THIS is why the war won't end

this is why we can't let up for one minute on our efforts to get the bush administration out of the white house... unfortunately, i think there are very few people in positions of power, and certainly not in the public at large, who fully comprehend the degree of danger we are in from our own government... bushco has repeatedly shown complete disdain for the two other supposedly equal branches of government, and, now, even with a democratic congress, i see nothing changing...

In signing statements and legal memos, the administration, with Cheney and Addington as its driving force, has repeatedly used the war on terrorism to advance the idea that the president has vast "inherent" authority to bypass laws enacted by Congress. Even when Congress voted, a week after the 9/11 attacks, to authorize the use of military force against Al Qaeda, the administration quickly seized the moment to lay down its marker.

"[Congress cannot] place any limits on the president's determinations as to any terrorist threat, the amount of military force to be used in response, or the method, timing, and nature of the response," the Justice Department asserted in a September 2001 memo solicited by the White House. "These decisions, under our Constitution, are for the president alone to make."

The following year, the administration drew up secret legal opinions informing military and CIA interrogators that the president has the power to authorize them to violate laws banning torture.

"In order to respect the president's inherent constitutional authority to manage a military campaign against Al Qaeda and its allies, [the anti-torture law] must be construed as not applying to interrogations undertaken pursuant to his commander-in-chief authority," said an August 2002 memo, which was leaked to the media only after the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib came to light.

Then, in December 2005, The New York Times revealed that the administration was wiretapping Americans' international phone calls and e-mails without warrants, violating the 1978 surveillance law.

Three days later, Cheney sat down with reporters and laid out his belief "in a strong, robust executive authority." Bypassing the warrant law, he asserted, was "consistent with the constitutional authority of the president."

the dems can initiate all the investigations they want, they can issue all the subpoenas they want, they can ask for all the documents they want, they can scream, holler, and yell, but it isn't going to make any difference... as long as we continue in a state of endless war, as long as the aumf stands, as long as bush can claim the authority of a wartime commander-in-chief, as long as the unitary executive theory remains unchallenged, we will continue to see the bush administration moving ever more inexorably toward a totalitarian state...

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