Repeat Offender

In an excellent post Glenn Greenwald discusses the continuing efforts of Bush to ignore his responsibilities under the Constitution to uphold the law. In it he references an article in the Boston Globe by Charlie Savage that shines the bright light on the attempts to steal the power of Congress.

President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.

Among the laws Bush said he can ignore are military rules and regulations, affirmative-action provisions, requirements that Congress be told about immigration services problems, ''whistle-blower" protections for nuclear regulatory officials, and safeguards against political interference in federally funded research.

Legal scholars say the scope and aggression of Bush's assertions that he can bypass laws represent a concerted effort to expand his power at the expense of Congress, upsetting the balance between the branches of government. The Constitution is clear in assigning to Congress the power to write the laws and to the president a duty ''to take care that the laws be faithfully executed" . .

It is very frustrating to continue to see the administration flaunt the law with such impunity. Why can't we get more people with some backbone to stand up to this? Evidently Stephen Colbert stepped up and did some serious finger pointing at the Whitehouse press dinner. (video here - transcript here).