quote:One section Bush targeted created a statute that forbids spending taxpayer money "to establish any military installation or base for the purpose of providing for the permanent stationing of United States Armed Forces in Iraq" or "to exercise United States control of the oil resources of Iraq."
I don't want my tax money going to a permanent army base in Iraq.
Posts: 2867 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
More importantly, how taxpayer dollars are spent is, constitutionally, exclusively the domain of congress... Bush has no constitutional authority to say that congress can't say that money cannot be used to build a military installation.
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posted
To quote Dennis Miller from back in his SNL days when he may have still been sane: "Will somebody please slap this jerk?"
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The next president is going to have quite the repair job.
Assuming Bush even steps down... Posts: 3295 | Registered: Jun 2004
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
Ha! Once upona time I may have been impressionable to think that but I dont there's a large enoyugh percentage of US army officers loyal enough of bush to support him.
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In a way, I am actually happy about this. It's only these sorts of things which will really force our government (and its citizens) to examine how outdated and zig-zagging our rules on these sorts of things are.
But when I zoom in from that very detached perspective, I wonder that President Bush dares to call himself a Republican anymore, working so hard to concentrate so much power into one federal office.
I'm also curious what legal basis this and similar signing statements have. "Interferes with national security" (to loosely paraphrase) seems to be pretty damn shaky ground to me.
--------
President Bush will step down in a year. I've never been able to grasp how far removed someone must be from reality to seriously imagine otherwise.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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quote:I've never been able to grasp how far removed someone must be from reality to seriously imagine otherwise.
I'd never thought of it before, but I wonder if:
1) There was a large scale terrorist attack on the US around October. Think nuclear bomb in NYC type attack.
2) GWB's inner circle tells him that Obama/Clinton would be disastrous as a war president. His generals say very similar things.
I'd say he at least considers declaring "emergency powers" that delay the election in the above situation.
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posted
What emergency powers? There's no mechanism in the Constitution for him to do that.
Even if the attack happens on election day, he'll be presidency until January, and then he's out. I don't see anything changing that, short of Obama or Hillary being assasinated before they are sworn in.
Rakeesh -
Yep. I do. They'd spin it as "Republicans are the ones that set up a situation where this could happen, they provoked this attack."
Florida could break off of the US, float away and explode and I still think the Democrats stand a better than average chance of winning.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:Yep. I do. They'd spin it as "Republicans are the ones that set up a situation where this could happen, they provoked this attack."
I think you're forgetting the first reaction we'd likely have to such an attack. It wouldn't be fear (which would mean the spin you suggest would be effective), it would be anger.
Americans would be furious, we as a nation would be shrieking for vengeance. And if you want vengeance, who do you go to? Senators Obama or Clinton? I think that's very unlikely.
Especially since the Republicans could just as easily counter that it was all this taking a 'softer' approach to dealing with terrorism that provoked such a hypothetical attack.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
I agree we'd be furious. But, I think a measured voice would remind America what happened the last time we got pissed and lashed out: We got mired in Iraq. What do you attack when your enemy by its very nature has no vulnerable places to be attacked? It's not like the USSR where Moscow is sitting there waiting to be nuked.
I think that you're right that if you want revenge you don't turn to Obama (maybe Clinton though, you're really undervaluing her status as a warhawk), but they'd be right there to remind us of what happened last time, and to warn us of the consequences. I think that, in the face of Republicans clamoring for war and nukes, would probably scare enough Americans into backing down.
quote:That's not always a sufficient barrier.
If it were a different president, he might be able to get away with it temporarily. But this president especially I think would not. I think either the attempt would be outright smacked down, or he'd be taken out in a coup, and elections would take place.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
Well, this argument is getting kind of silly since it's purely hypothetical. I'm losing interest, but...
You said the hypothetical attack was a nuke in NYC. I have no idea what the casualties to such a thing would be, but it would probably number in the tens of thousands at a minimum while rendering the city effectively uninhabitable, I think.
