Constitutional war debate?

mg,

I think the outcome of the midterms was a direst result of the peoples unhappiness with the current administration. While it may not have been the landslide of '94 the presidents party lost both houses. I think it was a referendom on the administration and on the war. I think thats why some of the presidents own party are jumping ship on him.
IMHO if the president continues with "I make the decisions" policies congress will stand and oppose him; which could make for an interesting constitutional showdown.

The way I see it unless the two parties start cooperating together in significant numbers the congress can't really do anything without the President's approval. On the other hand the same is true for Bush in terms of agenda but he can still do a lot more via the executive branch.

Good.. it is about time that Republican party (or at least some in it) grew some gonads to stand up to bush minor, or this insecure, belligerent little man is going to irrepairable damage to this country. Bring it on, bring it to a head and force the issue and start the constituitional crisis that we all know is looming.... this fool of a president thinks he is above the law and has paid no attention to what the voters said in November.

[edit on 31-1-2007 by grover]

President Bush is feeling the heat from republicans not toeing the party line.

today.reuters.com...
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush said on Wednesday "I don't feel abandoned" by fellow Republicans in Congress who are working with Democrats to protest his Iraq policy with a congressional resolutionBush said he saw the comment as Specter wanting to make sure Congress was heard.

"They get to decide funding levels, for example. And my hope is of course that they would make sure our troops have what it takes to do the jobs that I've asked them to do. But you shouldn't be surprised that members of the legislative body want to have input," Bush said.

No Mr. President YOU should not be suprised that congress WILL have an input.

Edit: Attempted to shorten link, didn't work.

[edit on 31-1-2007 by intrepid]

The old right is becoming fed up with Bush and the war:



Chuck Hagel and the Return of the Old Right Antiwar

Whether this is all blow and no go is debatable and so far it's been all blow.

[edit on 31-1-2007 by Regenmacher]

The only thing that bothers me of all this things coming out from the Republican side is . . . that they have to wait until congress is now democrat to start talking.

What happen in the last six years that they were in power?

A rat bit their tongue? or they were so scare of Bush that they could not fight him back on his policies.

It is too bad that the Republican party during its shift to the right forced out most of its liberal and moderate members... it was these who had the gonads to stand up to Nixon... the late and unlamented Republican controlled congress sold its soul to bush minor and to party loyality as opposed to the nation and we have all suffered.

Did you catch the pinhead in chief bemoaning economic disparity in this country as if somehow his policies and tax cuts to the wealthiest haven't contributed to it in a big way... his hypocrisy makes me gag.

Grover I have to get away from the TV and news lately because I was fining myself screamig at the TV like a mad woman.

I have not clue what in the heck is wrong with our politicians but no other conclusion than they are all corrupted.

They come to the TV voicing their unhappiness with bush administration but in their speeches they are so full of political correctness and try so much to made sure that they support our troops and that htey are all fo the war on terror that makes me gag.

The war on terror is the biggest hoax Bush has been able to get away with and our troops . . . if they care so much about them . . . they will be fighting teeth and nails to get them back and the hell with the corporate agenda in Iraq, halliburton and oil barons and the Iraq nation, let them fight until they either kill each other of find common ground I careless right now.

But nooooooo they are so full of bs is not funny, our entre political systems has becoe a joke with people so detach from mainstream america that is pityful.

Bush needs to be impeached and Cheney too, but pelosy is so scare of having to take the US as a president with the mess that our nation is on that I actually can not be mad at her for that.

This war was never about WMD, or human rights or freeing Iraqis from Saddam... as far as i can tell our men and women are dying and bleeding for three and only three things... Oil, a foreign policy that is rooted in ideology as opposed to pragmatism and so a small pathetic little man could say he finished what his father couldn't.

Originally posted by grover
This war was never about WMD, or human rights or freeing Iraqis from Saddam... as far as i can tell our men and women are dying and bleeding for three and only three things... Oil, a foreign policy that is rooted in ideology as opposed to pragmatism and so a small pathetic little man could say he finished what his father couldn't.

OMG Did you just accuse Bush of lying!?

bush minor doesn't give a rats ass about the Iraqi's or our soldiers or anybody else for that matter... he is so shallow my little toe couldn't get wet in his depths, much less drown.

Perhaps thats why the right like him so much...he's on their level.

Published on Friday, February 2, 2007 by CommonDreams.org
Game Over: Thirty-Six Sure-Fire Signs That Your Empire Is Crumbling
by David Michael Green


['So. You’ve built yourself an empire, eh?

Well, bully for you!

What’s next, you ask? Well, now you’ve got to do what everybody does when they have an empire, of course. You’ve got to worry about it falling apart, mate!

But how to tell for sure? Let me see if I can be helpful. Here are some rules of thumb to keep in mind, thirty-six sure-fire indicators that your empire is falling apart:

You know your empire’s crumbling when the folks who are gearing up their empire to replace yours start blowing up satellites in space. And then they don’t bother to return your phone calls when you ring up to ask why.

You know your empire’s crumbling when those same folks are cutting deals left, right and center across Asia, Latin America and Africa, while you, your lousy terms, and your arrogant attitude are no longer welcome.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you’re spending your grandchildren’s money like a drunken sailor, and letting your soon-to-be rivals finance your little splurge (i.e., letting them own your country).

