According to an AP article, President Bush, "moving toward a constitutional showdown with Congress, asserted executive privilege Thursday and rejected lawmakers' demands for documents that could shed light on the firings of federal prosecutors."
I just wanted to say thank you to Georgie and his wife Laurie who hail from some town called Crawford in a state where I have never been for telling my representatives that he and his friends in the White House do not have to answer to members of Congress or to the people they represent. I am so grateful that he can make decisions without consulting Congress and then when Congress exercises its oversight authority he simply refuses to respond to their legally binding subpoenas based on some bogus claim of executive privelige. The reason I state that his claim is bogus is that the original intent of executive privelige was to allow the President the ability to refuse to produce documents that would result in harm to the American people. The documents requested by Congress do not fit this definition. The right of the American people to know what their government is doing trumps the right of the Bush administration to protect itself or the President from public scrutiny. The claim, made by White House counsel Fred Fielding, that "for the President to perform his constitutional duties, it is imperative that he receive candid and unfettered advice and that free and open discussions and deliberations occur among his advisors and between those advisors and others within and outside the Executive Branch" is simply ludicrous. This claim contradicts the fundamental right of the people to conduct the affairs of our government. Without knowledge, our representatives, cannot act in our behalf. Being required to produce documents to our representatives does not in any way inhibit honest, upright, moral people from having honest, upright and moral deliberations nor does it prevent the President from receiving candid and unfettered advice. They can talk all they want, discuss whatever and have nothing to fear from public scruitiny if they didn't do anything wrong.
It is clear to me that the Bush administration thinks it is above the law and does not have to respond to the legally binding subpoenas of Congress because in his words it's "my government" instead of ours. Congress not only can but must assert its right to look at these documents in behalf of those whom they represent. The Courts have ruled that Congress has this power of subpoena and can hold those who refuse to adhere to Congressional subpoenas in contempt of Congress. Refusing a subpoena is grounds for contempt of Congres, and if Bush continues to conduct himself in this manner he could be impeached and or prosecuted for his actions. Normally, Congress understands that the President would like to exercise some discretion in what he reveals to Congress but they do and can exercise their constitutional and statutory authority to subpoena documents from the Executive Branch and refusal to honor those subpoenas is considered "contempt of Congress" under the law and it is a crime. There is solution short of prosecuting George Bush for contempt of Congress and that is for the President to stop thinking of himself as above the law and turn over the documents to our representatives and if he didn't do anything wrong and neither did anyone else in his administration than he has nothing to fear and everyone will be happy but I suspect Bush is using "executive privelige" which was intended to protect the American people to protect himself and those around him from the public eye.
I just wanted to say thank you to Georgie and his wife Laurie who hail from some town called Crawford in a state where I have never been for telling my representatives that he and his friends in the White House do not have to answer to members of Congress or to the people they represent. I am so grateful that he can make decisions without consulting Congress and then when Congress exercises its oversight authority he simply refuses to respond to their legally binding subpoenas based on some bogus claim of executive privelige. The reason I state that his claim is bogus is that the original intent of executive privelige was to allow the President the ability to refuse to produce documents that would result in harm to the American people. The documents requested by Congress do not fit this definition. The right of the American people to know what their government is doing trumps the right of the Bush administration to protect itself or the President from public scrutiny. The claim, made by White House counsel Fred Fielding, that "for the President to perform his constitutional duties, it is imperative that he receive candid and unfettered advice and that free and open discussions and deliberations occur among his advisors and between those advisors and others within and outside the Executive Branch" is simply ludicrous. This claim contradicts the fundamental right of the people to conduct the affairs of our government. Without knowledge, our representatives, cannot act in our behalf. Being required to produce documents to our representatives does not in any way inhibit honest, upright, moral people from having honest, upright and moral deliberations nor does it prevent the President from receiving candid and unfettered advice. They can talk all they want, discuss whatever and have nothing to fear from public scruitiny if they didn't do anything wrong.
It is clear to me that the Bush administration thinks it is above the law and does not have to respond to the legally binding subpoenas of Congress because in his words it's "my government" instead of ours. Congress not only can but must assert its right to look at these documents in behalf of those whom they represent. The Courts have ruled that Congress has this power of subpoena and can hold those who refuse to adhere to Congressional subpoenas in contempt of Congress. Refusing a subpoena is grounds for contempt of Congres, and if Bush continues to conduct himself in this manner he could be impeached and or prosecuted for his actions. Normally, Congress understands that the President would like to exercise some discretion in what he reveals to Congress but they do and can exercise their constitutional and statutory authority to subpoena documents from the Executive Branch and refusal to honor those subpoenas is considered "contempt of Congress" under the law and it is a crime. There is solution short of prosecuting George Bush for contempt of Congress and that is for the President to stop thinking of himself as above the law and turn over the documents to our representatives and if he didn't do anything wrong and neither did anyone else in his administration than he has nothing to fear and everyone will be happy but I suspect Bush is using "executive privelige" which was intended to protect the American people to protect himself and those around him from the public eye.
But, if George Bush was in fact King and there was no other way to get access to those documents I would start kissing his ass to get access to those documents and to read them because that is my fundamental right. One that isn't granted or bestowed by the Constitution, or by any law but by God himself. It is a right that is inherent to each of us which was violated when the Constitution was drafted and ratified but when it comes down to it there isn't a single person who would not do what is necessary and use whatever resources they can even in any form of government to achieve the goal of protecting their rights. This is what I am doing when I vote to deprive you of representation in the hope that I may get the person I want elected and therefore to succeed at having at least some control over the affairs of my government, but lacking that I must do what I must to protect my rights. So, if that means kissing Leahy's ass then I will do so.
while singing, "the Bushites have elected their friend Georgie President and he doesn't have to release any documents since he has executive privelige or in other words us good little bitches don't have the right to know what is going on in their government or better yet in Georgie's own words his government."