The point is, 9-11 would be chicken feed by comparison. Remember what happened the last time the possibility of nuclear weapons in the hands of our enemies was seriously posed? We invaded a country.
If that possibility instead became a certainty, I'm not sure why you think we'd be so very moderate in our response.
quote:It's not like the USSR where Moscow is sitting there waiting to be nuked.
Yet here we are, in Afghanistan and (especially) Iraq.
quote:But, I think a measured voice would remind America what happened the last time we got pissed and lashed out: We got mired in Iraq.
Dude, when you're freaking out in a panic and a bunch of your neighbors just got murdered in a spectacular fashion, you don't go to the 'measured voice'. That's just not how people work. People go to the voice that a) sounds unafraid, b) promises protection, and c) guarantees swift retribution. They don't go to, "Now let's remember, a conventional military response is not the solution to terrorism!"
They go to the candidate who says, "This is some serious @#$%, I swear I will use everything in my power to prevent it from happening again, and these @#$%#@$ are gonna pay bigtime."
Clinton would have to do a hell of a lot of switching to get 'warhawk' cred, Lyrhawn. And for every time she and Democrats (in theory) reminded the voters of the consequences, Republicans would be there pointing out how much interfering and sabotaging Democrats have been doing, and how much (as a campaign tactic) morale boost to our enemies Democratic politicians have been giving.
I think you vastly overestimate America's willingness to even listen to the calm, measured voice of reason in the hypothetical you describe. We would go totally lizard-brain, man.
Re: 'Emergency' powers, I'm just pointing out that insufficient or even totally absent constitutional support is not always a substantial barrier, when the metal meets the meat.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
Well, by what I would infer as your definition of a warhawk then, almost no one in Congress left really fits the description. Bush, Cheney, McCain and some other people in the Bush Administration really, but, other than that I'd think no one. She's constantly at odds with the more peaceable elements of the Democratic party, and they aren't happy with a lot of the votes she's made, especially as a member of the armed services committee. Maybe not by warmongering Republican standards, but certainly by her own party's standards she's in that column.
quote:Yet here we are, in Afghanistan and (especially) Iraq.
quote:If that possibility instead became a certainty, I'm not sure why you think we'd be so very moderate in our response.
Well it's not my hypothetical, but what makes you think there's certainty of anything? What would we do? Where would we go? With Bush in charge I'm betting he'd want to go to Iran, but there'd likely be zero evidence of any connection between a random bomb and any single nation. So what would we do? Nuke Tehran? Maybe a smaller city, take out Qum? Or hell, it's Bush, he might invade Norway. I guess my point is, that if it's 9 months from now, we aren't going to have the troops to invade Iceland, let alone another Middle Eastern nation, the option just plain wouldn't exist. It'd be a bombing. I don't care how pissed off you think we'd be, we wouldn't nuke anyone over it, especially considering we wouldn't know who to nuke even if we were going to do it.
I really don't know what you'd expect. With no troops really available, without emptying the US of all reserves and pulling troops from the DMZ in S Korea and whatever we have in Europe, we can't possibly invade another nation. I'm 99.99% certain we wouldn't nuke anyone. It's been more than 50 years since we did, and we haven't seen anything like WWII since, and losing a chunk of NYC won't change that. So what? Airstrikes? We just make it up as we go along?
It's not 10 years in the future, it's like 8 months in the future, with Iraq clearly in the forefront of our minds, and the long road of how we got into it and how we got STUCK there also in our minds. Pissed as we would be, I think as soon as Bush starts saying "trust me, I know who to attack" people start flashing back to Iraq.
Blind rage turns to grief eventually.
Re: Constitutional authority, yeah I see your point, and history certainly bears you out on that. But in present day America, I just don't see him getting away with it. Enough people would resist.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
Interesting last paragraph of the article...
quote:Among the presidential candidates, Mitt Romney, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama have said they would issue signing statements if elected. John McCain said he would not
quote:If it were a different president, he might be able to get away with it temporarily. But this president especially I think would not. I think either the attempt would be outright smacked down, or he'd be taken out in a coup, and elections would take place.
