Sunday, July 6, 2014

Boehner's Boner: Ineffectual Parenting of the Boyking

We've all seen those instances we immediately recognize as illustrations for a life class called Ineffective Parenting 101. You know the scene: a child is insolently and sullenly refusing to comply with an instruction from a parent; or a child is having a tantrum. The parent turns to the child and says, "if you do that again, I'm going to . . . ."

We know this is a pointless exercise.

The parent has already declared allegiance ... to entropy ... to inertia ... to couch-potatoism. The child, though no wiser than the parent, certainly is smarter in this instance. There will be NO repercussions, no consequences of merit.

That's how it feels to watch Speaker John Boehner threaten to sue the ‪#‎boyking‬Barack Obama. You definitely don't see Boehner giving Obama the constitutional butt-smacking he deserves, and, in fact, the only one of two constitutional disciplines of the President that belong to the Congress. If Boehner wants to do his job, he needs to forget about suing the President. Even if he can get every Republican in the House to authorize the suit, the federal courts will, ultimately, throw the suit out (a) because of lack of legal standing to sue, or (b) as presenting a non-justiciable political controversy.

No. If Boehner doesn't want to be the face of a thousand scenes of abandoned responsibility and duty undone, he will direct the House to turn its attention before any other business to drafting, investigating, and voting on Articles of Impeachment. The only just answer to the tyranny of this President is his impeachment, his removal, his indictment, and his conviction.