REPUBLICAN HATCHET MAN DEFENDS PRESIDENTIAL LAWLESSNESS

[dogday]

"Wartime is not a time to weaken the commander in chief," says paramount partisan hack Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), responding to the testimony of former Nixon White House Counsel John Dean at Friday's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Sen. Russ Feingold's Bush censure motion.

A good question for the senator might be this: if the war in question is the so-called "War on Terror," when exactly might we consider it an appropriate time for "weakening" the commander in chief?

President Bush has used this faux "war" as justification for all manner of power grabs, from the invasion of a country to the ignoring of acts Congress, to the violation of court orders to the violation of federal laws, to the termination of citizenship rights. By Bush's--and Hatch's--reasoning, the president cum commander in chief could order the secret arrest, detention, torture and execution of any one of us, could cancel national elections, could indeed, declare martial law and have done with the Constitution altogether.

And since this "war" will never end--terrorism having been with us for as far back as you want to look, and likely to be with us forever--Hatch's argument is a prescription for dictatorship.

http://www.freemarketnews.com/Analysis/154/4376/2006-04-04.asp?wid=154&nid=4376

[Trish1168]

1. war time is the best time to weaken the commander in chief

because history has shown repeatedly that laws get abused needlessly (from Lincoln's unsuccessful attempt to suspend the writ of habeous corpus to the detention of Japanese Americans) during war time.

Our president started a war, in part, to expand his presidential power using the war-time excuse. But, its important to keep in mind that he started the 'power grab' before we had any wars (before 9/11). He started it off by abrogating the ABM treaty with Russia. A treaty requires both congressional and presidential approval....so theoretically, a president does not have the authority to abrogate the treaty alone. Denis Kucinich sued the president, but the case was appealed to a Bush appointed judge who threw it out, and like other cases (the GAO- secret energy meeting case), the lawyers were nervous about appealing to a now obviously partisan supreme court (after the Bush v Gore decision).

We've been moving toward dictatorship longer than most people are aware.

[dogday]

2. He will be judged in History, but I don't

believe it will be the legacy he wants... All the Senators and Congresspeople who have supported his breaking the law will also be judged as well....

[Trish1168]

3. evil thrives when good men do nothing

Congress will be judged as the cowards they are.

[sinkingfeeling]

4. Two points. Commander-in-chief only applies to the military , not the

civilan population and since only Congress can declare war and none's been declared, Bushie boy isn't any damn 'war president'.