The president has, in an election year and without congressional oversight, assumed sweeping and virtually unilateral authority to make policy that will generate windfalls for his two most financially crucial campaign constituencies -- organized labor and the plaintiffs' bar.

◼ Manhattan Moment: The rest of the story behind Obama's recess appointments - James R. Copland/Washington Examiner

Just how important are trial lawyers and labor unions to the president's election? In the 2008 election, lawyers and law firms funneled over $45 million into Obama's campaign, more than twice as much as any other industry.

Since assuming office, Obama has worked to repay these campaign benefactors. The auto-company bailouts propped up unions by undercutting the clear legal rights of secured debt holders, and much of the "stimulus" spending was designed to protect public-sector unions by shielding them from budget cuts made by strapped state and local governments.

Trial lawyers avoided any serious tort reform in Obamacare, and they got legislation that gutted statutes of limitation for employment-discrimination lawsuits and expanded the scope of private litigation against government contractors.

...With his recess appointments, however, Obama is now in a position to avoid such congressional obstacles and help unions and lawyers through fiat. With three of the five NLRB members slipped into power in the dead of night -- and two of these three were nominated only two days before the Senate's Christmas break, hardly stalled by congressional inaction -- the president's labor-friendly cronies will be well-positioned to make rulings advantageous to unions.