[ITMFA] I reiterate...
What does it take to impeach this guy?
Sunday article on the Boston Globe indicates that Cheney's legal aide reviews legislation to help remove provisions that would limit Presidential power.
WASHINGTON -- The office of Vice President Dick Cheney routinely reviews pieces of legislation before they reach the president's desk, searching for provisions that Cheney believes would infringe on presidential power, according to former White House and Justice Department officials.
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The Bush-Cheney administration has used such statements to claim for itself the option of bypassing a ban on torture, oversight provisions in the USA Patriot Act, and numerous requirements that they provide certain information to Congress, among other laws.
Previous vice presidents have had neither the authority nor the interest in reviewing legislation. But Cheney has used his power over the administration's legal team to promote an expansive theory of presidential authority. Using signing statements, the administration has challenged more laws than all previous administrations combined.
2 comments:
Dan Savage does a world of good.
Those lapel pins look mighty tempting.
This is unsurprising. This administration has made it clear that they believe they should be virtual autocrats. Separation of Powers is not in their vocabulary. The 'expansive theory of the executive branch' is just code for 'we should be monarchs'. They believe that in wartime presidents should have whatever power they desire, and since we have yet another 'long war', that being the 'war' on terrorism [terrorism is a technique, not an enemy - perhaps we should call a spade a spade and indicate that this is esentially an undeclared war on Islam, which isn't an enemy either (although it has plenty of adherents), it is an ideology, much like the war on Communism during the Cold War] (the drug 'war' is another such example), we have perpetual war for perpetual peace, and so they have an ongoing excuse to take power without hesitation and no forthcoming reason to give it back. This from the claimed (lying) small-government Republicans, who instead attempt to centralize almost every aspect of government under their purview. Since many of these men are delusional theocrats and Dominionist Christian fundamentalists (the ones who aren't simply scheming hawkish neocon robber-barons), this falls under the old claim of 'the divine right of kings'. That it has been allowed to get this far without any real repercussions points to the willingness of the ignorant and manipulated American masses to be scared out of any sense of democratic restraint, of the impotence of Congress and the Supreme Court to assert that we do not tolerate kings, of the absolute corruption of the one-party that pretends it is two-party political system, and of the willingness of men and women who should know better to put up with this. These men shred the constitution and work to transform American Democracy into a reactionary Christian theocratic police-state, and Congress can't be bothered to do anything.
Is it any wonder so many people of my generation have begun to wonder if America has any real future? At least one that we'd want to live in, work in, raise children in, retire in?
I see no functional difference between the kind of government and policy that this administration is advocating and those of the nations of Iran or Saudi Arabia.
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