This should trouble anyone: signing statements
 

Signing statements aren't new in this administration, but there have now been over 750 instances of GWB signing a law and claiming an executive exception.

This is almost funny when the law is specifically passed to control a presidential decision and the president signs it while claiming it's null and void.

Here's the latest: Congress passed a law requiring minimum qualifications for anyone selected to head FEMA. Dubya said it doesn't apply to him.

---------------excerpt---------------
Bush cites authority to bypass FEMA law
Signing statement is employed again

By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff | October 6, 2006

WASHINGTON -- President Bush this week asserted that he has the executive authority to disobey a new law in which Congress has set minimum qualifications for future heads of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Congress passed the law last week as a response to FEMA's poor handling of Hurricane Katrina. The agency's slow response to flood victims exposed the fact that Michael Brown, Bush's choice to lead the agency, had been a politically connected hire with no prior experience in emergency management.

Full article:
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/10/06/bush_cites_authority_to_bypass_fema_law/
------------------------------

The mainstream media seem reluctant to comment on signing statements or recess appointments, or any of the other little chicken***** maneuvers this president pulls to avoid standing up for his opinions/choices.

YOU ANTI AMERICAN COMMIE PINKO!!!!


The Emperor is not subject to the laws that his mere mortal peons are.

The FEMA thing is the least of executive order outrages and they go way back through many presidents. With all the ammo Bush gives you, do you really have to go looking for more? Clinton had quite a few as well.

Oh but it's okay because the Republicans are about personal accountability. . . except when it applies to them. But that's not important. . .

Who said anything about that? What are you talking about and what does this have to do with partisan politics? Every president has done it and will continue to do it. Unless you were equally outraged by Clinton's exec. orders AND pardons, you don't make a lot of sense.

Re: This should trouble anyone: signing statements
 

Yet, Congress has given Bush II new authority to arrest and detain, without habeas corpus, anyone he chooses; so obviously these signing statements don't concern them at all.

If Caligula were elected, would they act to restrain him? I doubt it.

kinda like crossing your fingers when making a deal
or some other little kid trick to avoid the rules of the game
the neo-conned donot belive personal accountability
honesty or fisical accountability applys to them
but demand it from everyone else

and shut up about clinton he is so 6 years ago
and we are talking about NOW not the past

Oh, but we are talkng about the past because Bush did not invent executive orders and to the best of my knowledge, has used far fewer of them than many of his predecessors. It's just more evididence that the knee-jerk Bush haters will never accept anything as long as Bush's fingerprints are on it. Did you whine when Clinton did the same thing? C'mon, humor me.

I suppose knee jerk Clinton hating is better than knee jerk Bush hating?

IT'S ALL CLINTON'S FAULT!

Maybe if I keep posting that over and over again the Clinton haters will change their minds.

Nah, I'm still pissed at Ford for banning assassinations by exec order. Plenty of blame to go around.

Prior Presidents didn't use signing statements even a fraction as often as Bush does. 750 to date for W, vs <200 for Clinton, and used more aggressively. Interestingly, now-Justice Alioto first proposed expanded use of signing statements during the Reagan Administration, so there's at least one Justice who might think these statements actually have any legal effect. There otherwise isn't much support for the idea that these statements have meaning.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signing_statement

President Washington was a pot head. :p

I didn't know there was a difference between signing statements and exec. orders, but the Wikipedia article says there is. Plenty of exec. orders have undone predecessors' exec. orders. Kinda ironic how they're wrong if you disagree with them or disapprove of the number of times they were used. They're either right or wrong, legal or illegal. It's got nothing to do with which pres. uses them.

Not only didn't anyone claim Bush invented signing statements, the thread-starting post states that fact.

As for other presidents approaching Dubya's record number of signing statements, You'd need to add all of them together to surpass GWB's number. And the number of direct constitutional challenges is much higher under Dubya.

Here is a good discussion on the topic:

http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20060113.html

Rick appears confused between Signing Statements and Executive Orders. Two very, very different things.

The power grabs by this president have been unprecedented. Another reason we need to balance our government with a Dem Congress.

O.k. guys; I'm really fuzzy on this, so maybe you can help me out. Wasn't there some kind of expansion of Executive power granted by Congress to FDR as an expedient for use during wartime? From my fuzzy recollection, is not that expansion of power soley up to the Exective branch to relinquish if and when it sees fit? It's my understanding that no one has relinquished it yet, so it is still in effect. Am I all wet, or is there something to this?

