The Imperial Presidency 2.0 - New York Times
The New York Times

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January 7, 2007
Editorial
The Imperial Presidency 2.0

Observing President Bush in action lately, we have to wonder if he actually
watched the election returns in November, or if he was just rerunning the
2002
vote on his TiVo.

That year, the White House used the fear of terrorism to scare American
voters into cementing the Republican domination of Congress. Mr. Bush and
Vice President
Dick Cheney then embarked on an expansion of presidential power chilling
both in its sweep and in the damage it did to the constitutional system of
checks
and balances.

In 2006, the voters sent Mr. Bush a powerful message that it was time to
rein in his imperial ambitions. But we have yet to see any sign that Mr.
Bush understands
that - or even realizes that the Democrats are now in control of the
Congress. Indeed, he seems to have interpreted his party's drubbing as a
mandate to
keep pursuing his fantasy of victory in Iraq and to press ahead undaunted
with his assault on civil liberties and the judicial system. Just before the
Christmas break, the Justice Department served notice to Senator Patrick
Leahy - the new chairman of the Judiciary Committee - that it intended to
keep
stonewalling Congressional inquiries into Mr. Bush's inhumane and
unconstitutional treatment of prisoners taken in anti-terrorist campaigns.
It refused
to hand over two documents, including one in which Mr. Bush authorized the
Central Intelligence Agency to establish secret prisons beyond the reach of
American law or international treaties. The other set forth the
interrogation methods authorized in these prisons - which we now know ranged
from abuse
to outright torture.

Also last month, Mr. Bush issued another of his infamous "presidential
signing statements," which he has used scores of times to make clear he does
not
intend to respect the requirements of a particular law - in this case a
little-noticed Postal Service bill. The statement suggested that Mr. Bush
does
not believe the government must obtain a court order before opening
Americans' first-class mail. It said the administration had the right to
"conduct searches
in exigent circumstances," which include not only protecting lives, but also
unspecified "foreign intelligence collection."

The law is clear on this. A warrant is required to open Americans' mail
under a statute that was passed to stop just this sort of abuse using just
this
sort of pretext. But then again, the law is also clear on the need to obtain
a warrant before intercepting Americans' telephone calls and e-mail. Mr.
Bush
began openly defying that law after Sept. 11, 2001, authorizing the National
Security Agency to eavesdrop without a court order on calls and e-mail
between
the United States and other countries.

.

News accounts have also reminded us of the shameful state of American
military prisons, where supposed terrorist suspects are kept without respect
for civil
or human rights, and on the basis of evidence so deeply tainted by abuse,
hearsay or secrecy that it is essentially worthless.

Deborah Sontag wrote in The Times last week about the sorry excuse for a
criminal case that the administration whipped up against Jose Padilla, who
was
once - but no longer is - accused of plotting to explode a radioactive
"dirty bomb" in the United States. Mr. Padilla was held for two years
without charges
or access to a lawyer. Then, to avoid having the Supreme Court review Mr.
Bush's power grab, the administration dropped those accusations and charged
Mr.
Padilla in a criminal court on hazy counts of lending financial support to
terrorists.

But just as the government abandoned the "dirty bomb" case against Mr.
Padilla, it quietly charged an Ethiopian-born man, Binyam Mohamed, with
conspiring
with Mr. Padilla to commit that very crime. Unlike Mr. Padilla, Mr. Mohamed
is not a United States citizen, so the administration threw him into
Guantánamo.
Now 28, he is still being held there as an "illegal enemy combatant" under
the anti-constitutional military tribunals act that was rushed through the
Republican-controlled
Congress just before last November's elections.

Mr. Mohamed was a target of another favorite Bush administration practice:
"extraordinary rendition," in which foreign citizens are snatched off the
streets
of their hometowns and secretly shipped to countries where they can be
abused and tortured on behalf of the American government. Mr. Mohamed -
whose name
appears nowhere in either of the cases against Mr. Padilla - has said he was
tortured in Morocco until he signed a confession that he conspired with Mr.
Padilla. The Bush administration clearly has no intention of answering that
claim, and plans to keep Mr. Mohamed in extralegal detention indefinitely.

.

The Democratic majority in Congress has a moral responsibility to address
all these issues: fixing the profound flaws in the military tribunals act,
restoring
the rule of law over Mr. Bush's rogue intelligence operations and restoring
the balance of powers between Congress and the executive branch. So far, key
Democrats, including Mr. Leahy and Senator Richard Durbin of Illinois,
chairman of a new subcommittee on human rights, have said these issues are
high
priorities for them.

We would lend such efforts our enthusiastic backing and hope Mr. Leahy, Mr.
Durbin and other Democratic leaders are not swayed by the absurd notion
circulating
in Washington that the Democrats should now "look ahead" rather than use
their new majority to right the dangerous wrongs of the last six years of
Mr.
Bush's one-party rule.

This is a false choice. Dealing with these issues is not about the past. The
administration's assault on some of the nation's founding principles
continues
unabated. If the Democrats were to shirk their responsibility to stop it,
that would make them no better than the Republicans who formed and enabled
these
policies in the first place.

Copyright 2007
The New York Times Company

Posted by Miriam V.