President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.At the recent Arlington Democratic Committee Jefferson Jackson Dinner, the only question I heard a reporter ask attendees, including me, was ?Who are you supporting for president?? My response was that the early campaigning was a distraction from the need to hold the current administration accountable for its violations of the Constitution. I explained to the reporter that it would be dangerous for the country if the next president takes office with the enormous amount of governmental power that the Bush administration has taken for itself by intentionally disregarding constitutional and statutory law. Each executive branch administration creates precedent for the administrations that follow. Our failure to hold the Bush administration accountable now is de facto approval for such behavior by succeeding presidents.
During the dinner speeches, the national Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean focused on campaigning. As reported in the Arlington Connection:
Dean also told the crowd of Democratic loyalists that, as party chairman, he won?t stand for unfair attacks against Democratic candidates like the ones that tormented U.S. Sen. John Kerry?s (D-Mass.) presidential campaign in 2004. "The minute the Swift Boat people rear their heads in 2008, they?re going to forget they had heads," he said to thunderous applause.
The closest Chairman Dean came to the issue of holding the President accountable was this question, "Where is Osama Bin Laden, Mr. President?" That was it.
It is frustrating to hear the national leader of the Democratic Party speak forcefully about campaign strategy, but not about the crisis in our executive branch.
Also addressing the dinner crowd was Representative Jim Moran, my Congressman. The closest he came to raising the issue of accountability was this: "It?s hard to believe that we elected the worst, most incompetent president in history," Moran said. (Arlington Connection).
I was able to talk briefly with Rep. Moran before the dinner, and I thanked him for his work directed toward closing Guantanamo. He said he was thinking about starting a task force on the subject. After our conversation it occurred to me that Guantanamo has been the world symbol for American torture, secret imprisonment, and indefinite detention without bringing a charge, for more than four years.
In talking to my fellow Democrats at the dinner, I brought up the need to focus on accountability of the Bush administration rather than the ?08 elections. Most replied with the thinking that electing a Democratic president will cure the Constitutional violations. Elections have become a panacea. Thinking that winning an election is the cure for the ills of the Bush administration misses the core of the problem. The crisis created by the administration is bigger than just the man in office. The administration has placed the office of the presidency in conflict with our system of three separate branches of government.
Expecting the next president to cure the problem is asking the patient to cure himself. When the disease is too much unchecked power, what incentive is there for a president to operate and cut out his or her own power tumor? A power tumor in the presidency is not a threat to the office of the president, but a threat to the other branches of government. The malignancy is on our system of checks and balances, which is essential to our system of self-government.
Recent comments by a reporter on The Diane Rehm Show News Roundup brought to my attention that this sentiment of a Democratic president cure-all is extremely dangerous. John Harwood, a reporter for the WSJ, commenting on Hilary Clinton?s statement in a recent debate that we are safer since 9-11, argued that because ?we have not been hit since 9-11,? and ?. . . steps have been taken to make homeland security in a stronger position than it has before [sic],? then ?Hilary Clinton looks more like a truth teller. . . .?
If we are to accept, without question, statements like Hilary Clinton?s, and if the press is going to sanctify them instead of scrutinize them, then we are at great risk of passing on to our next president the power to disregard his or her Constitutional limits.
Hilary Clinton?s statement is a strong indication that she finds no faults with the Bush administration?s abuse of power. After all, his abuses have resulted in making us safer. Right? Take the Are We Safer Test at the end of this diary, and decide for yourself.
I went to see John Edwards last night at a $15 fund raiser, to see if he is demanding that the Bush administration be held accountable. The closest he came was to call for Congress to stand their ground and end the war in Iraq. As for humane treatment of prisoners and indefinite detentions, he declared that the first thing he would do as president is close Guantanamo. That was it. No demand that the Legislative Branch stop the administration?s abuse of power. Not even a mention that there has been an abuse of power.
The Edwards speech was full of progressive ideas for how the United States could better the lives of the world?s people. His ideas are innovative and show a worldview that is cooperative rather than jingoistic. Surely he will not violate the Constitutional limits on the office of the presidency or violate his oath of office if he gets elected, because he?s just not that kind of guy. Right?
