Three Proposed Constitutional Amendments

Bush commuted Lewis "Scooter" Libby's sentence, simultaneously vindicating the jury's guilty verdict on perjury while at the same time ensuring Libby will never set foot inside a prison. Not only does Bush attempt- with some success- to have his cake and eat it too, but this commutation effectively slams the door shut on any further attempt to investigate or prosecute the Plame leak scandal. Prosecutors now have no lever whatever to use on the one person who might possibly have fingered either the President or Vice President as responsible for leaking Valerie Plame's identity... which means, in all likelihood, that no one will be made accountable for the destruction of Plame's career and reputation.

Outrageous as this is, this is merely the latest, and hardly the largest, of George W. Bush's abuses of power. Today's news merely serves as a convenient trigger to reveal something I've been considering for months, something I personally think is vital to the survival of the United States as a free republic, vital to reining in a Presidency that acts like an elected monarchy rather than the executive of a democracy.

The Constitution needs to be amended.

Each term of Congress dozens of proposals are made to amend the Constitution of the United States. Over two thousand proposals have been voted on by one or both houses of Congress since it first convened in 1789; only twenty-seven have been ratified. As a general rule, attempting to amend the Constitution is a waste of time... unless there's an extremely strong reason to do so.

I believe the actions of the Bush administration, and those of the Democratic leadership in failing to even attempt to make that administration accountable for its misdeeds, provide very strong reason for amending the Constitution. George Bush has abused his power through his war in Iraq, by the authorization of torture, by the imprisonment without charge of thousands of people, by using "signing statements" to evade or nullify laws passed by Congress, and by undermining the very mechanisms of justice which should serve to hold him accountable. To make things worse, those who should act when the President exceeds his authority- the Attorney General, the Supreme Court, and the current Democratically controlled Congress- are actively sitting on their hands, refusing to do the only effective things to stop Bush before he further violates his oath to defend and uphold the Constitution.

First, to more clearly define the limits of Presidential power, here's what I call the Bush Amendment:

THE BUSH AMENDMENT

Section 1. The President of the United States acts as the Commander in Chief of the armed forces of the United States of America; but the President shall have no power to take offensive action against any nation, or against belligerents outside the United States (except for pirates on the high seas) except in time of war as explicitly declared by both houses of Congress, or under provisions of treaties with foreign nations as ratified by the Senate.

Congress shall have sole, exclusive, and non-delegatable power to declare war. Congress shall also have power to order, by joint declaration of a majority of each house, the President to cease offensive operations and withdraw armed forces from the territory of foreign nations. Refusal by the President to obey the will of Congress expressed in this manner shall constitute an impeachable offense.

The President of the United States retains the power to respond to invasion, revolt and insurrection within the territory and jurisdiction of the United States.

Section 2. The opinions of the President on the intent of any law, or its compliance with the Constitution, shall bear no weight in law, nor shall they be regarded by any officer or employee of the Federal government of the United States.

Section 3. The executive powers of pardon, commutation and clemency exercised by the President of the United States shall not extend to himself or herself, the Vice President, any member of Congress, or any person serving within the executive branch of the Federal government of the United States under that President.

Section 4. The right of habeas corpus shall not be denied to any person held prisoner by the Federal government of the United States or any department within that government, regardless of the prisoner’s citizenship.

Section 5. Torture, defined as the infliction of pain, degradation, or other cruel and unusual treatment of prisoners, shall be a Federal crime punishable by such sentence as Congress shall establish; but no sentence shall carry less penalty than ten years of imprisonment without parole or early release, forfeiture of any office of trust, and loss of all benefits and privileges of that office.

Any person who authorizes other persons subordinate to them to employ torture shall themselves be considered guilty of torture.

Torture shall constitute an impeachable crime under this Constitution.

Section 6. The President and Vice President, being citizens of the United States and members of the executive branch of the Federal government of the United States, may not exempt themselves from any law, regulation, executive order, or other ordinance or instrument applicable to all citizens of the United States or all members of the executive branch.

