President Obama’s lame-duck drive for disastrous ‘success’

Lame-duck presidents rarely get

much done in their final year, or even
try — clearing the field for election-
year politics. But President Obama is
plainly intent on feeding partisan
rancor in 2016 — via unconstitutional
overreach.
He’s going big with executive action,
damn the consequences. And he’s
doing so on divisive issues from gun
control to immigration.
On New Year’s Eve, his Homeland
Security Department announced new
rules boosting the number of work
visas for foreign-born US college
graduates — well above the level
approved by Congress.
This, just weeks after language
buried deep in the omnibus spending
bill increased visas for working-class
immigrants.
And as immigration has become a
bitter issue on the presidential
campaign trail.
On gun control, word is that an
executive order to expand
background checks on certain gun
sales will come this week.
Look: This issue’s been before
Congress for at least two years —
and gone nowhere. Worse, Obama’s
claim that he has the power to act
here is legally . . . imaginative. So the
action is nothing more than red meat
for the culture warriors on both sides
— plus provocation of the legislative
branch.
On both issues, the president could
have sought an honest dialogue with
opponents and tried to forge a
compromise. But he’s instead spent
years demonizing those opponents —
and losing Democratic seats in
Congress as a result.
And every time his rhetoric blows up
in his face, he resorts to dubious
unilateral action.
Most famously, in 2014 he issued an
executive order giving limited legal
status to illegal immigrants brought
to the country as children. It’s been
struck down in the courts, with only
faint hope of successful appeal.
So he inspires his political base,
enrages the opposition — and
changes nothing.
The underlying issue doesn’t get
resolved, yet the country grows more
divided, with all sides more
frustrated.
The president may think he’s “doing
something” with his unilateral
approach — but it amounts to
nothing more than stroking his own
ego at the nation’s expense.