Crime of the Century: Time for Congress to Act

[seafan]

Crime of the Century: Time for Congress to Act

by Dave Lindorff
February 1, 2008

Who's minding the store in Washington?

While President George W. Bush was standing before the members of Congress on January 28 laying out his plans, such as they are, for the final year of his second term in the White House, he was also seriously and perhaps fatally undermining the authority of Congress with a new signing statement, attached to the latest National Defense Authorization Act, in which he declared that he would simply violate or fail to comply with four provisions.

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* the establishment of a commission to investigate contractor fraud in Afghanistan and Iraq
* the protection or whistleblowers who report contractor fraud from harassment or official retribution
* a requirement that US intelligence agencies respond to Congressional requests for documents
* a ban on funding for any permanent military bases in Iraq, and on any actions that would seek to give the US control over Iraq's oil resources or oil money.


Now first of all, let's see what the Constitution has to say.

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(Article I) goes on to state that:

"Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it becomes a Law, be presented to the President of the United States; If he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his Objections, to that House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the Objections at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If after such Reconsideration by two thirds of that House shall agree to apss the Bill, it shall be sent, together with the Objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a Law...If any Bill shall not be returned by the President within ten Days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the Same shall be a Law, in like Manner as if he had signed it."

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It goes on to explicitly define and limit the president's powers, specifically to being "commander in chief" of the armed forces (not of the country or of the government!), to the granting of reprieves and pardons (except in the case of impeachments), to making treaties (subject to Senate approval) and appointing officers to the cabinet and the courts (all subject to Senate approval).

That is it. There are no other presidential powers in the Constitution. Certainly there is no power granted to disobey or ignore Acts of Congress or to violate the law.

And yet here we have the president, at the start of his last year in office, announcing that he will not obey a law duly passed by the Congress that requires his administration to establish a commission to investigate the rampant corruption among private contractors operating in Afghanistan and Iraq, that he will not obey a law barring him from punishing whistleblowers who disclose such corruption, that he will not obey an order that his intelligence services must respond to requests from Congress for information (about such issues as torture of captives, or spying on American citizens, or destroying documents), and that he will not obey an order banning the establishment and construction of permanent military bases in Iraq, and banning attempts to gain US control over Iraqi oil.

Logically one would expect members of Congress in both parties to be up in arms over this illegal and clearly unconstitutional defiance--the more so because both houses of Congress are in the hands of the Democratic Party.

But we have heard not a peep from the "people's representatives" at this brazen abuse of power.

The reason: Congress is afraid of impeachment.

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