Does it have anything to do with what Dubya is up to with these signing statements? What is the history of these; i.e. who first used them and what was their original intent? I can see where a President can, and should, possibly issue a non-binding statement concerning his views on any bill he signs; kind of footnotes that neither add nor detract from the bill. It sounds like what he is doing is some kind of illegal perversion of what might originally been a useful tool. It sounds like signing statements may have been on this path for some time and no one has really challenged the President on their use in the past, but now that Dubya is pushing the envelope on them, this practice has been given the scrutiny it probably needs.

The War Powers Act of 1933, as updated and amended several times. It's blatantly unConstitutional since Congress can't grant a power itself holds via the Constitution to another branch, but that's what the act does. Several legislators took a case to court over the act (not long ago), but the Supremes said that they weren't going to get involved in what they see as an argument between the executive and the legislative branches. In other words, shirking their duty.

An unbelievable number of crimes have been and are being commited under the power granted the executive branch via that act.

It is clear that the US lost interest in serious accountability and non-partisan (institutional) checks and balances when Congress began to allow the Pres to engage in War without formal Declaration. Have we yet won a War that was pursued under authority of the War Powers Act (or VN's GoT Resolution, or the Patriot Act...)? In fact, it seems that both branches are loath to honor their Constitutional duties on any important matter anymore.

The late 20th Century power grab by the Exec Branch, using Signing Statements and Executive Orders as a means to circumvent consensus policy-making is a tragic evolution of our Nation from Republic to Empire.

Divide & Conquer has vanquished E Pluribus Unum.

Signing statements are not related to Executive Orders.

The latter are the President's decisions on matters that the Executive branch controls. Typically directing agency decisions, e.g. create a wilderness area.

The former are a President's attempt to modify or limit a law that the Legislative branch has passed.

The system in our country is: Legislative (Congress) makes the laws, Judicial (Courts) interpret the laws, Executive (President and agencies) enforce the laws. Making laws is NOT part of the Executive's power, which makes these signing statements controversial.

Read the wiki article I linked, it is a good discussion, including of the history.

More broadly - in my opinion, Bush and his Administration are out of control in their drive to increase the power of the Presidency.

In the US system, the President already has incredible power. He has virtually complete control over warmaking and foreign policy. He controls, through his cabinet and agency heads, a huge federal government with tens of millions of employees involved in almost every part of our lives. He is the leader of his political party, and as such has huge influence over about 1/2 of the nation's Congressmen. In Bush's case, his party controls both houses of Congress as well.

Yet, Bush and his people seem determined with further increasing the President's power. Cheney in particular has been obsessed with this.

So the Administration has taken the legal position that the President has "inherent authority" to take whatever actions he deems necessary that are arguably related to national security. This is the main argument used to support the warrantless wiretapping program, the indefinite detentions without trial, and the torture at secret prisons.

However, the inherent authority claim doesn't apply to laws or matters unrelated to national security (at least, so far they haven't tried to make the argument). So the Administration has vastly expanded the program of "signing statements", as an attempt to modify and limit all laws.

To date, the Supreme Court has been somethng of a barrier to the Administration's power expansion. However, with his two appointments, Bush may have solved that problem. Justice Alito in particular was active in efforts to expand the Presidency's power, back in the Reagan days.

Whatever you think of Bush, I contend it is dangerous and unwise for the office of the Presidency to accumulate so much power. If you adore Bush and think its great for him and Cheney have such power, consider how you'll feel when the next Clinton takes office and becomes armed with these powers.

A wise President with a sense of history would recognize the need for balance in our government. He would resist the temptations to seize powers. Bush is an extremely unwise person. Whether he is personally power-hungry, or simply being led around by his advisers, the end effect is the same.

Its amazing, we can deplore the power grab that Putin is making in Russia, and not recognize what is going on right here at home.

Sadly, the last wise President was Calvin Coolidge. Before that it was probably Martin Van Buren.

There was a wise president?

Yes, but not a single mistake free president. Thomas Jefferson, arguably the best president, made the mistake of sending the expedition to Tripoli thus beginning the overseas military adventures for purely corporate welfare precedent. That should have been prohibited immediately, but of course we know that it was expanded.

Ok, I see.

Eleanor Roosevelt then?

America's first lesbian first lady? Naw.

