Contempt of Congress? Subpoenas? Stonewalling?

Maybe there's a smoking gun in the Republican-led investigations of the Obama administration — and President Barack Obama's pushback. But a large part of them could be what always goes on during a presidential campaign: political gamesmanship.

It ranges from House GOP contempt threats against Attorney General Eric Holder to Obama's waving a to-do list in the face of lawmakers.

Within two weeks, Obama fired a new pair of volleys across the bow of the congressional GOP leadership.

The first was his decree — bypassing Congress — that the U.S. will not, in most cases, deport illegal immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children. The other was his assertion of executive privilege to shield certain internal Justice Department documents from a House subpoena.

Both actions drew expressions of GOP outrage in Washington and on the campaign trail.