It’s Monday, January 16th, 2012….but before we begin, two brief notes, the first to those who would use the Bronco’s loss to New England as a means to disparage Tim Tebow’s faith:

Giants Down Defending Champion Packers

Aaron Rodgers is a devout Christian as well.  All either result proves is sometimes there’s only so much a quarterback, no matter how talented he might be, can do without the benefit of a defense!

Second, a photo forwarded from Paul Croisetiere that sums up our feelings this MLK Day:

Now, here’s The Gouge!

First up, two candidates….er,….make that two FORMER candidates in one!

Jon Huntsman to Drop Out of Presidential Race

Republican presidential candidate Jon M. Huntsman Jr. intends to drop out of the nomination contest on Monday and endorse rival Mitt Romney, the Huntsman campaign said. “He’s going to endorse Gov. Romney tomorrow and urge the party to come together,” one person briefed on events said.

A Huntsman aide said Mr. Huntsman was proud of his third-place showing in New Hampshire last week but felt his campaign was standing in the way of a Romney win in Saturday’s primary election in South Carolina. “He decided to drop out to clear the way for the person who is clearly the best suited to beat Barack Obama,” the aide said.

This from a man whose entire campaign was built on division, and had but last Friday found Romney “completely unelectable”, observing….

“To take on Obama, the candidate has to be able to get more than just Republican votes, and Huntsman said he’s the man who can deliver.”

Thus Huntsman’s quest for the Oval Office is over; his problem was never an inability to deliver more than just Republican votes, but rather that he couldn’t deliver any Republican votes….at all.

Now only Newt’s obduracy, Ron Quixote and Saint Santorum now prevent Republicans from focusing all their time, effort and money on defeating Barack Obama.  For good or ill, Mitt’s the man; and Conservatives and Libertarians alike will hold their noses, pull the lever and to trust their allies in Congress to keep Romney on the reservation.

Speaking of The Obamao, more on his latest end-run around the Constitution from Conn Carroll and the Morning Examiner….

Obama’s Endless Power to Appoint

President Obama’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) released its opinion yesterday justifying Obama’s January 4 “recess” appointments (Richard Cordray to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and Richard Griffin and Sharon Block to the National Labor Relations Board). The memo is dated January 6th, but the Department of justice insists it was completed well before Obama made the appointments. The Heritage Foundation’s Todd Gaziano explains why the decision will not hold up in court:

Animating that central problem is the artificial premise of the question presented, which only considers the period from Jan. 3 through Jan. 23, and argues over and over again that the Senate could not conduct business during that period. But the pro-forma sessions began when most senators left town on Dec. 17. Why not mention the even longer period of time, since that might ordinarily help the President’s argument? The answer is on page 21, where the opinion has to acknowledge that twice during such “pro-forma” sessions, the Congress actually passed bills that became law (on Aug. 5, 2011 and Dec. 23, 2011). Since the President signed these bills into law, it really had no choice but to admit that those pro forma sessions mattered.

The memo confirms that Obama believes he can pick and choose when the Senate is and is not in session on his whim. He was happy to sign the bills passed in pro forma session in December into law, but now he is claiming an exact same pro forma session could not approve his appointments.

Even liberals are admitting that the Obama OLC memo contains no limiting principle to Obama’s new asserted power. Mother Jones‘ Adam Sewer writes:

“Under the Justice Department’s argument, Obama could have recess appointed every federal judge waiting for an up or down vote but chose not to.”

This is 100% true. Under the logic of this memo, a President Romney could recess appoint his entire administration the first night the Senate gavel’s out of session after he is sworn in. Like his wildly unpopular health care reform law, anything these “recess” appointees do is guaranteed to end up challenged in court.

In a related item….

Obama to Propose Merging Agencies

President Obama will propose merging six agencies that focus on trade and commerce into one new department, a government official said Friday, an effort to make it easier for businesses that often get lost in a maze of bureaucracy.

The change would affect the Commerce Department as well as five smaller agencies. The president, who can’t make the change on his own, will ask Congress for fast-track authority to undertake the reorganization.

Thus the God-Emperor deigns to grant Congress some authority….

….for now!

Meanwhile, cracks in The Anointed One’s “man-of-the-people” facade continue to surface:

Book Depicts Cranky Obama On Baghdad Visit

Michael Hastings’ new book, The Operators, jabs at what could be a vulnerable spot for the Obama Administration, the president’s relationship with the troops. The book describes a visit to Baghdad:

After the talk, out of earshot from the soldiers and diplomats, he starts to complain. He starts to act very un-Obamalike, according to a U.S. embassy official who helped organize the trip in Baghdad.

He’s asked to go out to take a few more pictures with soldiers and embassy staffers. He’s asked to sign copies of his book. “He didn’t want to take pictures with any more soldiers; he was complaining about it,” a State Department official tells me. “Look, I was excited to meet him. I wanted to like him. Let’s just say the scales fell from my eyes after I did. These are people over here who’ve been fighting the war, or working every day for the war effort, and he didn’t want to take fucking pictures with them?”

Very “unObamalike”?  Only if you believed all the hype in the first place!

Since we’re on the subject of those who believe all the hype, next up, courtesy of The Daily Show, a must-see video clip which confirms the Left actually drinks its own Kool-Aid:

Turns out Joe Walsh was right; you really CAN’T argue with a sick mind!

Then there’s this from the Greatest Debilitative Body on Earth:

Senators warn new EPA rules would raise gas prices

“Warn”?  “Urge”?!?  Heaven forbid these heroic Horatiuses do more than just TALK about the problem….and risk running afoul of the Environazi lobby.  Though we’re left wondering, is there a RIGHT time to enact additional unnecessary regulations that will raise the price of fuel?!?

Moving to the “Getting Out While The Getting’s Good” segment, we learn….

Top Official Of Rail Plan in California To Step Down

In a totally unrelated item, for those who still haven’t come to the realization Sarah Palin, for all her virtues, will never be ready for national office, check out her screen test for the remake of Fargo:

And in International News of Note….

Iranian Ships Taunt U.S. Navy Vessels in Gulf

….a diabolical strategy first employed by the medieval French:

On the Lighter Side….

Finally, in the Wide, Wild World of Sports, another sign the apocalypse is upon us:

Magic center Howard smashes 50-year-old NBA free-throw record

Orlando Magic All-Star center Dwight Howard Thursday smashed Wilt Chamberlain’s 50-year-old NBA record for the most free-throw attempts in a game — shooting 39 times from the charity stripe as Orlando beat the Golden State Warriors 117-109 in Oakland.

Howard, a dreadful free-throw shooter, hit 21 of the foul shots and added 12 of 21 from the field to end up with a career-high 45 points and 23 rebounds. Howard has averaged less than 60 percent from the foul line for all but one season since entering the NBA in 2004, but has gotten markedly worse this year — averaging around 43 percent.

Hall of Fame center Chamberlain set the previous record of 34 free-throw attempts in a game against St Louis in 1962 — putting 19 of those through the hoop.

Only a contemporary “journalist”, sports or otherwise, could compose so misleading a headline.  Or is the quality of play in the NBA truly so bad it’s necessary to mischaracterize what amounts to a player, so inept at free throws the opposition would prefer to foul him rather than give him an easy bucket, being fouled a record number of times?

The answer is an emphatic “yes”!

Magoo