Before 9/11 Bush had the lowest approval rating of any President during his first year in office. After that his approval ratings soared to among the highest ever. Looking back on it, can you tell me what he did following that attack that was so great?
I certainly hope that the suspension of the constitution is something Americans would never tolerate even temporarily, but based on how people reacted to the last crisis, I fear that many Americans would accept it all to readily if they were scared enough.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:I certainly hope that the suspension of the constitution is something Americans would never tolerate even temporarily, but based on how people reacted to the last crisis, I fear that many Americans would accept it all to readily if they were scared enough.
There are situations I actually do hope we would (briefly) tolerate suspension of the constitution, but a nuclear terrorist attack is not one of them.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
I'm curious Rakeesh, under what circumstances would tolerate suspension of the constitution. Would you tolerate full suspension of the constitution, or are you thinking of just specific sections or rights.
Even during the Civil War, the constitution was never suspended, although certain rights were suspended in some places.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
Sorry to have been unclear, I did indeed mean sections and rights, not the entire thing.
A nationwide sudden lethal epidemic that demanded quarantine is one such circumstance, though. To my knowledge there is no mechanism by which the President can use the military to summarily suspend everyone's right of free travel between the states, but it would certainly be necessary in such a situation, I think.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: A nationwide sudden lethal epidemic that demanded quarantine is one such circumstance, though. To my knowledge there is no mechanism by which the President can use the military to summarily suspend everyone's right of free travel between the states, but it would certainly be necessary in such a situation, I think.
The constitution does grant the Federal Government the right to regulate interstate commerce. I suspect that would allow them to complete suspend interstate commerce in an emergency situation.
It was after all easy enough to ground all air traffic after 9/11 with out suspending any part of the constitution.
In any case, I suspect that a quarantine would be support by state governors and enforced by the National Guard rather than the regular military. That sort of thing is after all the mission of the National Guard.
There are some cases where I can see some rights being suspended during a crisis. If there were massive violent riots on a regional scale, I could see suspending the writ of habeas corpus, the right of free assembly and possibly even free speech with in that region until the riots were brought under control as long as the rights were immediately restored following the riots.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
DarkKnight, signing statements are not in and of themselves wrong. Most of them are PR, "I'm sure glad I signed this bill for the American people" sorts of things. Sometimes they are clarifications. Rarely are they descriptions of how the president is going to ignore them, until this administration.
quote:4. Under what circumstances, if any, would you sign a bill into law but also issue a signing statement reserving a constitutional right to bypass the law?
Signing statements have been used by presidents of both parties, dating back to Andrew Jackson. While it is legitimate for a president to issue a signing statement to clarify his understanding of ambiguous provisions of statutes and to explain his view of how he intends to faithfully execute the law, it is a clear abuse of power to use such statements as a license to evade laws that the president does not like or as an end-run around provisions designed to foster accountability.
I will not use signing statements to nullify or undermine congressional instructions as enacted into law. The problem with this administration is that it has attached signing statements to legislation in an effort to change the meaning of the legislation, to avoid enforcing certain provisions of the legislation that the President does not like, and to raise implausible or dubious constitutional objections to the legislation. The fact that President Bush has issued signing statements to challenge over 1100 laws – more than any president in history – is a clear abuse of this prerogative. No one doubts that it is appropriate to use signing statements to protect a president's constitutional prerogatives; unfortunately, the Bush Administration has gone much further than that.
quote:4. Under what circumstances, if any, would you sign a bill into law but also issue a signing statement reserving a constitutional right to bypass the law?
