Shorter Ruth Marcus

Here's the conclusion to "How 'lawless' is Obama?"

Obama is not the rogue usurper of conservative imagining. Rather, he has been understandably aggressive in wielding executive power while remaining within the lines. Still, those lines bear constant watching, whatever Republican president holds office.

There, I fixed it.  In case you didn't catch the scare quotes around "lawless" Ruth doesn't think anything Obama's doing is above the law.  Because Republicans:

But Obama has also been bolder in deploying the power, acting even when the Senate was holding brief sessions designed to frustrate recess appointments. Bush refrained from this in-your-face move, although, notably, his Justice Department concluded that would be constitutional.

Too bad Dubya wasn't a Constitutional Law adjunct professor - they've read the back of the board game cover.

The administration argues that Obama acted with restraint -- the appointments were only to agencies at risk of not functioning -- and in the face of Senate intransigence. But another president could use this tactic to gut the advice-and-consent requirement. The legality of Obama's appointments is now before the Supreme Court.

Hey, I'm not a high-falutin' Washington Post columnist or nothin' but it seems relevant to point out that the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed two lower court decisions that Obama's recess appointments were unconstitutional.  But, hey, now it's to the Supreme Court who may decide that - well, gosh - these weren't real important appointments and the Republicans were being jerks in the Senate.  The musty old "originalist" Scalia will hold tight to his belief in original text and we'll all laugh at him.