Van Buren Policies

Martin Van Buren announced his intention "to follow in the footsteps of his illustrious predecessor," and retained all but one of Jackson's cabinet. Van Buren had few economic tools to deal with the economic crisis of 1837. He succeeded in setting up a system of bonds for the national debt. His party was so split that his 1837 proposal for an "Independent Treasury" system did not pass until 1840. It gave the Treasury control of all federal funds and had a legal tender clause that required (by 1843) all payments to be made in legal tender rather than in state bank notes. But the act was repealed in 1841 and never had much impact. Foreign affairs were complicated when several states defaulted on their state bonds, London complained, and Washington explained it had no responsibility for those bonds. British authors such as Charles Dickens then denounced the American failure to pay royalties, leading to a negative press in Britain regarding the financial honesty of America. The Caroline Affair involved Canadian rebels using New York bases to attack the government in Canada. On December 29, 1837, Canadian government forces crossed the frontier into the US and burned the Caroline, which the rebels had been using. One American was killed, and an outburst of anti-British sentiment swept through the U.S. Van Buren sent the army to the frontier and closed the rebel bases. Van Buren tried to vigorously enforce the neutrality laws, but American public opinion favored the rebels. Boundary disputes in May brought Canadian and American lumberjacks into conflict. There was no bloodshed in this Aroostook War, but it further inflamed public opinion on both sides.

Van Buren took the blame for hard times, as Whigs ridiculed him as Martin Van Ruin. State elections of 1837 and 1838 were disastrous for the Democrats, and the partial economic recovery in 1839 was offset by a second commercial crisis in that year. Nevertheless, Van Buren controlled his party and was unanimously renominated by the Democrats in 1840. The revolt against Democratic rule led to the election of William Henry Harrison, the Whig candidate.

In the Amistad Case Van Buren sided with the Spanish Goverment to return the kidnapped slaves.

Coolidge Policies

During Coolidge's presidency, the United States experienced the wildly successful period of economic growth known as the "Roaring Twenties." His economic policy may be summed up in the quote "the business of America is business". He vetoed the proposed McNary-Haugen Farm Relief Bill, designed to allow the Federal Government to purchase agricultural surpluses.

Although some later commentators have criticized Coolidge as a doctrinaire laissez-faire ideologue, historian Robert Sobel offers some context based on Coolidge's sense of federalism: "As Governor of Massachusetts, Coolidge supported wages and hours legislation, opposed child labor, imposed economic controls during World War I, favored safety measures in factories, and even worker representation on corporate boards. Did he support these measures while president? No, because in the 1920s, such matters were considered the responsibilities of state and local governments." [4] Other commentators, Austrian Economists included, say that Coolidge's policies were not laisse-faire because inflation rates were heavily increased under his administration which they consider to be a major factor contributing to the Great Depression.

Coolidge was easily elected President of the United States in his own right in the election of 1924. Coolidge opposed U.S. membership in the League of Nations, but the administration was not isolationist. Its most notable initiative was the Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928, named for Coolidge's Secretary of State, Frank Kellogg, and for French foreign minister Aristide Briand. The treaty, ratified in 1929, committed signatories including the U.S., the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan to "renounce war, as an instrument of national policy in their relations with one another." The treaty of course failed to prevent the coming Second World War, but did provide the founding principle for international law after World War II. Also in 1928, Coolidge represented the U.S. at the Pan American Conference in Havana, Cuba, making him the only sitting U.S. President to visit the country. Coolidge maintained the somewhat unpopular U.S. occupation of Nicaragua.

Coolidge did not seek renomination; he announced his decision with typical terseness: "I do not choose to run for President in 1928." After leaving office, he and wife Grace returned to Northampton, where his political career had begun.

Mainly, these two presidents remained within the Constitutional boundaries set for the presidency, or very close to it.

She was a lesbian?

I don't know much about US Government except I hate Bush ;)

Ran across this quote, seems apt

"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." -Abraham Lincoln (1809 - 1865)

Good one.

The handful of defenders of this administration seem incapable of imagining any other president with the same power to put himself above the law.

The next presidential election will be a wake up call to those folks. I wonder what country they will threaten to leave to?

Yeah Tech, I'm sure a Pres. Hillary Clinton would never ever even think of a power grab or pushing the envelope. What kind of wake up call are we in for now?

Here's an interesting list of all of GWB's signing statements

http://www.coherentbabble.com/signingstatements/TOCindex.htm

Here's a good one, picked at random. It's from the Defense Authorization Act of 2006:

A number of provisions of the Act, including sections 905, 932, 1004, 1212, 1224, 1227, and 1304, call for the executive branch to furnish information to the Congress on various subjects. The executive branch shall construe such provisions in a manner consistent with the President's constitutional authority to withhold information the disclosure of which could impair foreign relations, national security, the deliberative processes of the Executive, or the performance of the Executive's constitutional duties.

