Power Surge: The Constitutional Record of G W. Bush (Cato Inst tosses *Co

[UpInArms]

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=6330

In recent judicial confirmation battles, President Bush has repeatedly—and correctly—stressed fidelity to the Constitution as the key qualification for service as a judge. It is also the key qualification for service as the nation's chief executive. On January 20, 2005, for the second time, Mr. Bush took the presidential oath of office set out in the Constitution, swearing to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." With five years of the Bush administration behind us, we have more than enough evidence to make an assessment about the president's commitment to our fundamental legal charter

Unfortunately, far from defending the Constitution, President Bush has repeatedly sought to strip out the limits the document places on federal power. In its official legal briefs and public actions, the Bush administration has advanced a view of federal power that is astonishingly broad, a view that includes

a federal government empowered to regulate core political speech—and restrict it greatly when it counts the most: in the days before a federal election;

a president who cannot be restrained, through validly enacted statutes, from pursuing any tactic he believes to be effective in the war on terror;

a president who has the inherent constitutional authority to designate American citizens suspected of terrorist activity as "enemy combatants," strip them of any constitutional protection, and lock them up without charges for the duration of the war on terror— in other words, perhaps forever; and

a federal government with the power to supervise virtually every aspect of American life, from kindergarten, to marriage, to the grave.

President Bush's constitutional vision is, in short, sharply at odds with the text, history, and structure of our Constitution, which authorizes a government of limited powers.

Full text at http://www.cato.org/pubs/wtpapers/powersurge_healy_lynch.pdf

(here are the "credentials" of the authors of this Cato Institute white paper:

Gene Healy is senior editor and author of "Arrogance of Power Reborn: The Imperial Presidency and Foreign Policy in the Clinton Years". Timothy Lynch is director of the Project on Criminal Justice and author of "Dereliction of Duty: The Constitutional Record of President Clinton."

[electropop]

1. CATO??? Holy crap, Bush is toast.

He's gone by August. According to the latest polls, he's right on track with Nixon to be out by then.

[UpInArms]

2. the full text of this white paper is fascinating

here's some on free speech and those zones that anti-*Co protestors are herded into:

“Free-Speech Zones”
The Bush administration has also allowed
restrictions on the rights of Americans to criticize
the government on the streets of our cities
and towns. In case after case, when President
Bush makes a public appearance, nonviolent
protesters have been harassed by law enforcement—
either Secret Service agents or local
police operating at their request—and forced
out of the president’s line of sight, to a designated
protest area known as the “free-speech
zone.” The free-speech zones are often behind
fences or obstructions such as “Greyhoundsized
buses” and far out of sight of the media
covering the affair.22 In one case, the 2004 G-8
summit on Sea Island, Georgia, protesters were
kept 10 miles away.23 If protesters fail to comply
with the order to move, they are subject to
arrest and prosecution.

“What the Secret Service does,” according to
Paul Wolf, an Allegheny County, Pennsylvania,
police supervisor involved in planning a presidential
visit to Pittsburgh in 2002, “is they come
in and do a site survey, and say, here’s a place
where the people can be, and we’d like to have
any protesters be put in a place that is able to be
secured.”24 During that presidential visit,
retired steelworker Bill Neel was arrested and
charged with disorderly conduct for refusing an
order to move. In an open public area, amidst a
crowd of Bush supporters, Neel unfurled a
homemade sign reading “The Bush family
must surely love the poor, they made so many
of us.” When he refused to move to a freespeech
zone in a fenced-in baseball field a third
of a mile away, he was handcuffed and arrested
by local police acting at the behest of the Secret
Service. The arresting officer testified that he
was instructed by the Secret Service to corral
“people that were there making a statement
pretty much against the president and his
views.”25 In St. Charles, Missouri, on November
4, 2002, activist Bill Ramsey was arrested by
local police when he tried to unfurl an anti-
Bush sign and refused to leave a crowd of Bush
supporters while Bush was visiting a local airport.
The police “said they’d been ordered to
by the Secret Service.” In January
2003, on a public street, St. Louis police arrested
IT worker Andrew Wimmer for refusing to
move his “Instead of war, invest in people” sign
to a free-speech zone three blocks away from
the presidential motorcade route. A woman
with a sign reading “Mr. President, we love you”
was allowed to remain. According to Wimmer,
the police told him that “the Secret Service
wanted protesters in the protest area.”26

Such actions against protestors violate settled
constitutional principles governing free
speech and public protest. As the Supreme
Court explained in United States v. Grace (1983),
a case involving two plaintiffs threatened with
arrest for leafleting and picketing on the sidewalk
in front of the Supreme Court building,
“‘

ublic places’ historically associated with
the free exercise of expressive activities, such as
streets, sidewalks, and parks, are considered . . .
to be ‘public forums.’ In such places, the government’s
ability to permissibly restrict expressive
conduct is very limited.” Any restrictions
on the time, place, or manner of the speech
must be “content-neutral narrowly tailored
to serve a significant government interest,
and leave open ample alternative channels
of communication.”27

there is much more damning of this illegitimate squatter to be read in this paper - it is well worth the full read.

:hi:

[electropop]

3. Dang. I'm amazed to see those clowns writing such smart stuff.

He is so screwed. I won't be around much today, but will read the Cato paper tomorrow. Great catch!

[UpInArms]

4. I've downloaded and saved the pdf for a full read -

I must admit, it is really hardhitting and very unflattering.

I hope that this gets a huge audience and that the congress starts to pay attention.

Impeachment must be done soon to save our country.

[Frustratedlady]

5. Popcorn doesn't appeal to me in the summertime,

but I'll make an exception, sit back and eat a bushel of it for this event.

Keep * on track, whatever you do.

CATO, huh? Whoa!