I have opposed the Bush Administration's abuse of signing statements, and as President, I would not use signing statements to disagree on policy grounds with legislation passed by Congress or as an end run around the veto. I would only use signing statements in very rare instances to note and clarify confusing or contradictory provisions, including provisions that contradict the Constitution. My approach would be to work with Congress to eliminate or correct unconstitutional provisions before legislation is sent to my desk.
quote:4. Under what circumstances, if any, would you sign a bill into law but also issue a signing statement reserving a constitutional right to bypass the law?
I share the view of many past presidents that signing statements are an important presidential practice.
quote:4. Under what circumstances, if any, would you sign a bill into law but also issue a signing statement reserving a constitutional right to bypass the law?
As President, I won’t have signing statements. I will either sign or veto any legislation that comes across my desk.
The names are linked to the Boston Globe questions that the candidates responded to, and I urge folks to read them. Very revealing.
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quote:I don't care how pissed off you think we'd be, we wouldn't nuke anyone over it, especially considering we wouldn't know who to nuke even if we were going to do it.
I sincerely hope you are right, but there are credible reports that the Bush administration and pentagon have seriously considered using Nuclear bunker busters to attack Iran's centrifuge facility. It's certainly possible that such plans are just Texas blustering, a madman stance to both scare Iran and make it easier to persuade Europe to join us in a more tempered assault. Lets hope so.
But everyone knows that is fool hardy to make threats if you aren't willing to follow through. Likewise it's extremely dangerous to assume that people who make these kinds of threats won't ever follow through. If leaders in the White House and Pentagon are willing to circulate such a plan today, I think we have to seriously consider the possibility that they would use nuclear weapons in a crisis situation including possibly in retaliation against a nuclear assault.
Its not rational, but I don't see much rationality from our leaders these days.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
I'm sorry but there has been a push pull relationship between all three branches of government especially the executive and legislative.
Bush is not a national hero that can do as he pleases because the people love him. He like many presidents, has found a way to extend the executive branches power in a way that has precedent and some constitutionality.
If people are pissed off that Bush has managed to extend the powers of the executive branch this far, they need to look at the congress for allowing it to happen. Because when the congress simply whines when they are ignored, I don't fault the executive branch for relying more on itself and trying to do things on it's own.
I look at the congress who has an even lower approval rating than Bush and shake my head. Grow some teeth and start reigning in the executive branch instead of whining that nobody will step in and do your job for you.
Having said that, that's why I think Obama would be so good for this country, he isn't polarizing, he isn't a whiner, but he also knows where the imbalances are in our country and is good at restoring equilibrium.
As much as I think Bush is wrong in THIS regard, I think the congress is ridiculous in that they don't stop it.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:I look at the congress who has an even lower approval rating than Bush and shake my head. Grow some teeth and start reigning in the executive branch instead of whining that nobody will step in and do your job for you.
Which members of Congress did you vote for last time?
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quote:I look at the congress who has an even lower approval rating than Bush and shake my head. Grow some teeth and start reigning in the executive branch instead of whining that nobody will step in and do your job for you.
Which members of Congress did you vote for last time?
The last time I could have voted for a senator I was on a mission and was not permitted to vote. The congressman for my district is not the one I voted for.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:The last time I could have voted for a senator I was on a mission and was not permitted to vote.
Why not? I was permitted, even encouraged to cast an absentee ballot while I was on my mission. Who told you you weren't permitted to vote as a missionary.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:The last time I could have voted for a senator I was on a mission and was not permitted to vote.
Why not? I was permitted, even encouraged to cast an absentee ballot while I was on my mission. Who told you you weren't permitted to vote as a missionary.
I could have sent an absentee balot, but we were asked not to read up on politics or the news. The main reason I did not vote was because I did not follow politics or the news closely and therefore did not feel I could cast a good vote.
Were you a couple missionary when you voted? Also I can see the rules varying by mission and by the time period one served.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
I'll also add that I think there is a big difference between saying that you chose not to vote because as a missionary you were not following the issues and so did not feel able to make a good choice and saying that you weren't permitted to vote as a missionary.