You know your empire’s crumbling when it’s considered an achievement to pretend that you’ve halved the rate at which you’re adding to the massive mountain of debt you’ve already accumulated.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you weaken your currency until it looks as anemic as a Paris runway model, and you’re still setting record trade deficits. (Hint: Because you’re not making anything anymore.)

You know your empire’s crumbling when “the little brown ones” (thank you George H.W. Bush – certainly not me – for that lovely expression) in country after country of “your backyard” blow you off and proudly elect anti-imperialist leftist governments.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you can’t topple those governments and replace them with nice puppet regimes – like in the good old days – even if you wanted to. And you badly want to.

You know your empire’s crumbling when one of their leaders comes to the United Nations and makes fun of your emperor, calling him the devil, and joking about smelling sulphur where he just stood. And though a few folks cringe, everybody laughs.

You know your empire’s crumbling when just about your entire military land force is tied up in a worse-than-useless war launched on the basis of complete fabrications, that every day is actually making you less – not more – secure from external threat.

You know your empire’s crumbling when almost half the soldiers in that war are high-paid mercenaries, and you don’t dare institute a draft.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you send soldiers into war with two weeks training and a lack of armor, and then you keep them there for three, four and five rotations.

You know your empire’s crumbling when a member of the Axis of Evil can test missiles and explode nuclear warheads, and all you can do about it is mumble some pathetic warnings about how they better not do that again or there will be consequences.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you even think that there is an Axis of Evil.

You know your empire’s crumbling when a rag-tag military hodge-podge of irregulars has you pinned down in an endless fight you can’t win, but also can’t lose.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you’re too dumb to even ban Humvees as a first step toward ending your dependency on a foreign-owned crucial resource.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you trade your prior moral leadership on human rights issues for global disgust at your torture, ‘extraordinary rendition’ (a.k.a. kidnaping for torture) and the dismantling of nine centuries worth of civil liberties progress.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you blow off international law that you once helped create, and undermine the institutions of international governance that you once helped build.

You know your empire’s crumbling when opinion polls confirm that every month you’re more and more despised throughout the world.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you can’t even pull off the hanging of a tin-pot murderous former dictator without turning him into a hero.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you’re the richest country in the world, but nearly 50 million of your people don’t have basic health care coverage.

You know your empire’s crumbling when the World Health Organization ranks your healthcare system 37th ‘best’ in the world, just above Slovenia, and just below Costa Rica. (And far below Colombia, Cyprus, Saudi Arabia and Morocco.)

You know your empire’s crumbling when instead of making it easier for citizens to obtain a higher education, you’re making it harder and more expensive.

You know your empire’s crumbling when your government gives tax breaks to industries as a reward for exporting your jobs elsewhere.

You know your empire’s crumbling when the so-called ‘opposition’ party can’t even turn that obscenity into a viable campaign theme and use it to clobber the worst emperor in your history.

You know your empire’s crumbling when your middle class has been stagnant for three decades, while the wealth of the hyper-rich continues to climb through the roof.

You know your empire’s crumbling when your reaction to that is to exacerbate the problem by enacting tax policies that massively increase further still the gap between the rich and the rest.

You know your empire’s crumbling when the predatory class has taken over your government and is stripping the country of everything not bolted down to the floor. And then it sells the floor itself, as well, to your rivals.

You know your empire’s crumbling when you’re spending tens of billions of dollars you don’t own on new nuclear warheads and space weapons that don’t work, to be used against an enemy you don’t have.

You know your empire’s crumbling when one of your cities drowns and your government does next to nothing before, during and after.

You know your empire’s crumbling when a massive environmental nightmare is looming around the corner, and your emperor not only ignores it, but claims it isn’t real while taking steps to exacerbate it.

You know your empire’s crumbling when your emperor is warned by a CIA briefer of an imminent terrorist attack of vast proportions, and responds by remaining on vacation and dismissing the briefer with the words: “All right. You've covered your ass, now.”

You know your empire’s crumbling when the same emperor drops everything to fly across the country from his vacation home in order to sign a bill intervening on the wrong side of a personal medical drama involving a single family.

You know your empire’s crumbling when gays and immigrants are used as diversionary issues to keep people from thinking about the pillaging of their country and their wallets actually taking place. And it works.

You know your empire’s crumbling when people are getting more religious and less scientific, not the other way around.

You know your empire’s crumbling when your political leaders start to be chosen by dynastic rules of succession.

And you especially know your empire’s crumbling when the most idiotic child of one of the least accomplished leaders in its history is not only crowned as the next emperor, but is even revered for a time by most of the public as a great one.

Rome? Britain? Spain?

At this rate we’ll be lucky to end up like Belgium."]

David Michael Green is a professor of political science at Hofstra University in New York. More of his work can be found at his website, www.regressiveantidote.net.

OUCH!!!

[edit on 3-2-2007 by grover]

[edit on 3-2-2007 by grover]

I think we all need to step back and think a moment.

I do believe this thread is about whether or not Congress is going to push the issue with Bush or not..

As Bush is obviously doing with Congress:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush will ask Congress for $99.7 billion for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars for the rest of fiscal year 2007 and more than $145 billion for fiscal year 2008, a Bush administration official said on Friday.
source

Like I said in my previous post... I think Bush is testing the waters to see if Congress will be ready and/or willing to push first.