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Posted on 02/24/2004 3:19:05 AM PST by Revel
Edited on 05/26/2004 5:19:43 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
WASHINGTON --Legislation introduced this month by Senate Republicans, including Texan John Cornyn, would dramatically change the way presidential succession works.
Should the president become incapacitated along with the vice president, members of Congress would be ineligible for the top leadership position in favor of Cabinet members.
"We really didn't have a workable plan if the terrorist attacks of 9/11 had been successful and the heroic passengers had not stopped that plane in Pennsylvania (that the FBI has said was aimed at Washington)," Cornyn said. "We began looking at exactly what would happen, and the more we scratched away, the more problems we saw."
At this time, if a president and vice president were killed, the speaker of the House would become president. Next in line would be the president pro tem of the Senate, a senior member of the majority party.
Cornyn and other lawmakers, along with a number of scholars and researchers, think the law is outdated and may be unconstitutional.
The bill he introduced with Republican Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi would remove members of Congress from the line of succession. Instead, Cabinet members, beginning with the secretary of state and followed by the treasury secretary, defense secretary, attorney general and the homeland security director, would form the line behind the president and vice president.
Part of the argument against the current law is that the country could be left with a president who holds views far different from those of the person elected by the American people. For example, the Reagan-Bush administration would have been replaced by liberal Democratic House Speaker Thomas "Tip" O'Neill, and the Clinton-Gore team by conservative Republican Newt Gingrich.
But some scholars challenge the idea of taking Congress out of the line of succession.
"Cutting all elected officials out of the loop (if the president and vice president were dead or incapacitated) is somewhat disturbing," said Paul Brace, a political scientist at Rice University. "The leaders in Congress are sensitized to the demands of running a democracy. With Cabinet members, you have had people of wildly varying capabilities over the years."
Other scholars say the language in the Constitution should keep the powers of the branches of government separate -- keeping Congress out of the loop.
The bill would clear up the constitutional questions, said John Fortier, a scholar with the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think tank.
"Having congressional leaders in the line of succession poses a lot of problems," Fortier said. "Is it a good idea to have the kind of radical policy shift you could have had during some periods if the speaker from one party replaced the leader of the rival party?"
The Lott-Cornyn bill has had a low profile on Capitol Hill so far. The leading Democrat on the Senate Rules Committee, Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, has not taken a formal position on the bill.
The line of succession was last altered by Congress in 1947 during President Truman's administration. In the 19th century, Congress first placed members of Congress in the line, then took them out.
Under the bill, the Cabinet member who becomes president would hold the job until the next scheduled election or until a disabled president or vice president recovers. If a Cabinet member becomes president temporarily while a president recovers from an incapacitating condition, the Cabinet member would not have to resign the Cabinet post, as present law requires.
House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., has not taken a position on the legislation.
Fortier is part of a private commission that, soon after 9/11, began looking at how power might be passed in orderly fashion in case of a Washington cataclysm. The panel is headed by Lloyd Cutler, a former counsel to Democratic presidents Carter and Clinton, and former Republican Sen. Alan Simpson of Wyoming. Two former House speakers, Democrat Tom Foley and Republican Newt Gingrich, served on the commission and support its findings.
In the early 1980s, Reagan officials set up an elaborate plan that would have established continuity of government in case of disaster. People such as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, then a business executive, and Vice President Dick Cheney, then a congressman, were listed among dozens of experienced leaders who would disperse to secret locations outside Washington to ride out catastrophe.
After Sept. 11, 2001, it became even clearer that some of the issues of who would govern after a deadly attack, and how power would be transferred, needed to be addressed in legislation, Fortier said.
Last fall, Cornyn introduced another bill that followed recommendations of the Cutler-Simpson commission on how Congress could be reconstituted in case of an attack on the Capitol building that killed scores of lawmakers.
Under that bill, states could choose a method to fill the seats. Those temporary lawmakers would hold office until elections could be held within 120 days.
As far as news from overseas or across the country, ham radio would be the only thing working without electricity...since it requires no wires or generators.
The main thing is to have an emergency power source. Right now, mine is the alternator and battery in my truck!
