patrick.ainge.com

ACSBlog:

Constitutional Scholars Join Letter Asserting Congress Has Power to Stop Escalation

Twenty-one legal scholars, including many who served as constitutional advisors to the President, have joined a letter to House and Senate leadership outlining Congress’ broad powers to limit the commander-in-chief (pdf available here).

As of now the link from ACSBlog is not working well so I have mirrored the PDF file locally.

The New York Daily News is reporting President Bush has quietly claimed the right to open Americans’ mail without a judge’s warrant.

Bush has issued a “signing statement” that declared his right to open people’s mail without a judge’s warrent under emergency conditions, contrary to existing law and in direct contradiction to the bill he had just signed.

“You have to be concerned,” agreed a career senior U.S. official who reviewed the legal underpinnings of Bush’s claim. “It takes Executive Branch authority beyond anything we’ve ever known.”

This from the man we have vested with the responsibility to protect and defend the constitution and laws of the United States.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that John Negroponte will step down from his post as “Intelligence Czar” to take a post as Deputy Secretary of State.

Can’t wait to see how Bush spins this one.

We need to remind Bush what his job is.

Whenever I hear the president mention, oh, every 12 minutes, that his greatest responsibility is “to protect the American people,” the insufferable civics robot inside my head mutters: “Actually, sir, your oath, the one with the Bible and the chief justice and the Jumbotron, is to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. For the American people are not mere flesh whose greatest hope is to keep our personal greasy molecules intact; we, sir, are a body politic — with ideals.”

excerpt from:

Down With Torture! Gimme Torture!
By SARAH VOWELL
Published: February 5, 2006
The New York Times

Hey! I’m back!

Unfortunately just in time to post the full text of the Military Commissions Act of 2006.
Just passed by Congress and on its way for approval by The President.

Another blow to freedom, and another step toward Bush’s police state.

I wonder how long it will be until those who oppose the current regime are branded terrorists and jailed without trial?

[via: Marty Lederman's post at Balkinization]

Here is a thought provoking analysis of the recent controversy surrounding Bush’s signing statements.

Thanks the backwardsbush.com now we can all count down to the end of the reign of Emperor Bush. The only question remaining is how many more people will people will pay for his shameless greed with their lives?

[T]he Bush administration is not big on European philosophers. So perhaps we can develop the philosophy in purely Bushian terms. To highlight its logic, I will present it in mathematical form, the way that Spinoza presented his ethics:

Axiom 1: We are good people.

Axiom 2: Our enemies are bad people.

Axiom 3: Anything that helps good people beat bad people is good.

Corollary 1: Whatever we do to beat our enemies is good.

Corollary 2: Whatever hinders us from doing what we do to beat our enemies is bad.

Theorem 1: Anything that makes us look bad is false.
(Proof: If it makes us look bad, it must be false, because, according to Corollary 1, what we do to beat our enemies is good, not bad.)

Corollary 3: It can’t be true that the Guantanamo prisoners killed themselves because of how we treated them.
(Proof: That would make us look bad. Whatever makes us look bad is false.)

Surprising Corollary 4: Facts that make us look bad are false.
(Proof: Follows directly from Theorem 1.)
(Comment: If you thought that facts can’t be false, you haven’t understood that truth and falsity are moral terms: truth is what good people say, falsity is what bad people say. If bad people state facts, those facts are false.)

Theorem 2: Laws that constrain us are bad.
(Proof: Follows directly from Corollary 2.)

Axiom 4: Good people support the rule of law, and that makes the rule of law good.

Corollary 4: We support the rule of law.
(Proof: By Axiom 1, we’re good people; and by Axiom 4, good people support the rule of law.)

Surprising Theorem 3: Laws that constrain us don’t exist.
(Proof: By Theorem 2, a law that constrains us would be bad. But by Axiom 4, the rule of law is good. Therefore there cannot be such a thing as a law that constrains us.)

Axiom 5: Anything that anyone uses against us is a weapon of our enemies.

Decisive Theorem: Any international forum or legal argument that might constrain us, or anything that might make us look bad, is a weapon of our enemies.

Axiom 6: We’re strong and our enemies are weak.

