Saturday, July 21, 2007

Emperor Bush???

Chris Weigant: pontificates on Huffington Post that the White House Declareed Bush Emperor because Bush administration officials unveiled a bold new assertion of executive authority yesterday in the dispute over the firing of nine U.S. attorneys, saying that the Justice Department will never be allowed to pursue contempt charges initiated by Congress against White House officials once the president has invoked executive privilege.

The Constitution set up three co-equal branches of Government. The Legislative Branch, which is to pass laws, the Executive branch which administers the laws (including the Justice Department), and the Judicial Branch, which decides what the laws mean. If Congress does not believe that a presidential Executive Order is right, they should appeal to the Judicial Branch for a ruling. They should not be able to order Justice Branch lawyers to take the head of the Executive Branch to court in a political move to try to usurp Executive Branch authority.

Because the Democrats control Congress, and the Republicans control the White House, Chris wants the Legislative Branch to show that it can override whatever the White House does. I wonder whether if the situation was reversed, and if there was a Democrat in the White House, and if the Republicans controlled the Legislative branch, if he would be as eager to see the Legislative Branch try to rule the entire government.

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