President Bush ... um ... Badnarik

hgc

Penultimate Amazing
hgc
Joined
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All the regulars here will remember long, fun threads discussing the Libertarian presidential candidate's plans for supplanting the Judicial Branch as the arbiter of the constitutionality of laws passed by Congress. The theory went that since the president takes an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the constitution, then he's the final arbiter of what is an isn't constitutional.

Well, the cat's finally out of the bag. Note the following exchange between a reporter and WH press secretary Tony Snow:

Q: But isn’t it the Supreme Court that’s supposed to decide whether laws are unconstitutional or not?

Tony: No, as a matter of fact the president has an obligation to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. That is an obligation that presidents have enacted through signing statements going back to Jefferson. So, while the Supreme Court can be an arbiter of the Constitution, the fact is the President is the one, the only person who, by the Constitution, is given the responsibility to preserve, protect, and defend that document, so it is perfectly consistent with presidential authority under the Constitution itself.
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Is there any distinction here between Badnarik's position and this administration's?

http://www.btcnews.com/btcnews/1451
 
Well I guess article III of the Constitution is void huh?

Section 1:The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court...

Section 2: The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution...
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well, it does have a long and honorable history

Although it has been able to promote its own power fairly well, the Supreme Court has not always been successful in enforcing its fiats. When Marshall declared that President Andrew Jackson’s Indian policy was unconstitutional, Jackson ignored the decision and said, "Mr. Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it." When Chief Justice Roger Taney criticized Lincoln’s habit of suspending habeas corpus, Lincoln just ignored him.
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http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/mcmaken8.html (whoever these guys are)
 
"No"?

"No"???

The White House Press Secretary just annulled the documents on which the United States of America is founded upon.

And introduced a full-blown dictatorship.

I am not wrong here, am I?
 
CFLarsen said:
"No"?

"No"???

The White House Press Secretary just annulled the documents on which the United States of America is founded upon.

And introduced a full-blown dictatorship.

I am not wrong here, am I?
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Yep, you're wrong.

Wanna have some real fun? Ever heard of Al Haig?
 
CFLarsen said:
"No"?

"No"???

The White House Press Secretary just annulled the documents on which the United States of America is founded upon.

And introduced a full-blown dictatorship.

I am not wrong here, am I?
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The link is broken for me but I'm pretty sure you are wrong. I think an executive police state would have made the local news.
 
CFLarsen said:
The White House Press Secretary just annulled the documents on which the United States of America is founded upon.

And introduced a full-blown dictatorship.
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Tony Snow has no power to annul anything.
 
Let's be honest here: the question was obviously asked as part of a series of questions (hence the beginning it with "but"). That context was not given in the original post, it has not been mentioned in the comments on it. But it probably matters quite a bit. The link given isn't working right now, and I can't find any such exchange in recent press briefing transcripts on the whitehouse site (when was the interview), so I can't judge what that context was. But I can take a guess, and that is that two competing opinions on the relationship of the president AND the supreme court to the constitution were being discussed, one by Tony Snow and one by the journalist. Snow's "No" comment could be him refuting the picture advanced by the journalist in toto - in other words, not so much that this one sentence is wrong, but that it does not support the position being put forward by the journalist. But we don't know, because we have no context. And those of you who have assumed some particular interpretation in the absence of any context aren't proving you understand the constitution better than Snow, or the Bush administration, does. You're demonstrating that you'll jump to conclusions quite easily because the idea that Bush is some idiot and his administration is eager to trample over the constitution flatters your biases.

Now, maybe Snow really is wrong, maybe he really is saying something outrageous. But it's not possible to tell from the quoted part of the transcript, and that much SHOULD be obvious.
 
The White House Press Secretary does not convey the official policy of the President of the United States?

Pardon me for asking, but just what the hell does he do, then?
 
CFLarsen said:
The White House Press Secretary does not convey the official policy of the President of the United States?

Pardon me for asking, but just what the hell does he do, then?
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He enforces our blasphemy laws for the royal family and our state-sponsored church. In other words, get a life, Larsen, you know perfectly well what a press secretary does.

He deals with pinhead questions from pinhead people. Like I'm doing right now.
 
I noticed that the White House Press Secretary just annulled the entire foundation of the United States of America.

Are we going to talk about that, or are we going to make inane personal attacks on me?
 
Jocko said:
He enforces our blasphemy laws for the royal family and our state-sponsored church. In other words, get a life, Larsen, you know perfectly well what a press secretary does.

He deals with pinhead questions from pinhead people. Like I'm doing right now.
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Ratio of words to relevancy: infinite
 
CFLarsen said:
I noticed that the White House Press Secretary just annulled the entire foundation of the United States of America.

Are we going to talk about that, or are we going to make inane personal attacks on me?
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I'm voting for #2, since #1 is prima face untrue and in fact laughably obtuse. Are you sure you lived in the States, Claus? You're certain it wasn't Luxembourg, and you were just a bit confused maybe? Because I can't see someone like you lasting half an hour in New York.
 
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CFLarsen said:
I noticed that the White House Press Secretary just annulled the entire foundation of the United States of America.
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He introduced a rationale that theoretically could lead to dictatorship, and considering the trash we currently have as president, I wouldn't be terribly surprised if that was the ultimate outcome. At this moment however, that has yet to be realized.
 
Does "an obligation to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States" entail "decid[ing] whether laws are unconstitutional or not"?

I'd say no.
 
hgc said:
Ratio of words to relevancy: infinite
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Are you going to provide us with a link that works? Or how about just a date when the interview took place, and we can look it up ourselves?

Your quote has no context. Context is obviously important in the interpretation of that passage. Anything said about it is little more than guesswork. That SHOULD be obvious, but apparently neither you nor Claus can figure that out. Hmmm... I wonder why. Scratch that, I'm pretty sure I know exactly why.
 
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