Rasmussen: Plurality of Democrats think Obama should be able to ignore court rulings if it’s “important” « Hot Air

Rasmussen: Plurality of Democrats think Obama should be able to ignore court rulings if it’s “important” « Hot Air: "I assume Rasmussen deliberately chose a phrase as open-ended as “important for the country” to nudge respondents about the potential for abuse. Once you tell the president it’s cool to ignore court rulings if it’s “important,” you might as well pass an enabling act and hand him supreme power. Forty-three percent of Democrats, an actual plurality, didn’t flinch, though. And the irony is, Obama’s own defenses of his power grabs aren’t much more sophisticated than that. His rationale for executive amnesty is that Congress is hopelessly gridlocked, the legal limbo that illegals find themselves in is intolerable, and we’ve now reached a point of crisis (a political crisis for the White House, not a policy crisis) that simply demands executive action. It’s crucially important that he act unilaterally and that he act now, even though he can’t quite explain — again, on policy terms — why that is. Just trust him. It’s important. And Democrats do, including and especially the core Democratic constituencies of women, young adults, and minorities.

If you’re looking for a silver lining here, you can find it in the fact that these numbers will move — probably within both parties — once a Republican’s back in the White House. Some GOPers will doubtless become more comfortable with executive action at that point, but I’d bet Republican opposition to the idea of the president defying court rulings doesn’t soften nearly as much as Democratic opposition will harden. That’s the state of the rule of law in the “progressive” party now. Separation of powers and check and balances are wonderful things, but only when they’re being used to restrain the right people."



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