Bush just gave himself the line-item-veto.

Just saw on the news (it was CNN or MSNBC) that Smirky McChimp issued an exec. order that no agency would implement anything that Congress funds that he considers an earmark. This is amazingly unconstitutional (what else is new?) Since it's the Congress that designates where to allocate money NOT the President.
Will Congress do anything about this new egregious power grab, probably not.

Busholini can still do a lot of damage to Amerika until he is forced out of office.

I dont know, I know hes an ass but lets assume the shoe is on the other foot and a GOP controlled congress tries to pack gifts for the fat cats into earmarks and President Obama as the person charged with running the agencies receiving the money decides that it better should serve the people..

No doubt that shurbs motives are not good but is the action itself of telling agencies how to use the funding allocated unconstitutional?

That being said I am no fan of the line item veto..

:grr:

..:eyes:

expect a strongly-worded letter to be issued very soon now.

The report has been delayed due to objections by minority members, but the full committee is expected to vote to urge the release of the report soon.

with a major, and I mean major leafleting campaign.

Our governance. We need a Super Hero.

this is just starting

Congress could impeach Bush in five minutes. Of course building a good case would take longer.

I'm for it. All Bush's crimes will be broadcast in the hearings. And then they will be broadcast again during the trial in the senate. Where the details and the evidence will be presented to a huge audience. And then, worst case, the people will get to watch pusillanimous Republican senators vote against the clear evidence and cast a purely political vote. Great for ads against them!

I say impeach -- what the hell else do they have to do?

--IMM

it will only effect the NEW PREZ and the NEW CONGRESS! As CNN said, he's kicking the can down the road!

..spent UNDOING the stupid and illegal shit the current moran has been doing...

overturn EVERY ex. order that Shrub issued? Just make his impact go away in one fell swoop!

:rofl:

I wish that it were so...

...could abuse an executive order just one more time in order to effect a blanket nullification, and include a clause ordering that no further abuse so egregious should ever be committed using such a vehicle. It would have to be clear on what constitutes an abuse, and it would basically only be a gesture since the precedent has basically been set.

What's funny is I don't trust any of the frontrunning candidates on either side to take office and then stand up to denounce/undo Bush's outrageous expansion of the executive's power. He has opened up the door to a whole new level of power hunger which will probably never close, and anyone who has a prayer at becoming president is simply salivating in anticipation of continuing the misuse of those ill-gained powers.

They are supposed to be used in a time of crisis when action has to happen too fast for congress to act... Katrina would have been a good time *sigh*...

But EXE orders (and I don't care who issues them) should not sit up there acting for all time. Its always the act of power grabbing president and a chickensh*t pass the buck congress..

office.

but congress has the *duty* to do it...

His Executive order applies only to earmarks not explicitly enacted into law by legislation. He can't touch the earmarks in the recently approved spending bill, for example. He also said that he would veto future bills that didn't cut the cost of earmarks in half.

More explanation here: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hPMZ7iSZa-gDStAOeC6GisjqYKkQD8UF8Q580

Get with the program. We are in a new century now!

:eyes:

But I was always under the impression a Line-Item-Veto was unconstitutional, but, this isn't the first time Bush has done this.

Its a direction to executive branch agencies not to follow instructions not written in the statute but contained only in the committee report or not even in the report, just in a letter or phone call from a member of congress or staffer telling them that money appropriated to the agency without strings in the statute has to be spent in a particular way.

I have little problem with this. If Congress wants money to go for a bridge to nowhere, it should be in the legislation that they pass, not in a committee report.

I could be wrong. There are no depths this criminal administration have not sunk to. Yet.

anything. Considering that Bush is Public Enemy No. 1 right now in the public's mind, and that impeachment hearings would provide a place for worlds of anger to concentrate, possibly blowing a hole in the very fabric of the universe, I'm glad that impeachment is still "off the table."

I don't know what it is but no matter how outrageous his conduct they just look the other way, and pretend it didn't happen.
If Obama is seriously the one to change things then it will be interesting to see how long it lasts until they get to him too.

unconstitutional.

As far as has been disclosed, the order only applies to non-statutory earmarks -- efforts by members of congress to direct specific spending without putting into law. Most often such 'soft' earmarks are contained in an "explanatory" statement that accompanies the law -- sort of Congress' version of a signing statement, if you will. While legislative history is a valid tool for interpreting ambiguous language in a statute, its only an interpretative tool, its not binding law. Put another way, if Ted Stevens puts an instruction into an explanatory statment that $XX of an agency's budget is to be used to build a bridge to nowhere, and the agency doesn't build the bridge to nowhere, do you think someone could successfully sue the agency to spend the money based on the explanatory statement?

Again, if chimpy tried to instruct an agency not to comply with a statutory earmark, that would be unconstitutional. But why we would defend soft earmarks is something I can't quite understand, unless suddenly we're in favor of bridges to nowhere being hidden in explanatory statemetns.

:puke:

in about 10 months...

Sorry. Its not that I want to defend the bozo, but raging against what he's done isn't politically astute, particularly since it is completely legal. WHile I haven't seen the text of the actual exectutive order, the 'official' description of it indicates that it only directs federal agencies not to honor non-statutory "earmarks" found in a Committee report or otherwise communicated to the agency (e.g., phone-marking) by Members of Congress or persons acting on their behalf. If the earmark is in the statute, the exec order doesn't apply. And no line item veto is involved.

And in terms of politics, arguing in favor of the earmarking process that brought us such things as the bridge to nowhere isn't too smart either.

you have something substantive to say, put it on the table.

Otherwise, you're just a windbag.

Per Capitol Hill Blue... and you know what? To all who believe CHP to be full of crap ACTIONS indicate they were right.