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It must suck to spend eight years ruling by fiat over a country only to find that in the end actual real government reasserts itself.

Kimberly Strassel at the WSJ reports:

The accepted wisdom in Washington is that the CRA [Congressional Review Act] can be used only against new regulations, those finalized in the past 60 legislative days. That gets Republicans back to June, teeing up 180 rules or so for override. Included are biggies like the Interior Department's “streams” rule, the Labor Department's overtime-pay rule, and the Environmental Protection Agency's methane rule.

But what Mr. Gaziano told Republicans on Wednesday was that the CRA grants them far greater powers, including the extraordinary ability to overrule regulations even back to the start of the Obama administration. The CRA also would allow the GOP to dismantle these regulations quickly, and to ensure those rules can't come back, even under a future Democratic president. No kidding.

It turns out that the first line of the CRA requires any federal agency promulgating a rule to submit a “report” on it to the House and Senate. The 60-day clock starts either when the rule is published or when Congress receives the report—whichever comes later.

“There was always intended to be consequences if agencies didn't deliver these reports,” Mr. Gaziano tells me. “And while some Obama agencies may have been better at sending reports, others, through incompetence or spite, likely didn't.” Bottom line: There are rules for which there are no reports. And if the Trump administration were now to submit those reports—for rules implemented long ago—Congress would be free to vote the regulations down.

There's more. It turns out the CRA has a[n] expansive definition of what counts as a “rule”—and it isn't limited to those published in the Federal Register. The CRA also applies to “guidance” that agencies issue. Think the Obama administration's controversial guidance on transgender bathrooms in schools or on Title IX and campus sexual assault. It is highly unlikely agencies submitted reports to lawmakers on these actions.

“If they haven't reported it to Congress, it can now be challenged,” says Paul Larkin, a senior legal research fellow at the Heritage Foundation. Mr. Larkin, also at Wednesday's meeting, told me challenges could be leveled against any rule or guidance back to 1996, when the CRA was passed.

The best part? Once Congress overrides a rule, agencies cannot reissue it in “substantially the same form” unless specifically authorized by future legislation. The CRA can keep bad regs and guidance off the books even in future Democratic administrations—a far safer approach than if Mr. Trump simply rescinded them

This can easily go back to 2009.

Barack Obama was like King Gilgamesh of antiquity, the bad King who did everything he could to achieve fame for himself at the expense of the people of his kingdom. But whereas a very arrogant and self-centered Gilgamesh finally gained wisdom and learned that fame and immortality were tied to actual governance and the building of his city with and for his people, Barack Obama learned nothing and achieved nothing of value for anyone.

His purpose never had anything to do with governance. Now his self-centered quest for "legacy" is well and truly O-ver as actual real government reasserts itself again.

In the epic poem that is America, these last eight years will be written as a one-line sad joke.

Glorious Revolutionary News! Even Sasha, my Borzoi is happy.

Let Obama do the singing:



--KOOK

Consider yourself insulted.