Let me translate that for you non-political types.

"Go fcuk yourselves!"

Funny. I read that to mean that Congress leaks like a sieve and can't be trusted with classified info, especially, when leaking it could damage Bush, regardless of whether it damages national security. Reading Woodward's latest book, I can see how plenty of info in there would have been a disaster if known by Congess and then leaked.

You're referring to the truth, I asume.

Strangely (or not), if the tables were turned and a Democratic President were to warp the balance of power, the cries of "foul" from the Republican supporters would be just as shrill.

Depends on whose ox is getting gored.

Observation seems to indicate that the "left" posters here tend to be a bit more likely to admit some bipartisanship than the "right". Anyone want to respond to this?

If you take everything Woodward writes at face value, then I'd like to hear your review of his last two or three books. Lots of stuff in his books was not made public except by Woodward. And, while I'm barely 1/3 through his latest one, I have to wonder why the theme of this one, namely Rumsfeld's lack of planning for Iraq, contrasts so much with his last one which was so much about Rumsfeld's planning for it. It's great reading though.

It's "the left's" great weakness, at least since the evangelicals and crazies hijacked the Repub party. Look at daddy and fint and Higgins .... full speed ahead for the Repubs, no matter how sleazy and incompetent and manipulative they show themselves to be. "Iraq is going great ... who's Abramoff ... the Dems spend a lot, not us ..." And on and on.

Loyalty trumps facts, loyalty trumps everything in that camp.

The "intellectuals" on the other side can put up with a lot of bull, but 100x less than the Repub soldiers.

That's one of the basics of the differences between "liberal" and "conservative." Conservative = narrow. liberal = wide. Diversity has always been one of the main constraints of the liberal party. Republicans are much more single-minded, more tightly grouped than Democrats. Democrats are much more wide-ranging. And, I would agree, more open-minded. Certainly more racially and ideologically diverse. The Democratic party has always struggled with "platform" issues because of this wide range of ideologies.

You couldn't be more wrong, Supe. I know liberals love to fancy themselves as more inclusive, but that is simply not true. Their range of inclusiveness is about the same as the conservatives; no wider. Just different. The two ranges overlap a great deal in the middle (probably more than zealots on either side would like to admit) but they are about equal in size. Conservatives do exclude many liberal ideologies and see many of them as some kind of lunatic fringe. The same is true of liberals, however. They rail on and on about the conservative zealots and their ideologies. Liberals have thrown just as many off the bus as conservatives have; the difference is they cannot acknowledge their own bigotry. At least conservatives can own up to that much.

Jeff:

Study what happened to the two parties because of the civil rights movement. DINOs in the South became Republicans in protest. That mindset still exists. Does "bigotry" exist in politics? No doubt. However, I posit that when it comes to airing dirty laundry, the Dems seem to be more open about their differences. The Reps circle the wagons, close the doors, hold secret meetings and come out with a "consensus" position while the Dems open the doors, rant and rail at each other, toss rotten fruit and act like a totally disorganized gang. One can only conclude, however, that the conservative movement has been possibly the most internally conflicted that has existed in recent years, inconsistent when it comes to how to deal with sexual preferences, gender differences, women's rights, personal freedoms, subtle attempts to institute a national faith, and the rest. I will give them credit though, for their cohesive public image.

The conservative movement (as truly separate from mainstream Republicans) has developed the ability to use slogans and deflect responsibility to a fine degree. Everything is someone else's fault. Everythig is reduced to sound bites (cut and run, stay the course, you are either with us or against us to name a few), and anyone who questions the status quo is automatically an enemy. I would ask those of the true conservative movement, Why is this so? Why is there no room for honest debate? Is it difficult to understand why anyone seeing things differently sooner or later "loses it"?

Do I get as annoyed with far left liberals? You betcha. I like consistency, but not necessarily unanimity. A basic platform of what should be done is necessary to differentiate the two schools of thought.

All this being said, middle of the roaders of both major parties are actually not that far apart in basic philosophy such as individual rights and the economy and shake their heads at the extremists, wondering just what the hell drives them. There are lunatics in both camps, and they make the most noise, making it seem they weild more real power than they actually do.

If we could rein in the extremists, the country would benefit.