America's problem is again a usurping king called George

[mr blur]

Bush's determination to impose his own reading of new laws amounts to a power grab and subverts the US constitution

Martin Kettle
Saturday June 17, 2006
The Guardian

Imagine a country with a different kind of monarch from the one we are used to. Forget the nation-binding human monarch whom Archbishop Rowan Williams praised so deftly this week. Imagine instead a monarch who, like many of Elizabeth II's ancestors, routinely reserved the right to override laws passed by the legislature, or who repeatedly asserted that the laws mean something they do not say. Imagine, in fact, King George of America.

<snip>

To their credit, even some Bush supporters are alarmed. If Bill Clinton had done what Bush is doing, the Republican senator Chuck Hagel has pointed out, Congress would be up in arms. If Bush were to bequeath the powers he claims to Hillary Clinton, the right would soon go berserk with indignation at the threat to American values. Which is why the most pertinent comment so far on the president's strategy has come from the anti-tax conservative Grover Norquist. He told Drew: "If you interpret the constitution's saying that the president is commander in chief to mean that the president can do anything he wants and can ignore the laws, you don't have a constitution: you have a king."

It is not anti-American to warn about what Bush is doing. On the contrary, it is profoundly pro-American. In 1776 Americans issued their declaration of independence. They demanded a new form of government in place of the "repeated injuries and usurpations" to which they had been subjected. In the long list of grievances that followed, the first was that King George had "refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good". That suddenly has a contemporary ring. Now, as then, America's problem is a usurping king called George.

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,1799692,00.html

[pretzel4gore]

1. Bush= the Death Rattle of America

shake it gopigs, shake your booty!
:hide:
:shrug:

[lindisfarne]

2. This is a duplicate thread; see

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x217556