Indie, do you have a HF transceiver? Since you are a Tech Plus, you would only have to take the General written test to get access to a lot more HF spectrum.
WorldNetDaily.com: "9 IRAQI SCIENTISTS MURDERED IN PAST 4 MONTHS U.S. Believes Killings Effort to Conceal Scope of Iraq's Nuke Program" (February 26, 2004) (Read More...)
JIHAD WATCH.org: "TALIBAN CLAIM RESPONSIBILITY FOR FATAL ATTACK ON AMERICAN RECONSTRUCTION TEAM" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "The Taliban is attempting to keep the jihad alive in Afghanistan by murdering construction workers. The focus on non-combatants accord with the provisions of Islamic law that forbid killing them unless they are considered to be aiding the war effort. This is used to justify bombings on buses in Israel, and by Osama for his attacks in the U.S. From the Guardian:") (February 23, 2004) (Read More...)
MEMRI.org - MIDDLE EAST MEDIA RESEARCH INSTITUTE Special Dispatch Series - No. 666: "CONTROVERSY IN THHE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY OVER THE TRIAL OF FOUR SUSPECTS IN ATTACK ON U.S. CONVOY" (February 24, 2004) (Read More...)
MEMRI.org - MIDDLE EAST MEDIA RESEARCH INSTITUTE - Inquiry and Analysis Series - No. 164: "THE SADDAM OIL VOUCHERS AFFAIR" by Dr. Mimrod Raphaeli" (February 20, 2004) (Read More...)
WEEKLY STANDARD.com: "SADDAM'S AMBASSADOR TO AL QAEDA From the March 1, 2004 Issue: An Iraqi Prisoner Details Saddam's Links to Osama bin Laden's Terror Network" by Jonathan Schanzer, Issue 24 dated March 1, 2004 (Read More...)
NEW ZEALAND HERALD.co.nz: "SIS SUMMARY OF ALLEGATIONS AGAINST AHMED ZAOUI The Following Document from the Director of New Zealand's Security & Intelligence Service was Released by Ahmed Zaoui's Lawyers on 20 Feb 2004:" (Read More...)
MEMRI.org - MIDDLE EAST MEDIA RESEARCH INSTITUTE Special Dispatch Series No. 664: "THE MUFTI OF AUSTRALIA CALLS FOR JIHAD; 'AUSTRALIA WAS DISCOVERED BY AFGHAN MUSLIMS'" (February 18, 2004) (Read More...)
JIHAD WATCH.org (SUN-HERALD): "AUSTRALIA: TERRORIST SUSPECT ENJOYS FREE REIN" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "From the Sun-Herald, with thanks to Jean-Luc: A week after a Pakistani-born man was named publicly as a terror suspect he is still free, walking the streets of Sydney. And it is almost four months since anti-terror forces searched the man's home in south-western Sydney, along with those of six others who were identified as key associates of terror suspect Willy Brigitte, who is in a French jail cell.But despite accusations that the man, named as Abu Hamza, was part of a group allegedly planning a terror attack in Sydney, police are powerless to put him behind bars. The Federal Government says it cannot detain him as he has not broken any law.") (February 16, 2004) (Read More...)
Hmmm... I live about 5 miles from the plant on the east side of the Hudson River and I saw nothing in my local newspaper this morning. While scuba diving in the Hudson River is not unheard of, what makes this interesting is that the Hudson at that location is iced over right now, except for the shipping channels, which are kept open by Coast Guard ice cutters. Although a person could have been doing underwater repair work near the plant, one would think that LEO would have known about a missing diver and would have been searching for him.
Note that "Marcy South," which is a high voltage power line that carries electricity from hydro and nuclear plants in upstate New York along the Canadian border, runs under the Hudson River right near where this guy was found. The Catskill Aquaduct, which feeds the NYC water system also runs under the river near the power plant. On the other hand, because of the strong tides and currents, this guy could have started out 30 miles away or more in either direction -- like the Indian Point Nuke Plant, which is 20 miles south on the east side of the River.
Even as Plus, I still get enough of the HF for usability. And in an emergency, of course, the rules wouldn't apply. I'd be using any freq I darn well wanted. :)
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