Perhaps more importantly, nearly eight months into the Obama Presidency, roughly 40% of key cabinet positions remain unfilled, many of these in the areas of defense and security.  Former Pentagon Comptroller, Dov Zakheim comments on the lack of defense appointments, "This is very worrisome, the Secretary [Robert Gates] has a problem."

Previous Defense Department acquisition chief, Jacques Gansler states:

[filling the jobs] certainly has gone slower than I expected, especially considering the acquisition and service vacancies at a time when the country is fighting two wars and with the budget issues the Pentagon is facing.

It's one thing for Presidents to select people to oversee or coordinate key positions of interest to the administration, but quite another if these appointments are in lieu of vital, Senate-confirmed posts that serve as integral components of our government.

While most of the media ignores these issues, Fox News has initiated an all out assault on the President's new Czars and some in Congress have taken up the banner.  U.S. Rep. Patrick McHenry has recently called for a hearing on the roles and responsibilities of Mr. Obama's Czars and states:

Each of the two possible scenarios here is troubling.  If the czars have high-level, decision-making authority as their titles would indicate, then it is my concern that their appointment without Senate approval represents a circumvention of our Constitutionally-mandated confirmation process. On the other hand, if the czars have no actual power, then I am equally concerned that taxpayers are fronting the bill for the salaries of these figureheads and their staff.

Strangely silenced now, Democratic Senator Robert Byrd remarked when the first Obama Czars started to materialize in February:

The rapid and easy accumulation of power by White House staff can threaten the Constitutional system of checks and balances.  At the worst, White House staff have taken direction and control of programmatic areas that are the statutory responsibility of Senate-confirmed officials.

Commenting on the President's previous promise of transparency, Senator Susan Collins, R-Ma states,

By creating these czars that are insulated from accountability, whose work is not transparent, he's moving in exactly opposite direction.

Jack Kingston, R-Ga:

It's almost like the president is building a parallel government, one that's in the constitution and then one that is outside of the constitution and the authority of congress.

Although almost completely ignored by the mainstream media until his Memorial Day weekend resignation, Green Jobs Czar Van Jones was one of the President's most controversial selections.  A self-proclaimed Communist, Van Jones also signed 9-11 "truther" petitions suggesting that the Bush administration was behind the terrorist attacks of 2001.

Van Jones previously described himself as "a rowdy black nationalist" and created a group called STORM (Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement) which held a vigil the night after 9/11 to "express solidarity with Arab and Muslim Americans, and to mourn the victims of U.S. imperialism around the world."  To his credit, Van Jones did apologize last Wednesday for calling Republicans "A-holes" during a previous lecture at Berkeley.

So where was the media on this questionable issue?  FNC's Bret Baier sums it up as follows:

There was no mention of Jones by CBS, NBC, ABC, the Washington Post or the New York Times on Wednesday -- the night Jones' first issued an apology for past statements. The same was true on Thursday, although a Washington Post blog picked up the story. That night Jones again apologized for a slew of old remarks and the signing of that petition that alleged the Bush administration was behind the 9/11 attacks. ABC and NBC failed to cover the story on Friday after that, although CBS finally did.

As we're hearing from most of the mainstream media now, Van Jones was simply another victim of typical right wing smear tactics and fear mongering.  I wonder if the same will be said for the likes of Science Technology Czar John Holdren who has previously advocated mass sterilizations via the water supply and argued that forced abortions could be constitutional.

Regulator Czar Cass Sunstein has been a long time advocate of the Fairness Doctrine and has also suggested bans on hunting and eating meat.  He also supports Peter Singer who once said that killing a newborn baby is never equivalent to killing a person.

Global Warming Czar Carol Browner, is an outspoken member of Socialist International which advocates a global system of government and of course we have Presidential healthcare advisor, Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel and his "Complete Lives System" complicating the healthcare debate.

By all accounts, these Czars will be operating outside the bounds of constitutional authority without any regulation or oversight from Congress.  While some have been formally approved, most serve exclusively at the President's pleasure and operate within the inner circles of government with almost complete immunity.  They conduct their business (whatever that may be) without FBI background checks and remain insulated from Supreme Court or Congressional testimony via Executive privilege.

As with most of these issues, grains of truth exist within the arguments we're hearing from both sides of the political fence.  Citizens should not storm Washington with their torches and pitchforks, but neither should we simply dismiss Mr. Obama's apparent intent or outright lack of judgment with many of these questionable appointments.  At the very least, Congressional hearings and a Supreme Court review of current Czar policy and authority would be well advised.

I would contend that the company one keeps is relevant and like it or not, our President has a long history of surrounding himself with a great number of "suspicious" characters and organizations.  Frank Marshall Davis, Bill Ayers, Abongo `Roy' Obama, Van Jones, Robert Malley, Raila Odinga, Jeremiah Wright, Tony Rezko, Hatem El-Hady, Mazen Asbahi, Rashid Khalidi, ACORN, The Apollo Alliance and the SEIU just to name a few.

Many, including myself, have catalogued these associations in the past only to be met with derision, but eventually one must also be able to read at least some of the writing on the wall no matter how thickly the whitewash has been applied.

When you wish upon a Czar
Makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires
Will come to you
If your heart is in your dreams
No request is too extreme
When you wish upon a Czar
As dreamers do