Bush Signing Statements Will Retire With Their Author

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.propublica.org/article/bush-signing-statemen...

Jan. 8:

President Bush has vetoed fewer bills than any president since Warren G. Harding, but not because his views always jibe with Congress. He prefers a suppler, quieter tool that can't be overturned by congressional majorities: the signing statement.

Bush has used these statements -- historically deployed for commemorating special occasions or voicing a president's reservations -- to approve a law but sidestep specific provisions, like statutes banning torture, requiring appointees to have relevant experience and providing whistleblower protections.

Critics say the statements, which went mostly unnoticed until the middle of Bush's second term, usurp Congress' constitutional right to make laws and violate the separation of powers. But hope is just around the corner for the signing statement opponents.

"They will mean nothing" once Bush leaves office, said Stephen Saltzburg, a law professor at George Washington University and member of an American Bar Association task force that studied, and ultimately condemned (PDF), the practice of using signing statements to reject statutes. Presidents should veto laws they believe are unconstitutional, the task force said.

[Orrex]

1. They shouldn't have been allowed to mean anything while Bush was in office, either (nt)

[ThomWV]

3. Bush is not the only one to use them (not by a long shot) and they do have value

They are a way, one of several ways, in which the President can give direction and guidance to his Cabinet Members for the application of law for which (in a perfect world) he will ultimately be held accountable. Where Bush abused their use was in signing statements that acted to counter the law they were supposed to assist in the application of. In short he did not use Signing Statements, he abused them.

[yourout]

2. I wish the other damage he has done was as easy to undo....

Roberts and Alito will be the sores that wont heal for decades to come.