Bush quietly challenging hundreds of laws

[Reckoner]

Article


Apparently he has issued signing statements to over 750 laws since taking office, changing the scope of the laws with which Congress has no say. How can the other branches allow him to get away with this?

 

[BBond]

Americans are apparently satisfied living under a monarch now. Otherwise why would they still allow this idiot to get away with this?

 

[Lemon law]

Correct action for any budding dictator---and if you don't like it--its the old you and whose army will it take to stop him.

But a needed step is to get the democrats in control of at least one branch of the legislature. And I am still guessing the supreme court--even though biased--is not that biased. To expand presidential power, it takes popular support--not exactly something G.W. Buffoon has in abundance right now.

But pushing a confrontation right before a mid-term election may be a very unwise move. Bush will lose all but his far right wing base of support---and cause the house and senate to begin and
complete impeachment.

 

[BBond]

OMG, click on the link to examples of this megalomaniac's signing statements.

People, really now, PLEASE WTFU! This has GOT TO STOP!

 

[Whoozyerdaddy]

Originally posted by: BBond
OMG, click on the link to examples of this megalomaniac's signing statements.

People, really now, PLEASE WTFU! This has GOT TO STOP!

Ok... which one (or more) of those are you getting upset about and why?

 

[BBond]

Originally posted by: Whoozyerdaddy

Originally posted by: BBond
OMG, click on the link to examples of this megalomaniac's signing statements.

People, really now, PLEASE WTFU! This has GOT TO STOP!

Ok... which one (or more) of those are you getting upset about and why?

I'm upset about THEM ALL!

Did you miss the little part about the Constitutional powers? Congress writes laws, the president must faithfully execute them. bush has no power to overturn laws yet that's just what he's doing. There are checks and balances in our system of government to prevent one person from doing exactly what bush is doing.

The better question is, why isn't EVERYONE upset?

 

[Kadarin]

Originally posted by: BBond

Originally posted by: Whoozyerdaddy

Originally posted by: BBond
OMG, click on the link to examples of this megalomaniac's signing statements.

People, really now, PLEASE WTFU! This has GOT TO STOP!

Ok... which one (or more) of those are you getting upset about and why?

I'm upset about THEM ALL!

Did you miss the little part about the Constitutional powers? Congress writes laws, the president must faithfully execute them. bush has no power to overturn laws yet that's just what he's doing. There are checks and balances in our system of government to prevent one person from doing exactly what bush is doing.

The better question is, why isn't EVERYONE upset?

If this kind of thing is allowed to continue, it will herald the end of representative democracy in the US.

 

[imported_Aelius]

There are 3 levels where laws can be overturned at anytime.

Executive

Judicial

Jury

So technically there's nothing wrong with the President in what he is doing. However he can, and should be, held accountable for his actions if it is deemed to be against the best intrest of the people of the United States. There is a process in place for it and it should be used if deemed required.

 

[conehead433]

Originally posted by: Aelius
There are 3 levels where laws can be overturned at anytime.

Executive

Judicial

Jury

So technically there's nothing wrong with the President in what he is doing. However he can, and should be, held accountable for his actions if it is deemed to be against the best intrest of the people of the United States. There is a process in place for it and it should be used if deemed required.

With the Republicans in charge of the House and the Senate unless they jump ship and go along with the Democrats there will never be an indictment against the President. This could change if one or both gain a majority of Democrats in the election this fall.

 

[shortylickens]

I keep telling people to stop voting democrat and republican but they never listen.
Theres a lot of folks in america who honestly believe we only have 2 parties.
They're both professional politicians, which means they are evil and self-serving. My greatest fear is that we get some 3rd parties into congress and they start taking bribes and become part of the system and then all hope is really lost.

 

[thraashman]

Originally posted by: Aelius
There are 3 levels where laws can be overturned at anytime.

Executive

Judicial

Jury

So technically there's nothing wrong with the President in what he is doing. However he can, and should be, held accountable for his actions if it is deemed to be against the best intrest of the people of the United States. There is a process in place for it and it should be used if deemed required.

