Pat Dollard : Young Americans Documentary

May 9th 2007

Pelosi Reveals Plan To Sue Bush

More desperate pandering to her loser owners at Daily Kos, Moveon.org, et al.

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From The Hill:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is threatening to take President Bush to court if he issues a signing statement as a way of sidestepping a carefully crafted compromise Iraq war spending bill.

Pelosi recently told a group of liberal bloggers, “We can take the president to court” if he issues a signing statement, according to Kid Oakland, a blogger who covered Pelosi’s remarks for the liberal website dailykos.com.

“The president has made excessive use of signing statements and Congress is considering ways to respond to this executive-branch overreaching,” a spokesman for Pelosi, Nadeam Elshami, said. “Whether through the oversight or appropriations process or by enacting new legislation, the Democratic Congress will challenge the president’s non-enforcement of the laws.”

It is a scenario for which few lawmakers have planned. Indicating that he may consider attaching a signing statement to a future supplemental spending measure, Bush last week wrote in his veto message, “This legislation is unconstitutional because it purports to direct the conduct of operations of the war in a way that infringes upon the powers vested in the presidency.”

A lawsuit could be seen as part of the Democrats’ larger political strategy to pressure — through a series of votes on funding the war — congressional Republicans to break with Bush over Iraq.

Democrats floated other ideas during yesterday’s weekly caucus meeting. Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) suggested that the House consider a measure to rescind the 2002 authorization for the war in Iraq. Several senators and Democratic presidential candidates recently have proposed that idea.

“There was a ripple around the room” in support of the idea, said Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.).

In the 1970s, congressional Democrats tried to get the courts to force President Nixon to stop bombing in Cambodia. The courts ruled that dissident lawmakers could not sue solely to obtain outcomes they could not secure in Congress.

In order to hear an argument, a federal court would have to grant what is known as “standing,” meaning that lawmakers would have to show that Bush is willfully ignoring a bill Congress passed and that he signed into law.

The House would have to demonstrate what is called “injury in fact.” A court might accept the case if “it is clear that the legislature has exhausted its ability to do anything more,” a former general counsel to the House of Representatives, Stanley Brand, said.

Lawmakers have tried to sue presidents in the past for taking what they consider to be illegal military action, but courts have rejected such suits.

A law professor at Georgetown Law Center, Nicholas Rosenkranz, said Bush is likely to express his view on the constitutionality of the next supplemental in writing. Whether Bush has leeway to treat any provision of the supplemental as advisory, however, depends on the wording Congress chooses, Rosenkranz added.

Bruce Fein, who was a Justice Department official under President Reagan, said Democrats seeking to challenge a signing statement would have to try to give themselves standing before filing a lawsuit.

“You’d need an authorizing resolution in the House and Senate … to seek a declaratory judgment from the federal district court that the president, by issuing a signing statement, is denying Congress’s obligation to [hold a veto override vote],” Fein said.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) introduced legislation to that end last year, but the idea of a lawsuit has yet to gain traction in Congress.

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) said that “the odds would be good” for a signing statement on the next supplemental, considering that Bush has in the past shown a predilection for excusing his administration from contentious bills. But Levin did not offer any clues as to how Democratic leaders would counter Bush.

Posted by Pat Dollard

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8 Responses

  1. Infidel

    While Ms. Pelosi is there in court, she needs to be charged with treason. Ms. Pelosi and all of them, Sen. Douchebag, are the American mouth-peice of Al Q.

    Hey, MS. PELOSI, lets hope the Kos is worth it! The people who voted in Nov., what you love to refer to, sure as hell didn’t vote for you to strip their President of his powers as COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF. You lousy miserable bitch!!! How else can you describe someone whose destroying this country to protect her lousy political career?

    It’s getting to a point where I don’t want to know anymore, until something is done about this. Wake me up then. I’ve got a memory like a steel trap and would be happy to make sure ALL of the EVIDENCE is presented fully.

  2. TJ

    this bitch recently saw fit to chastise President alvaro uribe of columbia for alleged human rights abuses in his country. never mind that he has turned around their criminal gang problem by beefing up the military(with US help)and going after and arresting, injuring or killing the gangs of thugs who terrorized columbia for years. Because people are safer, and murders have been cut in half, he has been able to organize investers to invest in his country finally. But hey his a conservative who supports Bush which makes him a target of the looney left and their so called human rights group whom URibe said uses the guise of human rights violations as a means to protect terrorrists. A man after my own heart. Now if only sarkozy will have the balls to do the same in france.

    Pelosi’s needs to prepare for her own arrest for treachery, and corruption, accepting money from george soros in exchange for usurping the the rights of the president and making foreign policy deals with dictatorial enemies.

    :evil:

  3. Mike

    I just wish the Conservatives would grow some balls and actually bring in the special prosecutor to investigate pelosi bitch for treason. What a great day in AMERICA that would be. I want to see that goofy bitch go head to head with GW.

  4. John in PA

    Why can’t the people sue pelosi? Anyone got a legal answer? I don’t.

    It appears to me that the only accountability the people have are:
    1- to vote people in or out
    2- to sick liberals upon successful and righteous people for purposes of smear, shame & develop overwhelming outcry to get out of office. Only the principled people step out of office.

    The CRITICAL flaw is that no one can ever succeed in smearting a liberal democrat because the libs redefine right and wrong to suit the situation, and make excuses like I was just sloppy. So if the libs can say they did not intend to do wrong then they’re off the hook. WTF??

    The root cause of our troubles people!!
    The Libs get away with everything……
    Those principled in right & wrong admit to the wrong
    The libs use our own system of right and wrong to hang the principled.
    What system is used to hang a lib? None!

    The saddest thing is the majority of liberals know nothing of the real issues and just trust the Democrats. They are blind pawns!

  5. John in PA

    AND
    The main stream media feeds the blind pawns and moderates piles of shit and they eat it up.

  6. Steve in NC

    TJ-

    pelosi exposes herself as a sympathizer of the chavez and the nouveau communists by these statements to the Columbian President. That on her face shows how dangerous and wrong she is, instead of encouragement and applause at the reform and improvements in Columbia, she admonishes him, basically her statement is is alike in reid saying the war is lost hoping to encourage our enemies and discourage our efforts and those of our allies.

    DEFEND THE SECOND AMENDMENT
    we are going to need it

  7. Brad W

    I think it is way past time for Pelosi to be charged with treason. Why can we not get our Republican reps on offense rather than defense. The libs attack the Republicans, and it seems to many that we are constantly responding, and it makes them look weak. Time to put the libs and dems on defense, charge them with anything possible, make them look weak, as they are, and then they will have to use all those lawyers they hired to defend themselves rather than investigate the Republicans.

  8. stormin1961

    i’m sure Bush has the same three words for her as he had for the terrorists … “bring it on”

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