John W Dean: The Problem with Presidential Signing Statements:

[rumpel]

Their Use and Misuse by the Bush Administration
By JOHN W. DEAN

Friday, Jan. 13, 2006

Presidential signing statements are old news to anyone who has served in the White House counsel's office. Presidents have long used them to add their two cents when a law passed by Congress has provisions they do not like, yet they are not inclined to veto it. Nixon's statements, for example, often related to spending authorization laws which he felt were excessive and contrary to his fiscal policies.

In this column, I'll take a close look at President Bush's use of signing statements. I find these signing statements are to Bush and Cheney's presidency what steroids were to Arnold Schwarzenegger's body building. Like Schwarzenegger with his steroids, Bush does not deny using his signing statements; does not like talking about using them; and believes that they add muscle.

But like steroids, signing statements ultimately lead to serious trouble.

Relying On Command, Rather Than Persuasion

Phillip Cooper is a leading expert on signing statements. His 2002 book, By Order of the President: The Use and Abuse of Executive Direct Action, assesses the uses and abuses of signing statements by presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Cooper has updated his material in a recent essay for the Presidential Studies Quarterly, to encompass the use of signing statements by now-President Bush as well.

By Cooper's count, George W. Bush issued 23 signing statements in 2001; 34 statements in 2002, raising 168 constitutional objections; 27 statements in 2003, raising 142 constitutional challenges, and 23 statements in 2004, raising 175 constitutional criticisms. In total, during his first term Bush raised a remarkable 505 constitutional challenges to various provisions of legislation that became law.

http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20060113.html

[fooj]

1. Did anyone ask Scalito about his part in all of this during the hearing

I understand he was the "architect" of it.

Peace.

[rumpel]

2. Yes, briefly yesterday. Was it Feingold?

[fooj]

3. Thanks...I missed it.

Peace.