A Belated Sense of Duty

It's ironic that it takes this sort of provocation to issue a "Contempt of Congress" citation. That contempt has been made manifest with every stonewall, every executive order, every dismissive remark by our Misleader.

Perhaps it's come to the point that Congress realizes that so many of them HAVE been blackmailed and pressured (I speculate, of course) via illegal means that people will tend to overlook the smaller sins due to outrage at the greater.

It will be interesting to see what happens if the Supremes stonewall this. Perhaps impeachment for the last two appointments? Or perhaps Alitio will convert to Constitutionalism, after re-reading the Federalist papers and checking the wind.

The gravity of this issue is impossible to overestimate. Deliberately provoking a Constitutional crisis in the name of upholding the principle of the "Unitary Executive" with an undercurrent of "I have the guns and you don't" is a good way to provoke Civil War.

It will be interesting to see if Bush tries to have Congress intimidated with tanks and artillery. Interesting in the Chinese sense. And it will be interesting to see if Rumsfield and his successor have managed to "restrutcture" the military to the degree that it will willingly fire on American Citizens.

clipped from www.thenation.com

No one was all that surprised when the Bush administration announced Thursday that it would not cooperate with congressional demands for documents and testimony

The best way to enforce the rule of law is by issuing a Contempt of Congress citation

The issuance of a Contempt of Congress citation would provoke the sort of Constitutional showdown that it now appears will be required if this administration is to be held to account for its abuses of power. In such a showdown between the legislative and executive branches, the third branch of the federal government, the judiciary, would be asked to decide whether the White House has a right to assert, as White House counsel Fred Fielding did in a letter telling the committee chairs that their demands would not be met.

"Increasingly," says Leahy, "the president and vice president feel they are above the law -- in America no one is above law."

tag: Contempt of Congress. Unitary Executive, Separation of Powers, George Bush, Dick Cheney