But wait- this depends on an Attorney General to investigate and produce evidence for impeachment. The Attorney General is appointed by, and personally loyal to, the President- so how is he supposed to work to impeach him? Hence my second proposal, which I call the Gonzales Amendment:

THE GONZALES AMENDMENT

Section 1. Congress shall establish a Department of Justice, the senior officer of which shall be entitled the Attorney General of the United States. The Attorney General shall be an American citizen of at least thirty years of age, resident in the United States without interruption for the previous five years, and shall not currently hold any elected office or other office of trust within the Federal government or any lesser government body within the jurisdiction of the United States.

The Attorney General shall be elected for a term of two years on the first Tuesday in November of odd-numbered years by majority vote of the Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States.

No Attorney General, having been elected by the Supreme Court, shall again be eligible to serve as Attorney General after the expiration of his or her full term.

Section 2. The Department of Justice shall organize, operate, and oversee any and all law enforcement organizations instituted by the Federal government to enforce the laws of that government. The Attorney General shall have power to appoint, with the advice and consent of the Senate, any and all lesser officers in such agencies; but on no account shall any person’s race, gender, creed, religion, or partisan affiliation be considered or questioned as a condition of or qualification for appointment or employment within the Department of Justice.

The Department of Justice shall have power to order and carry out the investigation of any officer within the federal government, including members of Congress, the President, the Vice President, and any seated justice of any Federal court, including the power to convene grand juries of inquest and to issue and enforce subpoenas of witnesses to testify before grand juries convened by the Department of Justice. In aid of such investigations, the Attorney General or such lesser officer as he or she may designate shall show probable cause to any justice of the Supreme Court and, with the justice’s consent, obtain warrants for search and seizure of evidence. No declaration of legislative or executive privilege shall have power to stay or challenge the execution of any subpoena or warrant issued by the Department of Justice.

Section 3. The President of the United States shall appoint, with the advice and consent of the Senate, a Solicitor General to act as the representative and advocate for the Federal government of the United States in any and all cases at law in which that government shall be a party. The Solicitor General shall have no law enforcement powers, nor any power of subpoena, and shall not be considered a member or officer within the Department of Justice.

Both the Attorney General and the Solicitor General shall be considered advisors to the President of Cabinet rank; however, the President shall have no authority over the Attorney General or the Department of Justice, nor may he terminate the term of the Attorney General in office.

And yet despite this Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House, refuses to even consider impeachment- the only effective punishment for a President out of control. There is one good reason why, though: if both Bush and Cheney are impeached at the same time, Pelosi becomes President. Under the circumstances, it could look like Pelosi sought impeachment solely to become President herself- which, in turn, would destroy the Democratic Party in 2008. Let's simplify things for her, then- by taking impeachment out of Congress' hands. Here's the Pelosi Amendment:

THE PELOSI AMENDMENT

Section 1. Any two Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, upon being presented evidence of treason or other impeachable crimes, shall have power to impeach any officer within the Federal government, including any member of Congress, the President, the Vice President, and any head of any department or agency established by Congress, excepting justices seated in Federal courts.

The Supreme Court of the United States shall have sole power to try impeachments, except in cases against Federal justices appointed by the President, a vote of two-thirds of all the justices of the Supreme Court being necessary for conviction.

Congress shall retain power to impeach and try justices seated in Federal courts.

Section 2. Impeachment and conviction shall carry no penalty beyond immediate removal from office, permanent disqualification for any future office of trust within the United States or any body of government within it, and the forfeiture of any and all privileges held by former holders of the office held when impeached; but any person impeached and convicted shall remain liable to indictment, trial, and punishment according to law.

