Reflections From a Murky Pond

It seems that even Obama can sense when the winds have shifted and his campaign promises are best left lying in gutter. With oil prices now under $50 a barrel for light crude – down from a high of $147 during last July – Obama has decided not to implement his windfall profits tax upon US oil companies.

CHICAGO/WASHINGTON (Reuters):

President-elect Barack Obama is not planning to implement a windfall profit tax on oil companies because prices have dropped below $80 a barrel, an aide said on Tuesday…

Obama, who signaled early in his campaign for the White House that he would take an active approach to oil markets as president, had planned to use the revenue from a windfall profits tax to fund a tax rebate for low- and middle-income families struggling with high energy prices.

The environmentalists in specific and the Left in general are gnashing their teeth over what they perceive as a betrayal by their Messiah. Meanwhile the oil companies are breathing a sigh of relief and crowing just a bit. Both groups are to some extent acting like idiots.

Let’s look at this from a pragmatic point of view. President-elect Obama is a politician – one raised in Chicago’s school of political street fighting – with political goals. It does not serve his purposes to use a tax to steal money from the oil companies when there’s no available money to be had. This is no way indicates that Obama doesn’t want to take money from the oil companies and use it for his own aims. If and when oil prices climb again, he’ll be more than willing to snatch as much as he can get away with.

There’s also another point that the environmental types should remember – Obama’s proposed windfall profits tax upon the oil companies wasn’t intended to be spent on green power; it was meant to be spent on an “energy rebate” ($500 to individual workers, $1,000 to families). With the drop in fuel / energy costs, this rebate is no longer needed.

On the other hand, the oil companies need to remember that Obama is no where’s near being their friend. They should keep it firmly in mind that this is a stay of execution, not a pardon. Obama and the Left have already tried them and found them guilty of the worst crime in the Left’s view of America – wealth. Obama and his constituents and helpers – Pelosi comes quickly to mind – will come for the oil companies sooner or later.

As I said, the winds have shifted – but it’s mostly nothing more than hot air.

Today, December 1, 2008, President-Elect Barack Obama has officially asked Sen. Hillary Clinton to be his Secretary of State and Sen. Clinton has accepted the appointment pending a successful Senate confirmation hearing.

This is strangely interesting development since Obama has violated the US Constitution by appointing Sen. Clinton as Secretary of State and Sen. Clinton has violated the US Constitution by accepting the position.

Sadly for the principals involved, The second clause of Article 1, Section 6 of the US Constitution forbids Sen. Clinton from being appointed to the office of Secretary of State or any other civil office.

No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time; and no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office.

— US Constitution
Article 1, Section 6, Clause 2

During the course of Sen. Clinton’s current term in the Senate, the salary for Cabinet officers was increased from $186,600 to $191,300. Said salaries are scheduled to yet again be raised in January 2009. This means that not only Hillary Clinton but all sitting Senate members could or should be considered constitutionally ineligible to serve in Obama’s Cabinet.

This seems a telling faux pas on Obama’s part since he used to practice constitutional law. 😉

Of course Obama is not the first one to run afoul of Article 1, Section 6 of our constitution. Presidents Taft, Nixon, Carter, and H.W. Bush had the same problem when they tried to appoint Cabinet members who were serving in the House or Senate.

They all also weaseled their way around the constitutional strictures by having the appointees’ respective salaries reduced to the levels they had been before their appointees had served in office. This was a move that may have honored the spirit of our Constitution, but clearly violated it’s written mandate.

Let’s put this in perspective though, since there’s some chance that this will become an issue in the blogosphere – if not the Obama-adoring MSM. Obama’s appointment of Sen. Clinton as his Secretary of State is a Constitutional Crisis, but it one we as a nation have dealt with before – far more than once.

This issue may, however, be a harbinger of how Obama will approach the Constitution while President, and may shed some light on how Obama has approached constitutional law in the past.