Acclaimed actor and former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson believes President Barack Obama has jettisoned the wisdom of the nation's Founding Fathers in pursuit of a liberal remaking of the United States.
"He has no concept apparently, or he acts like he has no concept, of the founding principles of our government,'' Thompson said on "The Steve Malzberg Show'' on
Newsmax TV on Monday.
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"[He is] the only president in history who I have ever seen or read about who thought that he could constitutionally bypass Congress as far as legislative acts are concerned.
"He acts as if he does not care what half the people in this country think. If they're not his voters, he wants to go down in history as having accomplished a couple things and changing the base of America to his liking and doesn't really care about anything.''
Thompson — who starred in TV's "Law & Order" and recently appeared on Broadway in "A Time to Kill'' — said several of the commander-in-chief's maneuvers, such as tweaking the Affordable Care Act, are "clearly unconstitutional.''
"[It's], 'Well, we're not going to enforce this part this month. The next month, 'We're not going to enforce the other part,''' Thompson said.
The 6-foot-6 Alabama-born star is in a new movie opening nationwide on Friday called "Persecuted," a PG-13 rated thriller that tackles the subject of religious persecution.
Also starring James Remar, Dean Stockwell and Bruce Davison, "Persecuted'' centers on an evangelist who is framed for murder by government officials after he refuses to support a bill for sweeping religious reform.
"It's more of a conservative film, if you will. Not a lot of these come out of Hollywood nowadays. The bad guy [is] the president, and the Senate majority leader — if you can imagine that,'' he said.
"They're trying to tell an evangelical what he must do and what he cannot do…. They frame him and most of the movie is what he goes through in order to stand up for his First Amendment rights.''
"It's an interesting, fun thriller on the one hand, but it carries a deeper message on how vigilant we have to be to protect our First Amendment rights and in this case, freedom of religion.''
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Thompson — whose Hollywood movies include "The Hunt for Red October,'' "Die Hard 2'' and "In the Line of Fire'' — said he doesn't miss politics after serving as the senator from the Volunteer State from 1994 to 2003.
"I went in with the idea of serving a number of years and then going back to the real world and put term limits on myself,'' he said.
"We'd be a lot better off with a lot fewer professional politicians, to start with.''
Thompson said that as a private citizen, he's "extremely concerned'' with the direction of the country.
"We're going in the wrong direction as far as the long-term economic outlook. We're doing nothing about some of the crucial issues that are going to absolutely break us as a nation a little bit further down the road,'' he said.
"We have less respect around the world than any time in our history, since World War I. So yeah, it's going to prove to be dangerous for us in the not too distant future.''
Thompson believes the dynamics on Capitol Hill have changed for the worse.
"Our country was built upon the notion that we would not come together on everything,'' he said.
"It was set up so that there would be conflict, that it would be done in a civil manner, and the important issues would be debated freely and openly, which they're not anymore.''
And there are two camps unable to agree on anything.
"We have a bunch of people who are satisfied with the status quo and don't want to change anything. They're getting their benefits from the government and things as most of us are nowadays; middle class has been the biggest beneficiaries,'' he said.
"You have a good number of other people, on the other hand, who are mildly concerned about the direction of our government and are exasperated when nothing seems to be being done in the right direction because politicians don't want to do anything that's going to anger their base or jeopardize their re-election.''
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