Corollary 5: Any international forum or legal argument that might constrain us, or anything that might make us look bad, is a weapon of the weak. To put it in other words, it is an act of asymmetric war against us.

QED

Over at aboyandhiscomputer.com Mermaid posted on Dan Savage’s “Savage Loveâ€? column on City Pages. Dan voiced concern about a washington post story by January Payne about new federal guidelines asking females capable of conception to treat themselves as “pre-pregnantâ€? regardless of whether or not they plan to get pregnant.

From the post article:

“…[T]his means all women between first menstrual period and menopause should take folic acid supplements, refrain from smoking, maintain a healthy weight and keep chronic conditions such as asthma and diabetes under control…[I]t’s important that women follow this advice throughout their reproductive lives, because about half of pregnancies are unplanned and so much damage can be done to a fetus between conception and the time the pregnancy is confirmed.â€?

I think Dan states his concern very clearly:

Color me paranoid, but ordering American women to regard themselves as “pre-pregnantâ€? because they may harm a fetus they don’t know they’re carrying opens the door to prosecuting women who harm their fetuses by failing to regard themselves as “pre-pregnant.â€? How long until “women should…refrain from smoking [and] maintain a healthy body weightâ€? becomes “women must…â€? Does that sound paranoid? Well, so did a war on contraception once.

Oddly enough, Bush’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention doesn’t urge straight men to regard themselves as existing in a perpetual state of “pre-fatherhood.â€? Smoking, obesity, asthma, and diabetes could seriously hamper a man’s ability to do the heavy lifting that comes with fatherhood. But Bush’s CDC doesn’t seem that interested in regulating the behavior of all those fat, smoking pre-fathers out there.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for people living a more healthy lifestyle. But why not everyone?

The Center for Constitutional Rights is calling for the impeachment of Greorge W. Bush and it’s no wonder.

With the mass media buzzing for months now with news of Bush’s “Signing Statements” where he quietly states that the laws of the United States of America do not apply to the Office of the President, I for one am amazed that Constitutional watchdog groups such as the CCR have not raised more of a stink already.

Of course simply stating that the laws of the US don’t apply to him doesn’t mean that he’s actually VIOLATING the laws, right?

It seems that with the revelation of the NSA tracking domestic calling records without court orders or judicial oversight that that Mr. Bush may be practicing what he preaches.

But we may never know.

In Saturday’s Wall Street Journal there is a Associated Press article stating that the Bush administration has submitted court documents claiming “State Secrets” privilege and asking for the lawsuits of the CCR and ACLU to be thrown out.

Quoting Shayana Kadidal, an attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights, calling the administration’s motion “undemocratic.”

“The Bush administration is trying to crush a very strong case against domestic spying without any evidence or argument.” “Can the president tell the courts which cases they can rule on? If so, the courts will never be able to hold the president accountable for breaking the law.”

And from an April 30th article by Charlie Savage in the Boston Globe –

”There can’t be judicial review if nobody knows about it,“ said Neil Kinkopf, a Georgia State law professor who was a Justice Department official in the Clinton administration. ”And if they avoid judicial review, they avoid having their constitutional theories rebuked.”

Without court involvement, only Congress can check a president who goes too far. But Bush’s fellow Republicans control both chambers, and they have shown limited interest in launching the kind of oversight that could damage their party.

”The president is daring Congress to act against his positions, and they’re not taking action because they don’t want to appear to be too critical of the president, given that their own fortunes are tied to his because they are all Republicans,“ said Jack Beermann, a Boston University law professor. ”Oversight gets much reduced in a situation where the president and Congress are controlled by the same party.”

Said David Golove, a New York University law professor who specializes in executive-power issues: ”Bush has essentially said that ‘We’re the executive branch and we’re going to carry this law out as we please, and if Congress wants to impeach us, go ahead and try it.’ “

On March 1st, on Salon,com, Garrison Keillor wrapped up his take on part of the whole affair.

”The U.S. Constitution provides a simple ultimate way to hold him to account for the crimes and the failure to attend to the country’s defense. Impeach him and let the Senate hear the evidence.“

I think that sums it up.