Al's Opinions

The President has used his executive authority to alleviate one of the worst parts of out faulty immigration system.  Basically, he has announced that there are certain rules regarding immigrants that he will not enforce.  The parents of children born in this country and attending schools here will not be arbitrarily deported.  Children born elsewhere of parents here legally will not be deported.  At least that's my understanding of it.

Is he breaking the law?  Well, yes.  He's refusing to enforce certain laws that he thinks are unjust.

Does he really have the power under the Constitution to decline to enforce certain laws?  Good question.  I don't know.  I do know that he is not the first President to refuse to enforce a law he didn't like.  There was another one, perhaps Andrew Jackson, who was so displeased with a decision of the Supreme Court that he said, "Justice **** has issued his decision.  Now let him enforce it."

Will there be a court challenge to Mr. Obama's policy regarding immigrants without papers?  You bet.  However, it will take time to find its way through the federal courts and end up in the Supreme Court.  Meanwhile, certain deportation laws will not be enforced.  Mr. Obama's policy may stay in effect until the end of his term on January 20, 2017.

Republican leaders are in disarray.  What Obama has done may split the GOP in two.  The more rational part really wants some sort of change, similar to what Obama has done.  The Tea Party part wants none of it.  Even with majorities in both chambers of Congress, Republicans will have to deal with the immigration issue rather than their financial program of cutting the tax rates on corporations and wealthy individuals, replacing Social Security with a tax-free savings system, and making some changes in the Affordable Care Act, such as eliminating financial support for poor people and getting rid of the employer mandate to provide subsidized health insurance to employees.  I look forward to two years of yelling and screaming but essentially nothing being changed, nothing being accomplished.  In effect, Mr. Obama has spiked the Republican cannons.