Section 3. The following shall be considered impeachable crimes:
• Treason;
• Abuse of power, defined as the use of the powers of an office to violate the rights of others unjustly or to violate the Constitution of the United States, or the use of the powers of an office for personal gain other than financial profit;
• Corruption, defined as the use of the powers of an office for the enrichment of oneself or of one’s friends and family through bribery, graft, or other illegitimate means;
• Obstruction of justice;
• Perjury;
• Deception of Congress, defined as deliberately lying to or otherwise misleading Congress in order to influence its deliberations and votes;
• And any crime designated a felony by Congress or the legislature of any State.

Please feel free to pass these proposals on and to discuss them with others. If something like these proposals gains popularity, perhaps we can at least deny the next Democratic President all the power that Bush is exercising and abusing.

I can only hope.

Similar in Theory, if Not in Magnitude

And to make up for the lack of a news item in the last post:

Iran: Death Penalty for Porn Creators

Nothing much to comment on here, except to remind y'all that Alberto Gonzales, and by extension George W. Bush, also want to use government power to wipe out pornography. This, of course, is despite the protests of free speech activists and even over the objections of prosecutors and lawyers on the street.

Again, it's interesting how US government resembles Islamic theocracies in certain respects more than the European culture we supposedly came from...

Cull Day: A Great Day to be Named Bush, and More

It's already been a long day, and I'm exhausted.

Unfortunately, too much is happening for me to be completely silent today. The Democrats have caved in to Bush, giving him everything he wants with absolutely zero accountability and zero movement towards ending the war. I've already said my piece on the Democrats and their lack of anti-war credibility on my personal LiveJournal. Short version: if you want to end the war, vote Libertarian or Green in 2008- not Democratic, and certainly not Republican.

George Bush has held another fortuitously timed news conference,, announcing the declassification of matters related to attempts by al-Qaida to organize a strike on the continental United States based in Iraq. (Um... is Osama bin Laden really so stupid as to make home base for a strike on the USA in a nation crawling with US troops and militias with conflicting or opposing goals to al-Qaida?)

If the timing of the declassification announcement was deliberately timed to distract from Justice Department aide Monica Goodling's testimony before Congress, it was a waste of a perfectly good propoganda tool. Aside from vague accusations that Deputy Attorney General McNulty perjured himself before Congress and an anecdote that almost, but not quite, accuses Alberto Gonzales of attempting to influence or alter Goodling's potential testimony after she was supoenaed, Goodling opened no fresh cans of worms and provided nothing of any practical use in investigating the rampant corruption in the Justice Department.

However, Keith Olbermann will have much to say on all of this tonight, especially on the failure of Democrats to stand to their guns on Iraq. I'm not going to go into great detail on that... or much of anything, for that matter. I'm tired, I'm feeling burned out for the day, which makes it a great time for the first Cull Day since the return of this blog.

So, let's check the bookmarks and see what stories are a week old or older that don't merit a larger post...

Alabama Calls Libertarians Terrorists - On the one hand, I'm outraged at how a government agency calls people who believe in individual rights terror suspects. On the other hand, I keep remembering how many militia-movement people we had in the party when I first joined in 1999, and how a large number of them were calling for an armed revolution in case of a Gore Presidency- despite the fact that that directly violated both the spirit and the letter of the LP's membership pledge against advocating violence for political change. A lot of our fellow travelers have given the rest of society good reason to be suspicious: time we recognized the fact.

Taliban Releases Kidnapped French Aid Worker - Lesson learned by terrorists (again): Terror works.

Ricky Williams Fails Drug Test... Again - I don't think marijuana should be illegal. I do think the NFL, like any private employer, has the right to set drug standards for employment. Either way, Ricky, when you were already on suspension, continuing to drink and toke and expecting to be allowed back on the playing field was JUST PLAIN STUPID. Folks, this is what wacky weed DOES to you- it makes you think dicking around the people you owe $10 million in non-performance contract clauses is a GOOD IDEA.

