Senate Republicans have been holding up the confirmation of Richard Cordray to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau until changes to the agency’s structure are made to provide oversight and accountability at the agency. But sources from inside the Capitol tell Capitol Confidential that a recess appointment of Richard Cordray to head the unconstitutional CFPB could come as early as tomorrow.

“We have been hearing consistently from the Senate offices that the President is considering a recess appointment of Richard Cordray along with a slew of other controversial nominees in the brief period between the two sessions of Congress,” a key Senate source said. “Now we are hearing from Senior Democrat staffers that something big is coming tomorrow [Jan 4].”

Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution provides the president with the power to “fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate.” The problem for the president and his liberal allies is that the Senate has not recessed and technically remains in session. However, liberal groups are pressing the White House to invoke the “Roosevelt Option” to stack key government positions with radicals ready to carry out an anti-business, pro-big labor regulatory agenda. The Roosevelt Option is coined from the actions of Teddy Roosevelt who in 1903, in a split-second between two congressional sessions of Congress, made more than 100 recess appointments. In 2012, Congress will need to move from the First Session of this current Congress to the Second Session. Liberals claim the fraction of a second between the sessions is enough to trigger presidential power.

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In an exclusive interview with the Heritage Foundation, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had strong words for President Obama:

In a crowded press-conference at the U.N. on Monday, King Cornelius Pacifus of Unicornia lauded the new Nuclear Posture Review recently published by U.S. President Barack Obama. In New York for the United Nations Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference that begins today, Pacificus gave Obama what amounted to a pre-emptive disarmament shout-out. Unicornia’s stance on nuclear matters is usually considered a bellwether for that of other nations on the thorny issue.

King Pacificus pledged his small peace-loving nation’s support for the American policy shift: “Unicornia herself long ago embraced the efficacy of a Peace through Weakness strategy, and today our nation whole-hornedly applauds and supports the American president for adopting a similar attitude,” Pacifus proclaimed.

Fielding softball questions from a room overflowing with docile MSM reporters, the monoceros monarch made clear his country’s reasons for supporting America’s recent radical shift in nuclear posture: “In the bitter Butterfly Wars of the 17th century, Unicornia learned the hard way that standing up to tyrants and cruel dictators not only doesn’t work—it’s also just not nice.” Scholars allege an estimated 3 million Unicorns and 40 million Lepidopterae perished in that protracted ten-year battle over which portion of the air the other species was entitled to breathe. “War is mean,” Pacifus observed, with his classic gift for understatement. “And nuclear war is really mean. Really really mean.”

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“Ever since Teddy Roosevelt first called for reform in 1912, seven presidents — Democrats and Republicans alike — have taken up the cause of reform time and time again,” President Obama said in a statement hailing the Christmas Eve Senate vote to take over 1/6 of the nation’s economy.  “Such efforts have been blocked by special-interests lobbyists who have perpetrated the status quo that works better for the insurance industry than it does for the American people.”

Note the date of TR’s “calling” for reform. It’s 1912.  Nationalized health care was part of the platform of the Progressive Party that year and every year thereafter. Americans are more familiar with the name Theodore himself gave to that third party bid. After being shot by a would-be assassin in Milwaukee, TR said it takes more than a single bullet to stop a Bull Moose. Instantly, the colorful sobriquet was applied to the Progressive Party.

What did Theodore himself think of his new-found allies, the Progressives? He was sincerely committed to reform. And he certainly thought he had been cheated out of the Republican Party presidential nomination in 1912. After all, he had won all the state party primaries in the limited number of states that held them. But TR also recognized that some of his Progressive supporters went over the top. For them, he coined the wonderful phrase, “the lunatic fringe.”

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The other day  I made the assertion that Barbara Boxer (D – Tiny Town) was the stupidest member of the United States Senate.  I may have spoken too soon.  Here’s a serious challenger:

Yesterday, in his desperate attempt to win friends, influence people and reach across the aisle as he tries to bring the senate’s version of a “health care” bill to a vote, Sen. Harry Reid (D – Las Vegas) decided to go for broke.  Speaking in his trademark tremulous, reedy voice that makes that of his predecessor, the homunculus from South Dakota, Sen. Tom Daschle (D – IRS), sound like Paul Robeson singing “Ol’ Man River,” the punch-drunk former boxer compared Republican opposition to the proponents of slavery and segregation.  “When this body was on the verge of guaranteeing equal civil rights to everyone, regardless of the color of their skin, some senators resorted to the same filibuster threats that we hear today…  History is repeating itself before our eyes.”

No words of mine can possibly do justice to the magisterial presentation of the Sage of Searchlight, so please have a look and listen before we continue:

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