Christy, please, can you help me to understand? I am not a lawyer but I am not daft either.

Some of Boardman’s comments are extraordinarily revealing of the Bush administration’s remarkable assertions of executive privilege and what amounts to oversight of Congress.

How about:

“Respect for the legislative branch… is shown when the president chooses to construe a particular statement in keeping with the Constitution, as opposed to defeating an entire bill that would serve the nation.”

or try:

“Boardman said the president has the power and responsibility to bypass any statute that conflicts with the Constitution, even in cases “where the Supreme Court has yet to rule on an issue, but the president has determined that a statutory law violates the Constitution.“

And this whopper, from Tony Snow (who was finally, at last questioned on the topic of “signing statements”, aka “line-item legislative veto power”):

“Snow also insisted that the president was merely fixing “relatively minor” constitutional flaws that Congress had “unwittingly” included in bills during the lawmaking process.”

So we have President Bush sitting as a sort of Supra-Supreme Court, passing judgement on legislation. The administration’s claim is that a single man’s judgement trumps all other opinion, from whatever source.

Snow amplifies this by asserting that the President can determine when Congress is behaving witlessly.

Specter’s half-hearted stab at the sotto voce constitutional crisis is to ponder legislation that would allow Congress to sue the President to force him into obeying the law. In other words, Congress will become a supplicant and take a number to stand in line waiting for the judiciary to attempt to order the President to follow the law.

First, we can’t expect for a minute that such legislation will pass. Second, if it does we can expect the administration to mount a vigourous attack on that legislation itself. Not to mention, it would need to be signed by the President to become law.

These are dark days.

Source for quotes is the inestimably valuable Boston Globe’s Charlie Savage:

Link

I gather from an AP report from a couple of days ago that the administration intends to defend Bush’s illegal wiretapping without the requisite FISA warrants by citing signing statements. Specter is likely to roll over and absolve the administration. The issue, nevertheless, remains untested. Should there be any impeachment hearings against Bush and Cheney, the WH is likely to rely on these signing statements for self defence.

Can some legal brains clarify the legal standing of these signing statements? If the Democrats manage to win a majority at least in the House, preferably in the Senate too, they need to wrestle with this issue and the debate needs to start now. For too long we have had far too many supine Democrats running scared to respond effectively to ad hominem tu quoque Republican Rovery. They don’t like the arguments but they cannot refute them, so destroy the credibility of the of those raising these arguments. Democrats have yet to show a strategic rebuttal of these tactics. L’Etat, c’est mois concept is far more criminal in a constitutional democracy than extra marital fellatio in the Oval Office.

Russ Feingold did this masterfully on MTP this week. Murtha did this exact thing just last week. Some republican asshole was saying “Yeah, we really respect that John Murtha visits the troops in the hospital and all, BUT ITS A GOOD THING HE WASN’T HERE FOR THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE OR IWA JIMA OR WE’D ALL BE SPEAKING GERMAN OR JAPANESE.” Murtha got right up and said “Hey bud, were you there at either of those places? Have you ever had boots on the ground anywhere?” The repub had to fall back to “I said I really respect all the work you’ve done.” Murtha chopped him off at the knees like the scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

Once you neutralize them, you can lay out your progressive vision. “You see, Ann, I don’t buy your Nazi vision of an America that persecutes its own citizens. My vision for America is one where…” But we will never get to do that if we are so busy trying to prove we’re not unpatriotic. That way they catch the dems in a bind where they end up having to vote for bs legislation just to prove they aren’t whatever the republithugs have called them that week. It’s all so orchestrated, you’d think they’d be able to see it themselves, but maybe we need to remind them.

CLASSIC! ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT!

An important point to remember is that it was Sam Alito who, as a deputy Attorney General, first argued in favor of these signing statements as a means of influencing the courts’ interpretation of the law.

Back in January, I asked, “Will the Congress take this lying down or will they rise up and do their duty? Stay tuned.”

Unfortunately, Arlen Spector’s history of talking tough against the administration and then rolling over for it does not give me much optimism.

Visit the Schapira blog, What we know so far

and tell ‘em Big Mitch sent ya!

My mom taught me not to be a tattletale, but this post in the Flag thread below made my troll-dar go off…

Maria says:
June 27th, 2006 at 10:42 am

I might be overreacting, but maybe some nice moderator can take a looksee?

Or, as a certain science fiction show put it:
The President: I’m here because the people of this country elected me to run their country for them

The emphasis is from the original dialogue. Figures that the show was written by a couple of Canadians.