Cheney Promises US Will Keep Persian Gulf Open - Two points. First- does anybody believe anymore that Cheney, and Bush and the rest of 'em, are NOT trying to get us in a shooting war in Iran? Second- does anybody in the rest of the world have any respect whatever for anything ANY American government official says, especially Cheney?

Army Offering Bonuses to Retain Officers - Yeah, because, y'know, getting badly underpaid and having benefits cut right and left while being put in ever-longer action tours and ever-shorter time stateside looks SO DAMN ATTRACTIVE to folks who've seen Iraq once... twice... thrice... four times running... Tell me, how do you say, "Not for all the corn in Iowa," in Arabic?

Karl Rove: Re-Open Democrat Voter Fraud Prosecutions, Or Else - I finally got round to reading All the President's Men last week. Today I picked up a copy of the follow-up, The Final Days, detailing how Nixon was persuaded to resign. Between that and this, I'm developing newfound respect for the Washington Post.

Texas Legislature Considers Tax on Nursing Homes - This annoys me. First, a large chunk of nursing home occupants are essentially wards of the state- Medicare or Medicaid is paying for thousands of dollars per month of care they can't afford. For these people, this tax would be a tax on the government- making these programs even MORE expensive than they already are! Second, those NOT on Medicare/Medicaid are pouring their life savings into their care... and this tax would make it even more expensive. Finally, this tax is earmarked... until a future legislature votes to redirect it to the general fund... to "improve nursing home care" by handing the money right back to the nursing homes... that is, those homes approved of by the state bureaucracy. Finally, the law has a provision forbidding nursing homes from passing it on to the consumers directly or indirectly. How in the hell do they expect to prove that a rate hike isn't due to this tax? From start to end, BAD IDEA.

Texas Senate Approves Tying Marriage License Fee to Family Counseling - Speaking of dumb shit from my state legislature, here's this notion- double the cost of getting your government's permission to get married unless you agree to state-mandated, state-controlled, state-chosen pre-marital counseling class. Considering the bill is written by Warren Chisum, the biggest homophobe and anti-sex warrior in either house of the Texas Legislature... just what kind of stuff will they teach in those classes? "Wives, your only proper role is as receptacle for your husband's semen. Husbands, you are not allowed to beat your wives with any stick thicker than one inch in diameter."

Zimbabwe to Head UN Sustainable Development Commission - First Syria chairing the UN Human Rights Commission, and now this. What gets me here isn't that the UN seems determined to prove it has no moral authority whatever to tell anybody to do anything. No, what gets me is that the UN considers Syria, Zimbabwe, and others as democracies, despite their one-party rule with fixed elections and strongmen serving for life. We need to remember that the trappings of democracy, or of a republic, by no means guarantee freedom. Only strict limitations on government power, enforced by the electorate, can do that... and if we aren't careful, what we see in Syria and Zimbabwe could happen here.

$17 Million in Texas Worker's Comp Death Benefits Kept by State, Mostly Paid Back to Insurance Companies - Wow. Government corruption and insurance corporation corruption in the same story. Please note the laws that mandate this were enacted in 1991, back when Texas was still solidly in Democrat control. As much as I'd love to stick this to Bush or Perry, I'll settle for demonstrating equal opportunity graft.

Lawmakers Try to Live a Week on Food Stamps - First, I've had to live on that amount, and I didn't have the help of food stamps. Second, the Congresscritters are very right: you just plain cannot afford a healthy diet on that amount. Third, I don't know that many people on food stamps or other assistance, but: (a) how many states don't supplement the federal food stamp program with their own programs, (b) how many food stamp people don't supplement their stamps with cash, and (c) what role do private charities play in feeding these people? Libertarians need to take an active role in creating a world where (c) adds up to no more need for taxpayers to pay for (a) and/or (b). Until then, let's get past cheap but thrilling publicity stunts like this one-week diet and get some actual facts on the topic.

... wow. That's a lot of stories, and still the list is huge. It's been really thick times for government stupidity, looks like. Probably do another of these before my upcoming business trip.