Obama Recess Appoints Despite Lack of Recess

Ballsy, though the argument is made clear by the Senate's actions; by expecting supermajorities for everything and blocking routine government appointments (citing ideological problems with government itself) then holding bullshit pro-forma sessions with the explicit purpose of permanently depriving the President of a Consitutionally-endowed authority.  Via NY Times;

“The president has recess authority under the Constitution so he can continue to fulfill his constitutional function — which is to run the government — when the Senate is unavailable to fulfill its function,” Ms. Ruemmler said, “and it currently is unavailable despite the fact that it is in a ‘pro forma’ session’ for 30 seconds every three days.”

It never passed the smell test, to me, and since the Congress is essentially tied itself into fight-or-flight knots of bureaucratic tomfoolery to stop anything from happening, this kind of move is simply made likely by a completely hamstrung legislative branch.  Hopefully an aggressive Executive and a better-informed electorate can lead to an effort later to rebalance the scales.