Signing Statements
It is amazing to me that the American public has shown so little outrage at many of the things that have happened to our country over the past 6 years. I suppose some of it has been due to the constant rhetoric on many 'news' stations and talk radio speaking of 'war on terror', 'post 9/11 world', 'terrorists want to kill us', and other such sound bites. These stations, people, and efforts have covered up many of the acts that are destroying our rights, our historic position in the world, parts of our way of life, and altering the constitution.
What has happened to our media? Why are they not leading the masses in rising to oppose these outrageous instances. It has become increasingly biased, promotional, and definitely not liberal. There is very little real investigative journalism as most news organizations are more interested in providing entertainment than real news or hard facts. Most use the same news feeds to get their information, and are most often not sending their own people to get the story first hand.
Signing statements are one area that must be looked at closely. During the terms of the first 42 presidents only about 600 signing statements employed. Ronald Reagan used 95, George H.W. Bush around 121, and Bill Clinton around 220. George W. Bush has so far utilized this method to get around the laws he signed over 1100 times. That is almost twice as many as all previous presidents combined. (He has also borrowed more money from foreign countries - with the majority from China and India - than all previous presidents combined. But that is another story.)
Presidents during the 1980's and 1990's used a line item veto, which allowed them to strike through part of a law and veto only that section, while signing the rest into law. The Supreme Court struck this down as unconstitutional.
Signing statements are written statements the president or his staff writes and attaches to the law which says that he will follow or enforce one part of the law and ignore another. This appears to do the exact thing that the unconstitutionally declared line item veto did.
There should be outrage over this abuse. Perhaps the reason for a lack of it is that these statements have been kept under wraps for the most part and the American public have not known they were being used. The public saw the laws passed, heard they were signed, but did not hear about the signing statement. We need demand our congressmen find a way to stop this activity. These statements have the effect of changing the executive into the legislative. Congress must protect their powers that were bestowed by our constitution.
What has happened to our media? Why are they not leading the masses in rising to oppose these outrageous instances. It has become increasingly biased, promotional, and definitely not liberal. There is very little real investigative journalism as most news organizations are more interested in providing entertainment than real news or hard facts. Most use the same news feeds to get their information, and are most often not sending their own people to get the story first hand.
Signing statements are one area that must be looked at closely. During the terms of the first 42 presidents only about 600 signing statements employed. Ronald Reagan used 95, George H.W. Bush around 121, and Bill Clinton around 220. George W. Bush has so far utilized this method to get around the laws he signed over 1100 times. That is almost twice as many as all previous presidents combined. (He has also borrowed more money from foreign countries - with the majority from China and India - than all previous presidents combined. But that is another story.)
Presidents during the 1980's and 1990's used a line item veto, which allowed them to strike through part of a law and veto only that section, while signing the rest into law. The Supreme Court struck this down as unconstitutional.
Signing statements are written statements the president or his staff writes and attaches to the law which says that he will follow or enforce one part of the law and ignore another. This appears to do the exact thing that the unconstitutionally declared line item veto did.
There should be outrage over this abuse. Perhaps the reason for a lack of it is that these statements have been kept under wraps for the most part and the American public have not known they were being used. The public saw the laws passed, heard they were signed, but did not hear about the signing statement. We need demand our congressmen find a way to stop this activity. These statements have the effect of changing the executive into the legislative. Congress must protect their powers that were bestowed by our constitution.
posted by NHThomas | 4:38 PM
|
1 comments
