The link to the thread is in post #39 above. Here it is again: linky
Toward the end of that thread, you admitted that you were expecting us (i.e. we liberal respondents to the thread) to have answered differently than we did, and more like the way you apparently now remember that we did.
I’m saying that you were wrong then and you’re wrong now. Do you think that’s so unlikely that you won’t even review the previous thread for yourself? If you don’t wish to test your worldview against actual events, if your “liberal hypocrisy” belief system is a closed epistemology, then me quoting various posts won’t fix it.
For the benefit of others in this discussion, here’s a few notable quotes. Be warned, they tend to follow a set of goalposts which rather arbitrarily march around the field:
First of all, the primary example I have used to explain why I think that Presidents should not be forced to follow a statutory deadline in the face of practical consequences rather than political views has been the non-partisan issue of space travel, so I feel confident that your cries of political partisanship of “only Democrat Presidents have special powers” can be safely excluded from my comments.
But let’s say the hypothetical President Romney and the GOP Congress got the votes together to pass the “Mandatory School Voucher and Legal Citation Education Program of 2019.” That bill fully embraces the elimination of the public school system in the United States and provides Ronald Reagan Freedom Dream and Religious Education Scholarship Grants for every schoolchild in America to attend parochial schools. What’s more, the law requires every schoolchild to receive special training in Lexis-Nexis searches beginning in the third grade, so that every dispute, debate, or even witty exchange could be fully sourced and cited to Supreme Court cases. I’m sure there are plenty of Republicans around the country who would find it to be a glorious piece of legislation, and it might be one of the crowning achievements of the Romney presidency.
Lo and behold, with the bill being passed so late in Romney’s first term, there’s a problem with implementation. Turns out that the watermark showing Reagan’s face on each voucher check is making the Great Communicator look more like Woody from Toy Story; and wouldn’t you know, Lexis-Nexis doesn’t have the computing resources to accept millions of new children as users of their databases. The implementation deadline of July 1, 2020, simply can’t be met. The President says an extra year is needed to make sure that this program is actually implemented as Congress intended.
I’m fine with that. President Romney is working to fulfill the law as best as he can, and barring any new revelations about his intent, it seems reasonable that the Chief Executive simply cannot snap his fingers to make situations beyond his immediate control such that the law will be implemented by a statutory deadline, but it seems that with a little extra time, the will of Congress will be carried out.
But, on January 20, 2021, President Howard Dean is inaugurated. He, like me, doesn’t like this law. He knows full well that the program is constitutional (for the Roberts court has already ruled on it), but he just doesn’t think it’s good public policy. He wants to delay implementation because he doesn’t like the law. In my view, he is not upholding his oath of office, and I believe his actions to be illegal.
And here, the problem… wait, what?
Look, you have answered clearly, concisely, reasonably, and completely every point I’ve made. So as it happens, I have nothing to say to you except thanks for answering.
OK, one other thing. I don’t think your opinions are shared by the other responders to this thread.
<golf clap> for Ravenman .
Seriously, Bricker , I doubt you’ll find anyone who’s so far argued in this thread for the legality of Obama’s reporting delay who actually disagrees with Ravenman about the relative legalities of the delays by hypothetical President Romney and his hypothetical successor President Dean.
Ok, I accept that.
I’m trying to put my mental finger on why I was so convinced that the answers would come out differently, and I think there are a couple of pieces of evidence that nudged me towards that conclusion.
One is the general acceptance of California’s approach on Prop 8 – they refused to defend it. So I guess I could tweak the Romney/Dean hypo as I started to ask a couple of pages ago: what if the issue were President Romney’s defense of the Mandatory School Voucher and Legal Citation Education Program of 2019?
In your hypo, the Court has already blessed it. But what if we explore this question – the law gets challenged, Romney’s administration defends it, and then Dean’s administration comes into power and stops defending it in court?
I honestly don’t know that a Dept. of Justice can just stop defending an extant case that’s being adjudicated, can they?
But let’s say under Romney the law has been ruled in error some way by a lesser court and then Pres. Dean is sworn in and instructs the AG (either his newly confirmed nominee or the existing Romney era guy) not to appeal that decision. I think this is probably not improper. Same answer if PPACA had not already been upheld in SCOTUS and a 2017 administration decided not to defend it. Then I think it bounces back to Congress to fix or scrap the law per the specific judgement.
Same with selective prosecution, I think. I recall that the Bush administration had definite political priorities in the selection of cases to prosecute. I recall many of their choices infuriating those of my political stripe, but I don’t believe that was ever seriously considered unconstitutional discretion.