Is Obama Trying to Make Government Too Big to Fail?

When President Obama spoke of fundamentally transforming America, I took him at his word. I was always troubled by those comments because, although America has issues that will require creative solutions, it certainly shouldn’t be fundamentally “transformed.” Transformed into what? One transformation that President Obama is trying to institute is a legacy of dramatically bigger, more bureaucratic, and more intrusive government. This new government leviathan that he has constructed has built-in mechanisms to ensure that it is not easily dismantled.

Here is a short list of areas which have been altered and damaged and will take time and effort to repair and unwind:

1) Service-Oriented Government:

The players in the IRS targeting scandal, the EPA email scandal, the Clinton email scandal, the NSA targeting scandal, and the AP/Fox News journalist-targeting scandal, have yet to suffer any real consequences for their actions. Because of this lack of consequences a new “standard” for government has been set. That new standard states that the weaponizing of government is acceptable as long as the political fallout can be contained. A legacy that will outlast this President.

2) The Mainstreaming of Soft Bigotry and Anti-Semitism:

The Obama administration’s overt hostility to Israel in favor of tyrannical and destructive regimes, along with their callous handling of the Paris terror attacks in the Jewish deli, has assisted in mainstreaming both a soft and a hard bigotry against Jewish people and Israel. This will be difficult to unwind because many people who share the Obama administration’s views are now serving in appointed positions in the government bureaucracy and this will take time to change.

3) Presidential Abuse of Power:

The Obama administration’s abuse of prosecutorial discretion through their illegal Executive Actions on immigration, along with their unilateral, and completely unconstitutional, rewriting of Obamacare, has resulted in unprecedented presidential power at the expense of Americans who rely on our constitutional system to protect them against the abuse of power. These “new” presidential powers have reset what is “acceptable” action by the President and have put the next President in an awkward scenario where his or her first task should be to strip away the illegal authority President Obama has taken.

4) Crony Capitalism:

Both Democrats and Republicans are responsible in this arena, but the Obama administration has been pushing tax code carve-outs for his “special” corporate friends in the green energy arena, and legions of others who have figured out that it is far more profitable to lobby and invest in kissing the butts of government officials than to invest in producing better products. This has ensured a steady flow of money into the campaign accounts of politicians interested in regulation, taxation and in big-government, not the free-market, picking economic winners and losers. This will persist long after the President has left office.

5) Immigration:

The Obama administration has provided, through illegal and unconstitutional measures, incentives to avoid the legal immigration process in favor of those violating the immigration laws. One of the reasons they are doing this is to ensure a steady-stream of, what they believe to be, future voters in electorally strategic areas, long past the time President Obama has departed the White House.

6) Financial Markets:

The Dodd-Frank legislation signed into law by the Obama administration has enabled the government to designate a private business as “systemically important.” The end result of this is that the company will be forced into a regulatory spider web and your tax dollars will bail them out if they fail. This is that rare piece of legislation that manages to upset both taxpayers and crony-capitalists receiving taxpayer bailouts. The legacy of this legislation is that it ensures large campaign donations to big government politicians who will help influence who is designated “systemically important” and who gets the tax payer bail outs. This will enshrine a bigger and more aggressive regulatory state if we don’t stop it soon.

7) The Internet:

The Obama administration’s relentless push for the recently passed FCC “Net Neutrality” regulations will guarantee a future of Internet taxes and heavy government regulations. The permission of FCC bureaucrats will now be needed for web activity which was previously free of government intervention. This will inevitably lead to abuses of power where Internet content is regulated and corporate money is diverted from Internet development and growth into lobbying and paying off elected officials who can “approve” what were previously free-market arrangements.

8) Land-Use Planning

The Obama administration’s push, through various environmental edicts, to move people into living in cities is an effort to coalesce people into strong, lasting Democratic voter-enclaves. City living is heavily reliant on government (transportation, water, police, fire, sanitation etc…) unlike rural living where Americans are free to be more self-reliant. This will lead to voting trends that are difficult to counteract.

9) Most importantly:

The Obama administration’s disingenuous and relentless pursuit of division in America based on race, socio-economics, place of birth, religion, sexual-preference, and gender, strictly for political advantage, has done lasting damage to the fabric of the country. We can no longer have legitimate policy differences without being accused of racism, sexism or some other “ism” or “phobia.” It will take years to reestablish a more dignified and respectful political dialogue in the country after President Obama leaves office.

Now, for the good news. In order to know where we need to go, we have to know where we’ve been. We can, and will fix this. You and I were put here to fight back, not to sit back and rest on the liberty given to us by The Lord but secured and paid for by the blood and sacrifice of others. It was never going to be easy but nothing truly worth having is. Our mission is clear and 2016 is right around the corner. It’s time.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the Conservative Review. The featured image is courtesy of CR and the AP.