The presidential state

So it has come to this: the president of the United States, a onetime professor of constitutional law, has done away with the Constitution of the United States. What need do we have of Congress, when Mr Obama by executive action can rewrite any legislation that it passes? Why not simply do away the laws, and create new ones on the fly? That's what he has done on the subject of immigration.

To add to my creepy sense that America is falling into an abyss, the New York Times this morning applauds the action. The president had to do it, the Gray Lady argues, because Congress wouldn't act. Never mind that legislation is a Congressional prerogative, and that it is elected by the people, most recently on the second Tuesday of this month. Congress be damned! The people be damned!

We have seen this president scold the Supreme Court. He will be in the White House for two years and two months yet, time enough for him to jettison the judiciary as well. What then will be left of the United States of America, whose laws he has twice sworn faithfully to execute?