Once a President signs a bill into law, he is also subject to those laws. What Bush is doing is saying that he doesn't ever have to follow any laws in this country if he doesn't want to. And for that, among many many many MANY other reasons, I think Bush should be impeached, convicted, tried for treason, convicted, and executed.

 

[BoomerD]

Silly mortals...laws don't apply to King George...

 

[BBond]

Originally posted by: thraashman

Originally posted by: Aelius
There are 3 levels where laws can be overturned at anytime.

Executive

Judicial

Jury

So technically there's nothing wrong with the President in what he is doing. However he can, and should be, held accountable for his actions if it is deemed to be against the best intrest of the people of the United States. There is a process in place for it and it should be used if deemed required.

Once a President signs a bill into law, he is also subject to those laws. What Bush is doing is saying that he doesn't ever have to follow any laws in this country if he doesn't want to. And for that, among many many many MANY other reasons, I think Bush should be impeached, convicted, tried for treason, convicted, and executed.

Or we could just send him on a hunting trip with dickhead cheney.

 

[trenchfoot]

obviously, this situation fills in another piece of the puzzle of just what his real and hidden agenda is.

taking into account his past history as our president, including all of the apparently non-sensical decisions he's made, his suspicious obsession for secrecy, the programs he's pushed that have gone awry (social security reform, among others), his pattern of deception, all the lies he made up to get us to invade iraq, etc. etc.,most of the pieces of the puzzle that he's hiding from the nation is in place.

it will take a change of majority in congress to bring the puzzle out in the open and dismantle it, piece by deceptive piece.

 

[BBond]

Originally posted by: tweaker2
obviously, this situation fills in another piece of the puzzle of just what his real and hidden agenda is.

taking into account his past history as our president, including all of the apparently non-sensical decisions he's made, his suspicious obsession for secrecy, the programs he's pushed that have gone awry (social security reform, among others), his pattern of deception, all the lies he made up to get us to invade iraq, etc. etc.,most of the pieces of the puzzle that he's hiding from the nation is in place.

it will take a change of majority in congress to bring the puzzle out in the open and dismantle it, piece by deceptive piece.

Judging by the absolutely INSANE actions of geroge w. bush, it would appear the "New World Order" has something to do with "The Manchurian Candidate".

bush couldn't do more harm to America if he intended to, and I'm beginning to think that he does indeed intend to. Just who is bush really working for?

 

[morkinva]

Judging by the absolutely INSANE actions of geroge w. bush, it would appear the "New World Order" has something to do with "The Manchurian Candidate". bush couldn't do more harm to America if he intended to, and I'm beginning to think that he does indeed intend to. Just who is bush really working for?

By George, I think you're finally getting it!

Once a President signs a bill into law, he is also subject to those laws. What Bush is doing is saying that he doesn't ever have to follow any laws in this country if he doesn't want to. And for that, among many many many MANY other reasons, I think Bush should be impeached, convicted, tried for treason, convicted, and executed.

This guy seems to agree with you, somewhat. :laugh:

 

[Lemon law]

Where did that absurd notion come from that there are three levels that a law can be overturned.

The executive can refuse to enforce certain laws passed by congress--that does not overturn the law. And puts the exective in a position of being in violation of the law.

A jury can simply refuse to convict a person that is certainly in violation of a law. Again that does not overturn the law. The next lucky person may not find the jury sympathetic--and pay the legal forfeit.

A court can declair a law umconstitutional. Only after appeals are exhausted is the law overturned.

 

[DickFnTracy]

The ones where he states that as the commander in chief he will control the .mil as he see's fit he is absolutely 100% correct and any law where the Congress is trying to control the military, such as the War Powers Act, should be summarily ignored.

 

[CallMeJoe]

Originally posted by: DickFnTracy
The ones where he states that as the commander in chief he will control the .mil as he see's fit he is absolutely 100% correct and any law where the Congress is trying to control the military, such as the War Powers Act, should be summarily ignored.

The president may be Commander-in-Chief, but he, like everyone else in the military chain-of-command, is bound to obey the laws of the United States as passed by the Congress.

