Monday, February 19, 2007
Making Martial Law Easier
A disturbing recent phenomenon in Washington is that laws that strike to the heart of American democracy have been passed in the dead of night. So it was with a provision quietly tucked into the enormous defense budget bill at the Bush administration’s behest that makes it easier for a president to override local control of law enforcement and declare martial law.
The provision, signed into law in October, weakens two obscure but important bulwarks of liberty. One is the doctrine that bars military forces, including a federalized National Guard, from engaging in law enforcement. Called posse comitatus, it was enshrined in law after the Civil War to preserve the line between civil government and the military. The other is the Insurrection Act of 1807, which provides the major exemptions to posse comitatus. It essentially limits a president’s use of the military in law enforcement to putting down lawlessness, insurrection and rebellion, where a state is violating federal law or depriving people of constitutional rights.
The newly enacted provisions upset this careful balance. They shift the focus from making sure that federal laws are enforced to restoring public order. Beyond cases of actual insurrection, the president may now use military troops as a domestic police force in response to a natural disaster, a disease outbreak, terrorist attack or to any “other condition.”
Changes of this magnitude should be made only after a thorough public airing. But these new presidential powers were slipped into the law without hearings or public debate. The president made no mention of the changes when he signed the measure, and neither the White House nor Congress consulted in advance with the nation’s governors.
There is a bipartisan bill, introduced by Senators Patrick Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, and Christopher Bond, Republican of Missouri, and backed unanimously by the nation’s governors, that would repeal the stealthy revisions. Congress should pass it. If changes of this kind are proposed in the future, they must get a full and open debate.
Labels: Bush Administration, Conservatives, dictator, impeach
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Call Him Caesar
For reasons that elude me, Republicans have stood idly by for years while George Bush and Dick Cheney pull out every pseudo-legal stop to evade the will of the people, while slowly transforming a once vibrant political party into what may soon become a fractured, regional joke for a generation. Here's the latest (H/T RS):
NYT -- In an executive order published last week in the Federal Register, Mr. Bush said that each agency must have a regulatory policy office run by a political appointee, to supervise the development of rules and documents providing guidance to regulated industries. The White House will thus have a gatekeeper in each agency to analyze the costs and the benefits of new rules and to make sure the agencies carry out the president’s priorities. This strengthens the hand of the White House in shaping rules that have, in the past, often been generated by civil servants and scientific experts.
Heads up to the legislative and legal branch, that includes Democrats, but most especially Republicans: For the good of the nation and your political skin, you need to think about how you're going to shut these neoclowns down, or look for a new line of work. They've proven themselves utterly inept at everything they touch. They have a well established track record of leaving ruined lives, dead or maimed bodies, and terminal political careers, in their wake. You or your constituents could well find yourselves in any of those three categories if this shit is allowed to continue. Pissed off people make unreliable voters. Capiche?
Labels: dictator, George W Bush