I've heard enough weird rumors and interpretations of the draconian rules the church imposes on missionaries, no need to add fuel to the fire.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:Were you a couple missionary when you voted? Also I can see the rules varying by mission and by the time period one served.
Jeez BB, We met. I'm not that old.
I served my mission when I was 22 during the 1984 election.
That's two years after I was born! It's perfectly plausible that you served a mission as a 21 year old AND as a couple. Not all couple missionaries are in their 60's or 70's. In Hong Kong we had couple missionaries in their 40s working in the church offices.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:That's two years after I was born! It's perfectly plausible that you served a mission as a 21 year old AND as a couple. Not all couple missionaries are in their 60's or 70's. In Hong Kong we had couple missionaries in their 40s working in the church offices.
There are occasionally couple missionaries who are that young but it is very rare. The church does not generally call couples who are of child baring age or who have children under the age of 18 and the demands of jobs and career make it highly impractical for most couples to serve missions until they retire.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
I do not think President Bush would or could ever try to disallow the elections, or to disallow n elected rival from taking his job after the election.
However, I do believe that many of the policy's and precedents that he set may be used by less scrupulous people to hold onto and retain power they no longer should constitutionally have. Yes I can see a day when a president would arrest rivals as "Enemy Combatants" based on "Secret Information we can not disclose to court" showing "there surrender based attitudes help our enemies, and are a danger to the country."
Would those who approve of President Bush's use of signing statements truly be satisfied if a President Hillary Clinton were to have that same power?
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I'm clearly in a downward spiral at this point, with no hope of leveling my craft, if I opted out of ejecting and crashed to my death would that make you feel any better?
I was going more for I am exceedingly young not so much that you are very old.
I've yet to meet an old person who could handle a motorized scooter in the city. Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
What I don't get is why we tried and impeached President Clinton for having an affair -- something that, while morally reprehensible, in no way affected the country at large -- and meanwhile we're letting Bush get away with challenging the constitution with little or no repercussions! I mean the man has broken more laws than most of the criminals in our justice system!! But because he's the president using "signing statements" he can give it just enough of an air of legality and legitimacy that we're letting him get away with it?
quote:Originally posted by Alcon: What I don't get is why we tried and impeached President Clinton for having an affair -- something that, while morally reprehensible, in no way affected the country at large -- and meanwhile we're letting Bush get away with challenging the constitution with little or no repercussions! I mean the man has broken more laws than most of the criminals in our justice system!! But because he's the president using "signing statements" he can give it just enough of an air of legality and legitimacy that we're letting him get away with it?
It's immensely frustrating.
Before I let myself explode, I'll stick to your statement.
Clinton was not impeached because he had an affair, he was impeached because he lied to a grand jury under oath.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:Clinton was not impeached because he had an affair, he was impeached because he lied to a grand jury under oath.
Well, to be even more accurate, he was impeached because enough Congresspeople voted to impeach him. You don't actually need a reason to impeach anyone, and they certainly didn't have one.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Clinton was not impeached because he had an affair, he was impeached because he lied to a grand jury under oath.
Well, to be even more accurate, he was impeached because enough Congresspeople voted to impeach him. You don't actually need a reason to impeach anyone, and they certainly didn't have one.
I put it in bold for you to make it easy. Did you miss that part? And before you say you don't think that was a very good reason to impeach, I remind you that the entire Supreme Court of the United States refused to attend Clinton's State of the Union Address following his perjury; something that never before happened in the history of the country.
But wait... BUSH LIED, KIDS DIED!!! IMPEACH THE CHIMP!!!
Posts: 1286 | Registered: Dec 2005
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quote:I remind you that the entire Supreme Court of the United States refused to attend Clinton's State of the Union Address following his perjury; something that never before happened in the history of the country.
I'm sure the Supreme Court was very, very hurt. *plays world's smallest violin for them* Somehow I doubt Congress was all choked up about the "lying under oath" thing, though. Call it a hunch. Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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