anything to say in rebuttal, by all means let him have his say. But if he is not sufficiently learned to make a proper argument, then it were better if he remain in his seat, quietly, and listen to others who are prepared to state their case in words.'
'Arius himself spoke directly to the emperor, 'Should anyone who has the temerity to hit me, in from of Your Majesty, remain unpunished?' Emperor Constantine replied, 'Indeed, there is a law which forbids anyone to lift his hand in violence in the presence of the emperor and it specifies that his hand be cut off. However, it is not up to me, in this in Assembly, to act upon it. Instead, Your Holinesses, should make the decision in this case; I leave it to your judgment, whether and how this act is to be punished.'
"The bishops conferred with each other, and when they came to a decision, they said to the emperor, 'Your Majesty, the bishop of Myra has acted wrongfully. We all saw it happen and attest to it. We therefore ask your permission to let us strip him of his clerical garments, shackle him, and place him under guard as a prisoner. In this way, he shall not be permitted to participate in the proceedings of the Council for the rest of the deliberations. Once the synod is completed, a final judgment in his case may be made.'
"As a result, that evening, Nicholas was made a prisoner in another wing of the palace. He was placed in a jail-like room, without his bishop's mantle and shackled on hand and foot. However, during the night he was visited by Jesus [and His] Mother. They observed Saint Nicholas in his cell and said, 'Nicholas, why are you imprisoned?' And Saint Nicholas said, 'Because of my love for you." First they freed him from his shackles. And then Jesus said, 'Take this! and he gave him a volume of the Holy Scripture. Then [Mary] went away, returned, and brought him his bishop's garments, so that he might clothe himself with appropriate dignity. At peace, he studied the Holy Book through the night.
"The next morning, a jailer came to bring him bread, saw that Nicholas was no longer shackled, that he was clothed in the garments of his position, an that he was studying the Scriptures in the cell. Even his stole was in one hand, while he held the book with the other. News of this miraculous event was quickly brought to the emperor. He asked that Nicholas be freed, and when the two men met, the emperor asked the bishop's forgiveness (Ebon, 34-35)." (As found in Joe Wheeler and Jim Rosenthal, St. Nicholas: A Closer Look at Christmas, published by Nelson Reference and Electronic, a Division of Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 2005, pp. 46-47.)
That's the Saint Nicholas we should follow, not the false "Santa Clauses" of the false opposites of Modernity or the false "Santa Clauses" who have given away the Holy Faith in the name of "aggiornamento" an who have given away her moral authority to various "world governing" bodies (see Finishing Off The Overthrow of the Papal States).
The readings for Matins as found in the Divine Office for today's feast provide us with additional inspiration of a saint of true Catholic charity, starting with a love for God and the integrity of His Sacred Deposit of Faith:
Nicolas was born at the famous city of Patara in Lycia. His parents obtained him from God by prayer, and the holiness of his life was marked even from the cradle. When he was at the breast he never would suck more than once on Wednesdays and Fridays, and that always after sunset, though he sucked freely on other days. This custom of fasting he never broke through during his whole life. While he was still a young man he lost both his father and mother, after which he gave his whole property away to the poor. One particular example is given of his Christian charity. There was a certain needy man in the city who had three marriageable daughters, for whom he could not get husbands, and so thought to make them harlots. When Nicolas heard of it, he went to the house by night and threw in by the window such a sum of money as made a dowry for one of them. This he did a second and a third time, and thus by his charity they were honourably given in marriage.
When he had given himself entirely to God he set forth for Palestine, that he might see the Holy Places, and worship therein. During this pilgrimage he embarked once on board a ship when the sky was clear and the sea calm, but he foretold a great storm, which afterwards arose and raged until the sailors were afraid; and then the saint by prayer stilled the tempest. After he had returned home, and his holy life was known to all men, God bade him go to Myra, which is the chief city of Lycia, at a time when the Bishop had just died and the Bishops of the Province were called together to choose a successor. While they deliberated, they received a warning from heaven to choose that Nicolas who should first come into the church in the morning. In obedience to that warning, Nicolas was seized at the door of the church, and with universal consent consecrated Archbishop. In his great office he was an unceasing model of purity, as he had always been, of gravity, of regularity in prayer, of watching, of abstinence, of charity, of hospitality, of meekness in exhortation, and of sternness in rebuke.
He was the com