A few days ago, I wrote about the multi-step process that kicks in every time I read of a new example of Bush hubris. At that point, it was Bush’s desire to read anybody’s mail he’d like to, given "exigent circumstances," a term so vague you could write a dissertation on it.
The grander strategy of this White House (and I use that all-inclusive bit of metonymy because it’s very hard to know who within that white house is the guiding force) seems to be declaring audacious new powers well outside the bounds of the Constitution, then leaving its opponents without any reasonable recourse except the path no one wants to talk about: impeachment.
Bush has made it clear that, Democrats or no Democrats, he intends to remove all limits to his power. News has trickled out that, in addition to saying he can read our mail (saying that and being able to make sense of all those words, thank heavens, are two different things), he’s also not planning to let those of us who hired him, pay his salary, and let him live in our White House have any knowledge of who comes or goes from said White House.
It’s yet another example of what this administration does best: it finds ways to manipulate, parse and circumvent the language of laws in order to get anything and everything it wants. Even though the Secret Service logs of White House visits are clearly part of the Secret Service and subject to Freedom of Information Act requests, Bush and crew have made those records, by merely declaring so in a memo, fall under the category of presidential records, which aren’t subject to FOIA requests. It’s boring and complicated, but in the end the intent is clear. They want what they want, and no stinking law is going to stop them. They can’t justify this one with "national security," either. What can we do about it? Exactly nothing.
What has to happen for the portion of the population slumbering in television coma to realize that we have an aspiring dictator on our hands? He already claims he can take office without winning the most votes, eavesdrop, torture, surveil, imprison without charge, and pretty much anything else a dictator would.
Bush is precipitating precisely the crisis the Constitution was written to prevent.
What will the Democrats do?
