washingtonpost.com — For President Bush, the fight over war-spending legislation has become the only talking point -- an opportunity, his strategists hope, to demonstrate strength and turn the tables on a Democratic Congress that may be overreaching. As Democrats see it, Bush is having a hard time adjusting to life in a two-party government.
Apr 4, 2007 View in Crawl 4
littlebylittleApr 4, 2007
People who use words like "libtards" have no intelligence and should be sidelined and ignored.I saw Reid make this comment. So true. George thinks he's above the law and he acts accordingly.
floorman56Apr 4, 2007
If Bush vetos it he will find no funding for IraqHe will get funding ....he will start to pull it from other parts of the defense budget. First to go will be the juicy defense contracts in the Dem's districts. Military flights for congress people? FORGET ABOUT IT . Videos of troops not getting what they need? YOU BET.
kbmitchellApr 5, 2007
thank you for your time: their is blood in the streets up to your knees. watch and see. who's it gona be you or me. it's only another Vietnam. wait who's that knocking on your door?it's not big brother.he dose not live here any more. thank you kbmitchell
swrostmoreApr 5, 2007
this is how the insane clown posse feels about the current political climate: I saved up my money and went to see the Lilith fairstarted stabbing lesbians, there was millions of them thereI took off my thong and jumped in the pitbut there wasnt any pit, it was only me and that was itbut so what, I was throwin myself all over the floorSarah McLachlan was on stage, I said you f**kin whoreOne time I met Slipknot, I stabbed their assstabbed them all in the face, that's why they wear masksmy little newspaper truck runs on a tank of bloodI drive with my lights off all throuhg my neighborhoodbut its so hard to sneak because of the mufflerI hate that f**ker
provocateurcrowApr 5, 2007
Is he really President??? I was hoping this was all a vivid nightmare..
ryanchappellApr 6, 2007
"Let me imagine it for a second. We wouldn't be in Iraq, we would be more focused on catching Osama, we wouldn't have squandered the good will of the world, we'd be talking to Iran and North Korea directly about their nuclear program and our military wouldn't be near breaking so we would have real strength behind our words. I guess you're right, we'd be really screwed."Wrong. There would have been more sucessful attacks in the US, and Europe. Afghanistan would be festering with the extremist scum, while weak Democrats beg them to stop. At least we have them in an uncomfortable position, and disparate enough to suicide bomb. The war is over there not here. The desperate position is that they know society's progress, which is expedited by our work in the middle east, and their backwards extremist ways cannot survive, so they are doing everything they can. They are losing and they know it!
wombatcontrolApr 8, 2007
edverb:1.) Bush is right. The Social Security "Trust Fund" is a bunch of IOUs. They're not *public debt* because they're bonds held by the government, not by individual investors. See Fleming v. Nestor, 363 U.S. 603 (1960). There's nothing unconstitutional about making such a statement, especially when it is entirely correct.2.) Woodward is wrong. The appropriation was to move CENTCOM to Qatar to be closer to where the action was -- both Iraq and Afghanistan. Those improvements would have made sense even if we had never gone to war with Iraq. Unless Congress specifically appropriated those funds only for one purpose (which they rarely do), there's no violation of the Constitution at all.3.) Read the link you posted. It explains in some depth the legal reasons why the NSA program is authorized under the law, mainly the September 16, 2001 AUMF that gives the military the ability to go after al-Qaeda. Given that al-Qaeda launched their strikes from America, it doesn't take a genius to figure that intercepting communications between al-Qaeda operatives in the US and those overseas would be part of that mission. The letter you posted lays out the legal issues including the relevant precedents. Again, there is no violation because the President is acting under a Youngstown Category I situation - he's using is Commander in Chief powers under the aegis of a Congressional authorization.4.) Signing statements are part of the Executive's Constitutional prerogatives: Art. II, § 3, the "faithful execution" clause. The President has the Constitutional duty to refuse to enforce laws which violate the Constitution, even if Congress has passed them. Signing statements don't have force of law, but are directives to the rest of the Executive Branch on how they are to comply with Congressional mandates. Every President has used them, and they have been upheld by the Supreme Court -- see Bowsher v. Synar, 478 U.S. 714, 733 (1986), Franklin v. Massachusetts, 112 S. Ct. 2767, 2775 (1992)5.) Read the article again. The House and the Senate both voted on the bill, but there was a mistake in one of the provisions. I don't believe this issue would be litigated, but it's doubtful that there would be any standing in the case. Members of Congress rarely (if ever) read the bills they vote on, and a litigant would have to prove that the procedural error was so great that the law was invalid. That isn't going to happen - and the Democrats could have easily corrected the error but made a political choice to force the issue -- which the courts would see as making the issue a nonjusticiable political controversy which the Judiciary should not examine.The fact is that these sort of procedural errors are common -- which is why they're normally dealt with by a voice vote in Congress. It's only because the Democrats wanted to force the issue that this wasn't handled in the normal way.6.) You're wrong on Hamdi. Read the opinion again: (<a class="user" href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/03-6696.ZS.html),">http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/03-6696.ZS.html),</a> especially Justice O'Connor's opinion at III.A:"All agree suspension of the writ has not occurred here. Thus, it is undisputed that Hamdi was properly before an Article III court to challenge his detention under 28 U.S.C. § 2241."One can argue that what Bush is doing is *bad policy* -- but the arguments that it's somehow unprecedented and unconstitutional aren't borne out by looking at the facts and the relevant law.
influsionApr 8, 2007
Nothing wrong with a king. Just wrong that President Bush believes he is one.
timstevensApr 13, 2007
Bush is a wimp, but Reid is a dick.