 

[BoomerD]

Text

 

[FrancesBeansRevenge]

The scariest thing of all in this whole sorry period of American history is a rather significant percentage of Americans seem rather indifferent, and even supportive, of the POTUS' power grab.
Our system was created for the very purpose of limiting any one man's power and this administration is literally shitting on the spirit of that ideal... and some of us are applauding them for it.

 

[FrancesBeansRevenge]

Originally posted by: BoomerD
Text

Truth is often said in jest eh?

 

[BBond]

Originally posted by: CallMeJoe

Originally posted by: DickFnTracy
The ones where he states that as the commander in chief he will control the .mil as he see's fit he is absolutely 100% correct and any law where the Congress is trying to control the military, such as the War Powers Act, should be summarily ignored.

The president may be Commander-in-Chief, but he, like everyone else in the military chain-of-command, is bound to obey the laws of the United States as passed by the Congress.

:thumbsup:

We got rid of one King George and don't need another. Especially a moron like our current "king george".

 

[BBond]

Here is some light reading for those of you who still doubt the direction king george is taking our former democracy in.

I'll post each article separately so as not to overwhelm those who consider reading a few paragraphs too much to ask to preserve their freedom.

I'll post a short paragraph from what used to be our Constitution just to put the first article in perspective.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

In Leak Cases, New Pressure on Journalists

By ADAM LIPTAK

Earlier administrations have fired and prosecuted government officials who provided classified information to the press. They have also tried to force reporters to identify their sources.

But the Bush administration is exploring a more radical measure to protect information it says is vital to national security: the criminal prosecution of reporters under the espionage laws.

Such an approach would signal a thorough revision of the informal rules of engagement that have governed the relationship between the press and the government for many decades. Leaking in Washington is commonplace and typically entails tolerable risks for government officials and, at worst, the possibility of subpoenas to journalists seeking the identities of sources.

But the Bush administration is putting pressure on the press as never before, and it is operating in a judicial climate that seems increasingly receptive to constraints on journalists.

In the last year alone, a reporter for The New York Times was jailed for refusing to testify about a confidential source; her source, a White House aide, was prosecuted on charges that he lied about his contacts with reporters; a C.I.A. analyst was dismissed for unauthorized contacts with reporters; and a raft of subpoenas to reporters were largely upheld by the courts.

It is not easy to gauge whether the administration will move beyond these efforts to criminal prosecutions of reporters. In public statements and court papers, administration officials have said the law allows such prosecutions and that they will use their prosecutorial discretion in this area judiciously. But there is no indication that a decision to begin such a prosecution has been made. A Justice Department spokeswoman, Tasia Scolinos, declined to comment on Friday.

Because such prosecutions of reporters are unknown, they are widely thought inconceivable. But legal experts say that existing laws may well allow holding the press to account criminally. Should the administration pursue the matter, these experts say, it could gain a tool that would thoroughly alter the balance of power between the government and the press.

The administration and its allies say that all avenues must be explored to ensure that vital national security information does not fall into the hands of the nation's enemies.

In February, Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, asked Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales whether the government's investigation into The Times's disclosure of a National Security Agency eavesdropping program included "any potential violation for publishing that information."

Mr. Gonzales responded: "Obviously, our prosecutors are going to look to see all the laws that have been violated. And if the evidence is there, they're going to prosecute those violations."

Recent articles in conservative opinion magazines have been even more forceful.

"The press can and should be held to account for publishing military secrets in wartime," Gabriel Schoenfeld wrote in Commentary magazine last month.

Surprising Move by F.B.I.

One example of the administration's new approach is the F.B.I.'s recent effort to reclaim classified documents in the files of the late columnist Jack Anderson, a move that legal experts say was surprising if not unheard of.

"Under the law," Bill Carter, a spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said earlier this month, "no private person may possess classified documents that were illegally provided to them."

Critics of the administration position say that altering the conventional understanding between the press and government could have dire consequences.

