The Bush Administration has really passed the point of parody. Here, again, it's simply announcing unilaterally that it doesn't feel like following a law passed by Congress -- one that President Bush SIGNED -- so it's not going to follow the law.
From this morning's New York Times:
Administration to Bypass Reporting Law.
WASHINGTON — The Bush administration has informed Congress that it is bypassing a law intended to forbid political interference with reports to lawmakers by the Department of Homeland Security.
The August 2007 law requires the agency’s chief privacy officer to report each year about Homeland Security activities that affect privacy, and requires that the reports be submitted directly to Congress "without any prior comment or amendment" by superiors at the department or the White House.
But newly disclosed documents show that the Justice Department issued a legal opinion last January questioning the basis for that restriction, and that Michael Chertoff, the homeland security secretary, later advised Congress that the administration would not "apply this provision strictly" because it infringed on the president’s powers....
Translation: "Screw you, America! I don't feel like following the law, even one that I signed. Whatchagonna do about it, huh?"
A question for conservatives: Do you like the idea of an Obama Administration that can simply do whatever it wants to, ignoring the laws of the country whenever it feels like it? You've clamored for an secret, unaccountable executive dictatorship for eight years. Now contemplate what the other side of that coin looks like.
The Bush Administration has adopted the transparently hypocritical line that the president is refusing to carry out laws which he considers "unconstitutional". Problem is, that's not his job. The United States has a mechanism for determining that laws are unconstitutional. It's called the Supreme Court. The President is not the Supreme Court. They're the guys in that other marble building across town. The ones who wear the black robes and stuff.
Allowing politicians to unilaterally, whimsically decide whether or not they feel like following the law is a disastrous precedent, and one which is fundamentally contrary to our whole tradition of constitutional government. It's especially rancid when it's patently obvious that the purpose of the President's illegal acts is to hide politically embarrassing information. (Perhaps the words "Nixon" and "Watergate" will remind Mr. Cheney of something, hm?)
Just what information related to the Bush Administration's illegal spying on American citizens is so politically embarrassing, or legally incriminating, that the Bush Administration must publicly defy a law Bush himself signed in order to hide it from the American people and their elected representatives in Congress?
Although the Bush Administration may get away with laying one more gigantic stinking turd on the proud heritage of American constitutional government just because no one considers it worth the trouble of shooting down a lame duck, it is still a terrible precedent for the future of our country.
The fact that the Bush Administration official involved is named "Hugo Teufel III" is the silly final fillip that pushes the whole thing into farce. A third-of-that-name scion surnamed with the German word for "devil"? Oh, please. I know he didn't get to choose his own name, and for all I know he might be a great guy. But, really, it sounds like a moniker the "Billionaires for Bush" would dream up.
This administration can't be gone too soon.