Sun-Times: "Bush is Signing Away Our Checks and Balances"

The Sun-Times is hardly a defty lefty (home to Bob Novak and others) yet its got one heluva strong and accurate oped, "Bush is Signing Away Our Checks and Balances" that I encourage you to check out. What Bush has already done and wants to do far more of in the future is the exact thing our forefathers warned us against if we concentrated power too greatly in a precious few.

From the piece:

The Constitution gives a president two choices in considering a bill passed by Congress: Sign or veto it, and tell Congress why. But starting with James Monroe, presidents have issued statements about their opinions of some bills, indicating they would not enforce some provisions. This was infrequent until Ronald Reagan, when signing statements became a way to influence the way legislation was interpreted by the courts. The statements became a political tool.

Still, no previous president holds President Bush's record when it comes to presidential signing statements. He's issued 807 vs. the 600 by all of the other presidents. He has made an art of cherry-picking parts of bills he doesn't like and regally declaring after he signs the bills that he has the authority not to carry out certain parts of them.

"He is usurping the power of Congress," declares Neal Sonnett, chairman of an American Bar Association task force that examined the issue of presidential signing statements and recently released a report about them that will be discussed at the ABA meeting in early August. Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, agrees. He is presenting a bill to "authorize the Congress to undertake judicial review of those signing statements with the view to having the president's acts declared unconstitutional."

...ABA task force member Bruce Fein, who helped Specter draft the bill, says Bush is making "Swiss cheese out of our laws." The framers of the Constitution created checks and balances within government exactly to prevent this royal approach. If Bush disagrees with bills he should veto them. Plain and simple.