Posted on 03/27/2002 1:09:35 PM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
Edited on 07/12/2004 3:52:16 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
As more details emerge, it looks as if there is going to be neutrality from Ashcroft and Olson on a lot of this stuff. The heavy lifting on the defense will be done by the Common Cause crowd. And there are about two dozen court decisions that make the ultimate result of the expedited handling of the case pretty easy to guess.
Congressman Billybob has a lot of expertise on this issue, and listening to his discussion of this matter leads me to believe that Bush decided to kill this issue PERMANENTLY. The only way to do that, though was for this bill to become law. SCOTUS cannot give advisory opinions.
Quite frankly, I can see the logic. I'd have preferred a veto, but things look like they will work out even better. What's left of this law will benefit our side, and the Dems will be toast.
McCain-Feingold Follies
Who says he's a sore loser? Who says he just couldn't give John McCain his moment in the Rose Garden, a ceremonial signing of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill? Who says he would rather look petty than go through the gripping and grinning and pen-handling that a White House ceremony entails?
Who? Just about everybody, after George Bush dashed off his signature between bouts on Iraq with Condoleezza Rice and the vice president. Then he dashed off to raise funds.
McCain got a call at 7 a.m. at his Arizona home from a junior White House aide whose name he didn't know, telling him the bill had been signed. Later, a White House emissary brought to his office a commemorative pen and a note of congratulation. McCain issued a statement striking for its terseness: "I'm pleased that President Bush has signed campaign reform legislation into law."
Perhaps Bush was playing, as he so often does, to his right wing, which hates McCain, foams at his bill and deplores his lack of deference to Bush. They attribute McCain's insubordination to the fact that he "never got over South Carolina" -- the state where Bush effectively ended McCain's White House hopes.
The right wing is not moved by the sight of magnanimity and bipartisanship. Right-wingers thought Bush was right to call the bill "flawed" the day it passed the Senate.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28653-2002Mar27.html
Bush has not only failed to defend our beleaguered Constitution. He has added to the already backbreaking list of unconstitutional legislation that has (sometimes surreptitiously, sometime flagrantly) forced its way into our daily lives.
Bush's philosophy of reaching out stinks.
Reaching out (especially to the left) in America 2001 almost always results in one thing: capitulation to those who hold the Constitution in about as high regard as they do their morning newspaper (if that). And if uniting America (Bush's apparent domestic theme) is defined as capitulating to special interest groups, or surrendering more of our Constitutional liberties (especially the freedom of personal choice, as opposed to obedience to unconstitutional government dictates), then there is something to be said for divisiveness. Unity, at the sacrifice of liberty (as embodied in Constitutional tenets) provides a fleeting sense of communal well-being, at best. Our founders were not concerned with our sense of well-being as defined by our ability to afford prescription drugs, or buy steel-based products at a certain government-prescribed price. They were concerned with our sense of well-being as defined by our ability to make our own decisions, and enjoy the fruits of our own labors.
Unfortunately, revisionist historians, and modern-day brainwashers philosophers/pundits have taught us to believe that our well-being (pursuit of happiness?) is based on physical/temporal things, rather than timeless, priceless, intangible, God-given possessions (life, liberty). And we have (unfortunately) learned their (perverted) lessons well. And with each new, 'well-intentioned' legislative attempt to make life a little more physically comfortable for us all, the Constitution (the most brilliant blueprint for governance ever conceived by the mind of man) is one step closer to residing in the dustbin of history.
Once again, the American form of government has been betrayed....snopercod
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