"Once you make the press the defendant rather than the leaker," said David Rudenstine, the dean of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York and a First Amendment scholar, "you really shut down the flow of information because the government will always know who the defendant is."

The administration's position draws support from an unlikely source ? the 1971 Supreme Court decision that refused to block publication by The Times and The Washington Post of the classified history of the Vietnam War known as the Pentagon Papers. The case is generally considered a triumph for the press. But two of the justices in the 6-to-3 majority indicated that there was a basis for after-the-fact prosecution of the newspapers that published the papers under the espionage laws.

Reading of Espionage Laws

Both critics and allies of the administration say that the espionage laws on their face may well be read to forbid possession and publication of classified information by the press. Two provisions are at the heart of the recent debates.

The first, enacted in 1917, is, according to a 2002 report by Susan Buckley, a lawyer who often represents news organizations, "at first blush, pretty much one of the scariest statutes around."

It prohibits anyone with unauthorized access to documents or information concerning the national defense from telling others. The wording of the law is loose, but it seems to contain a further requirement for spoken information. Repeating such information is only a crime, it seems, if the person doing it "has reason to believe" it could be used "to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation." That condition does not seem to apply to information from documents.

In the Pentagon Papers case, Justice Byron R. White, joined by Justice Potter Stewart, said "it seems undeniable that a newspaper" can be "vulnerable to prosecution" under the 1917 law.

Indeed, the Nixon administration considered prosecuting The Times even after the government lost the Pentagon Papers case, according to a 1975 memoir by Whitney North Seymour Jr., who was the United States attorney in Manhattan in the early 1970's. Mr. Seymour wrote that Richard G. Kleindienst, a deputy attorney general, suggested convening a grand jury in New York to that end. Mr. Seymour said he refused.

Some experts believe he would not have won. The most authoritative analysis of the 1917 law, by Harold Edgar and Benno C. Schmidt Jr. in the Columbia Law Review in 1973, concluded, based largely on the law's legislative history, that it was not meant to apply to newspapers.

A second law is less ambiguous. Enacted in 1950, it prohibits publication of government codes and other "communications intelligence activities." Andrew C. McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor who took part in terrorism investigations in New York after the Sept. 11 attacks, said that both The Times, for its disclosures about the eavesdropping program, and The Post, for an article about secret C.I.A. prisons, had violated the 1917 law. The Times, he added, has also violated the 1950 law.

"It was irresponsible to publish these things," Mr. McCarthy said. "I wouldn't hesitate to prosecute."

The reporters who wrote the two articles recently won Pulitzer Prizes.

Even legal scholars who are sympathetic to the newspapers say the legal questions are not straightforward.

"They are making threats that they may be able to carry out technically, legally," Geoffrey R. Stone, a law professor at the University of Chicago and the author of "Perilous Times: Free Speech in Wartime," said of the administration. The law, Professor Stone added, "has always been understood to be about spying, not about newspapers, but read literally it could be applied to both."

Others say the law is unconstitutional as applied to the press under the First Amendment.

"I don't think that anyone believes that statute is constitutional," said James C. Goodale, who was the general counsel of The New York Times Company during the Pentagon Papers litigation. "Literally read, the statute must be violated countless times every year."

Rodney A. Smolla, the dean of the University of Richmond law school, took a middle ground. He said the existing laws were ambiguous but that in theory it could be constitutional to make receiving classified information a crime. However, he continued, the First Amendment may protect newspapers exposing wrongdoing by the government.

The two newspapers contend that their reporting did bring to light important information about potential government misconduct. Representatives of the papers said they had not been contacted by government investigators in connection with the two articles.

That is baffling, Mr. McCarthy said. At a minimum, he said, the reporters involved should be threatened with prosecution in an effort to learn their sources.

"If you think this is a serious offense and you really think national security has been damaged, and I do," he said, "you don't wait five or six months to ask the person who obviously knows the answer."

Case Against 2 Lobbyists

Curiously, perhaps the most threatening pending case for journalist is one brought against two former lobbyists for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or Aipac. The lobbyists, Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman, were indicted in August on charges of violating the 1917 law by receiving and repeating national defense information to foreign officials and reporters.