The framers of the Constitution were not so trusting of their fellow man, when it came to governing. They were well aware of human weakness and the dangers of unchecked power. They knew from firsthand experience that reliance on the benevolence of a king was no protection against tyranny. Their solution was a system that spread governmental power among three separate branches, with each branch having exclusive powers to check the actions of the other two branches.
We have to keep reminding ourselves that this system involving the separation of powers is in fact an ongoing experiment in self-government. Brilliantly conceived, it has served us extraordinarily well through crisis after crisis for over a few more than two hundred years. But like everything else that is man-made, it is not perfect. The system can only work properly as long as those in power constantly work to preserve the constitutionally established limits on the power of each branch. In the case of the executive branch, when the limits are disregarded or left unchecked, the system?s protection against tyranny is breached.
We are so accustomed to our system of three branches of government, which was developed with the express purpose of avoiding absolute rule by one person that the idea of tyranny rarely arises in our politics. Indeed, we think the idea of tyranny is antiquated and obsolete; antithetical to our enlightened form of government. The reality is that our system of government was adopted for the very purpose of protecting against tyranny. To believe that ?it can?t happen here? is to ignore the very basis for the three branches and the separation of powers.
There is a crisis in the executive branch. The Bush administration has breached our protections against tyranny by taking for itself enormous amounts of governmental power through intentional violations of constitutional and statutory law. This breach has to be stopped and the executive branch must be brought back within its Constitutional limits before the next president takes office. To do otherwise creates a precedent for an imbalance between the branches that will inevitably lead to tyranny.
Take action now. Attend this Grassroots Town Hall Forum on the topic of Presidential Accountability: Should Impeachment be on the Table? Saturday, June 23rd 1-4 PM at the George Mason University (Fairfax Campus), Mason Hall Conference Center.
Come and discuss pros & cons with special guests. The distinguished panel of speakers includes: Lawrence Wilkerson, former Chief of Staff for Secretary of State Colin Powell; Bruce Fine, Constitutional lawyer, Associate Deputy Attorney General Reagan Administration; Markus Raskin, Co-Founder Institute for Policy Studies; Barbara Olshansky, Professor, Stanford Law School; Co-author The Case for Impeachment; and Moderator Ron Pinchback, General Manager WPFW (89.3FM) Pacifica Radio. Also attending: Mark Levine, Host ?Inside Scoop? radio-web-TV talk show, former Congressional staff attorney; Dennis Loo & Barbara Bowley, Co-editor/author, Impeach the President: the Case Against Bush & Cheney. Invitations have been extended to Hon. Jim Moran, VA 8th Cong. Dist. and Hon. Tom Davis, VA 11th Cong. Dist. Organizers: Virginians for Peace and Accountability . Free and open to the public.
Here is the Are We Safer Test:
1) Are we safer because our government puts persons in secret prisons or in Guantanamo but is not required to disclose who is in prison and the reason they are there?
2) Are we safer because no one has been held accountable for failures of 9-11, yet some of our 16 intelligence agencies knew who the hijackers were before they attacked?
3) Are we safer because the President and his closest advisers manipulated intelligence for the purpose of deceiving American citizens and Congress that a preemptive war was justified?
4) Are we safer because the United States engaged in a war of aggression against a sovereign nation?
5) Are we safer because the President intentionally disregarded the terms of the Geneva Conventions requiring humane treatment of prisoners?
6) Are we safer because the President conducts surveillance at his order in direct violation of law, instead of by warrant of an independent judiciary?
7) Are we safer because the President and his closest advisers failed to properly plan and prepare for committing the United States to an invasion of a sovereign nation, with the result that it has effectively depleted our military strength and our treasury?
8) Are we safer because the President and his closest advisers failed to properly plan and prepare for committing the United States to an invasion of the nation of Iraq, and thereby failing to maintain civil order resulting in devastating destruction of the civil society of Iraq with resulting violent deaths of the Iraqi people numbering in estimates as high as over 600,000, all in disregard of the terms of the Geneva Conventions?
9) Are we safer because the President and his closest advisers decided to leave Bin Laden free to post threats against the United States whenever the President decides he needs to stoke the flames of perpetual fear?
10) Are we safer because the President hires and fires United States Prosecutors based upon how willing they are to selectively enforce the law against his political rivals?