The lobbyists say the case against them is functionally identical to potential cases against reporters.

"You can't say, 'Well, this is constitutional as applied to lobbyists, but it wouldn't be constitutional if applied to journalists,' " Abbe D. Lowell, a lawyer for Mr. Rosen, said at a hearing in the case last month, according to a court transcript.

In court papers filed in January, prosecutors disagreed, saying lobbyist and journalist were different. But they would not rule out the possibility of also charging journalists under the law.

"Prosecution under the espionage laws of an actual member of the press for publishing classified information leaked to it by a government source would raise legitimate and serious issues and would not be undertaken lightly," the papers said. Indeed, they continued, "the fact that there has never been such a prosecution speaks for itself."

Some First Amendment lawyers suspect that the case against the lobbyists is but a first step.

"From the point of view of the administration expanding its powers, the Aipac case is the perfect case," said Ronald K. L. Collins, a scholar at the First Amendment Center, a nonprofit educational group in Virginia. "It allows them to try to establish the precedent without going after the press."

What is king george so intent on hiding?

 

[BBond]

Originally posted by: BBond


What is king george so intent on hiding?

Good question. But if king george is so intent on hiding information and so intent on secrecy then why does king george leak information himself? Oh, that's right. king george can do whatever he damn well pleases. That's what being a king, a "decider", is all about.

Bush administration practicing `selective secrecy'

BY MARK SILVA
Chicago Tribune

WASHINGTON - Early in President Bush's first term, Andrew Card, then the White House chief of staff, summoned a group of new staffers to a West Wing office to thank them for coming aboard and to stress the importance of secrecy.

"He said very clearly that the president wants the right to announce things first, and that he also has a right to have information managed and he doesn't want people freelancing," one staffer recalled. "It was very clear that it was a cardinal sin to leak and that you'd better not."

One year later, Bush himself authorized the release to selected reporters of "relevant" portions of a once-classified National Intelligence Estimate to rebut criticism of the Iraq war, according to court documents. The assertion, which the administration has declined to address, is contained in a filing by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that cites testimony from former White House aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

This double approach - clamping down on unauthorized disclosures while releasing documents on carefully chosen occasions - illustrates how the White House has attempted to manage closely held government information since the terrorism of Sept. 11 made Bush a wartime president.

"It's selective secrecy for political control," said Tom Blanton, director of the independent National Security Archive at George Washington University. "Secrecy puts power in the hands of officials who then can abuse it. It also covers up the abuse."

The Bush administration's determination to manage information, which experts say goes far beyond the efforts of recent presidents, drew added attention recently when the CIA fired an official for unauthorized conversations with a reporter. The FBI, for its part, has asked the family of the late investigative reporter Jack Anderson for permission to screen his papers for any secrets before they are donated to George Washington University. The family is resisting that request.

The hiring of a media-savvy White House press secretary, Tony Snow, has prompted questions about whether the Bush team is preparing to relax its hold on information at least a little.

But in the aftermath of Sept. 11, the White House asserts broadly that it is necessary to re-evaluate what information should be available to the public, such as technological or strategic information that could offer terrorists an opening.

"There is some information that in a pre-Sept. 11 mindset would have been viewed one way that is viewed differently in a post-Sept. 11 mindset," said Dana Perino, Bush's deputy press secretary. "We don't want to give the terrorists an open invitation to view our playbook for protecting the American people."

But critics say the Bush administration's instinct to keep information confidential goes beyond reasonable precautions.

"The theme of insularity and secrecy is pervasive," said former Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., who chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee and now teaches at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. "They are adopting a position that the American people cannot be trusted with information that is critical to their well-being."

Graham noted that the CIA attempted to broadly censor the report of the joint House and Senate committee that investigated the intelligence community's performance before and after Sept. 11. Graham served as co-chairman of the inquiry.

When the report was released on July 24, 2003, according to a book Graham later wrote, "virtually every section of the report had been censored." While agreeing that several sections were redacted "for the right national security reasons," Graham argued that one section did not need to be kept secret - "the one area where the White House simply refused to relent."

The blacked-out 27 pages involved financial assistance that the Saudi Arabian government may have provided to some of the Sept. 11 terrorists living in the United States, according to Graham.

Other post-Sept. 11 actions have also proved controversial. The Bush administration has held "enemy combatants" in custody and established military commissions to try suspected terrorists, providing for far more secrecy than ordinary legal proceedings.

And Bush, shortly after the 2001 attacks, secretly authorized the National Security Agency, without obtaining a court order, to intercept telephone and e-mail communications between people inside the United States and suspected members of terrorist groups overseas. When this came to light, Bush insisted Congress had been briefed more than a dozen times, but Graham said the briefing he attended merely "focused on a technical issue."

Supporters of the administration say it's only natural that secrecy would increase after Sept. 11. Even a society like the United States that prides itself on its openness, they say, has to allow its government to operate with some confidentiality. Bush himself has made the point that for his subordinates to give him candid advice, they must be certain that advice will not be made public.

And just as the nation would never publicize the troop movements of its armed forces, Bush's backers say, it would be folly not to take reasonable steps when dealing with terrorists. None of this means the republic is in danger or that basic principles of open government are being violated, they add.

But the administration's critics do see a threat in its approach.

To test the administration's tightening control in 2004, the National Security Archive, an independent research group based at George Washington University, asked the Federal Aviation Administration for copies of warnings about terrorism it issued to U.S. airlines prior to Sept. 11. The FAA denied the request, and even withheld the titles and dates of the FAA documents as "sensitive security information."

Yet these documents had been cited by title and date in a 2004 bestseller, "The 9/11 Commission Report."

The FAA had circulated a memo to airlines warning of the potential for "an airline hijacking to free terrorists incarcerated in the United States," the Sept. 11 commission noted, citing an FAA circular, "Possible Terrorist Threat Against American Citizens," from June 22, 2001.

In 2003, when Bush updated an executive order on classification of secret information, he empowered agencies to reseal information that already has been made public.

"Prior to 2003, if it had been declassified under proper authority and released to the public, that was it, you couldn't reclassify it at all," said Bill Leonard, director of the Information Security Oversight Office at the National Archives.

Several agencies and presidential libraries already had been withdrawing information from the National Archives, and the CIA last year withdrew 254 documents after it found that declassified documents had been circulated on the Internet. In an audit of a sample of such withdrawals from the Archives since 1995, the ISOO last week reported that 24 percent "were clearly inappropriate for continued classification" and that an additional 12 percent were "questionable."

"A stunning, large percentage of the documents examined were wrongly classified," said Allen Weinstein, U.S. archivist. "In short, more than one of every three documents removed from the open shelves and barred to researchers should not have been tampered with."

All this has raised calls for tougher oversight. "Any White House that wants more authority, and there is going to be more authority during times of conflict, has to have strong oversight," said Rep. Chris Shays, R-Conn. "You need a continuous review of documents to make sure they should be classified."

It's not clear how much of the administration's tightening of the information flow will extend to future presidencies, since many measures were enacted by presidential authority and can be rescinded by future presidents.

Facing bipartisan calls for greater openness, Bush issued an executive order in December on "Improving Agency Disclosure of Information."

The order called for "a citizen-centered and results-oriented approach" to improving performance and "strengthening compliance" with the Freedom of Information Act. But it did not reverse the administration's determination, laid out in a 2001 policy, to protect information in which "institutional, commercial and personal privacy interests could be implicated by disclosure."

The 2005 order does require every agency to review its handling of requests and deliver an "improvement plan" by June. This nod to critics followed legislation filed by a bipartisan team, the Open Government Act of 2005, demanding greater public access.

Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., recently gave Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Joshua Bolten, who is now the president's chief of staff, a gentle reminder in a letter: "Unfortunately, as we approach the 40th anniversary of (the Freedom of Information Act), the speed and urgency with which several federal agencies treat FOIA requests is sorely lacking."