HO HO HO Sam, you ask me to explain the granting clause, which I so graciously did for you, using the help of professor Rothstein. After initiating that confrontation, and getting a good smack in the mouth by the professor's response, you then retreat to this silliness? You are not even able to muster a response? None at all? Weren't you a lawyer at one point in your life? A lawyer can't even defend himself in an argument regarding the Constitution? Wow. It's time for you to wave the white flag in defeat. OWNED
To be fair to Trader_J, he could be pulling a Doc Rocket... he's really telling us that we will soon see, straight from the grave, a reincarnated Cary Grant... the granting clause of Article 2, don't you see?? He'll be starring in Gunga Din II, reprising his role as Sgt. Archibald Cutter. Playing the Guru, in a ground-breaking career move, will be Jason Alexander. Andy Serkis plays a CGI-generated Gunga Din, in the title role. This has Oscar written all over it! We'll be able to hear these immortal lines again... Sgt. Archibald Cutter: You're mad! Guru: Mad? Mad. Hannibal was mad, Caesar was mad, and Napoleon surely was the maddest of the lot. Ever since time began, they've called mad all the great soldiers in this world. Mad? We shall see what wisdom lies within my madness. For this is but the spring that precedes the flood. From here we roll on. From village to town. From town to mighty city. Ever mounting, ever widening, until at last my wave engulfs all India! Sgt. Archibald Cutter: Now you're all under arrest. Her Majesty's very touchy about having her subjects strangled. Guru: You seem to think warfare an English invention. Have you never heard of Chandragupta Maurya? He slaughtered all the armies left in India by Alexander the Great. India was a mighty nation then while Englishmen still dwelt in caves and painted themselves blue. Sgt. Archibald Cutter: How can we get a nice little war going? Gunga Din: The salute satisfactory? Sgt. Archibald Cutter: That's the idea. Only... you want these fingers to fan the eyebrows more like this. [makes a salute] Sgt. Archibald Cutter: The fleece from them fingers oughta almost blow these eyebrows off. Now try it again. [Din salutes, Cutter smiles] Sgt. Archibald Cutter: Very good. Very good indeed. Eh... That one almost blew your turban off, didn't it? Sgt. 'Mac' MacChesney: You ain't so stupid as you look. Sgt. Archibald Cutter: Now get me some tools. Something to rip these blinking bars out. Gunga Din: Already bring all tools could find. Is this satisfactory, sire? [holds up a fork] Sgt. Archibald Cutter: Look... What do you think I want to break out of - a bloomin' pudding?! Now go on, get something big. [Din returns with an elephant] Sgt. Archibald Cutter: What are you doing, Din? Gunga Din: The large tool you asked for, sire. I've heard that the original is a hot item at the White House. Thanks for the inside scoop, Trader_J!!! Keep D&D Civil.
you have put all your hope into an opinion of ONE professor from georgetown?? the guy didn't even graduate from georgetown.. and then say you owned someone based on that? I asked you earlier where is the link to you source but you never responded.. I did a search and you gout it from an interview on faux news with o'reilly.. why don't you post the whole interview? because another law professor disagreed with your great professor rothstein? cherry picking again? Law Professor To O'Reilly: "I Believe the President Committed a Federal Crime ... That Crime Was Premeditated" But It Won't Rise to an "Impeachable Offense"
Are you r****ded? Are you seriously trying to convince people that the constitution allows the president to become dictator? How I hate it when I ignore my ignore list.
Well, I will paraphrase Trader Jorge's response for him in advance. Professor Rothstein is a professor at George-TOWN, who US News and world report routinely ranks in or around the top 10 law schools in the country. Turley, meanwhile is only a professor at George WASHINGTON, which gets a paltry top 20 ranking. Plus his name rhymes with girlie. Plus, it's Hanukah. So I'm going with Rothstein.
If anyone is able to understand VL's argument here, please share. He is a law professor at Georgetown. Since he didn't go to Georgetown for his education, he is somehow less credible? This is almost as good as adeelsiddiqui's famous assertion that there is a HUGE number of Muslims in America because 30% of all American Muslims are black. VL, are you aware that you make absolutely no sense? You remind me of my crazy uncle who spouts off nonsensical lunacy at the Thanksgiving dinner table. We give him some courtesy laughs and chuckles and just hope he quits talking. No one is able to understand his point so it's best to just move the conversation elsewhere.
Thanks that was actually very enlightening and I helps me understand Prof. Rothstein's point better. From what I gather I believe Rothstein DOES believe that the President has dictatorial powers in regard to national security but recognizes that there is a constraint put on by the political nature of the checks and balances. I disagree with him whether the Constitution gives dictatorial powers but I think he's right on about the political check. Impeachment is much more a political process than it is a legal process. A president could be impeached without technically breaking the law or could not be impeached even if they did. Besides that though the Executive branch can still be restricted by the Judicial branch if it is found to be violating the law and while the Judicial branch can't remove the President it could still indict and possibly even convict the person in office, ala Jones v. Clinton, and it can still judge and even penalize the Executive branch.
nephew, my point is I don't think he's response is the most accurate.. do you think his response is most accurate because he's a professor at georgetown? or it just so happens you agree with it? howbout the response of the professor at george washington university? is it wrong because its not georgetown? what if some professor from georgetown agrees that bush should be impeached? my point is don't put all your hope on the opinion of one professor.. use your own common sense if you have one.. can the president break the law/constitution and not be accountable? where do you want to take the conversation?
. . . or outside the law? By Bruce Fein December 28, 2005 President Bush secretly ordered the National Security Agency (NSA) to eavesdrop on the international communications of U.S. citizens in violation of the warrant requirement of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, abominations. The eavesdropping continued for four years, long after fears of imminent September 11 repetitions had lapsed, before the disclosure by the New York Times this month. Mr. Bush has continued the NSA spying without congressional authorization or ratification of the earlier interceptions. (In sharp contrast, Abraham Lincoln obtained congressional ratification for the emergency measures taken in the wake of Fort Sumter, including suspending the writ of habeas corpus). Mr. Bush has adamantly refused to acknowledge any constitutional limitations on his power to wage war indefinitely against international terrorism, other than an unelaborated assertion he is not a dictator. Claims to inherent authority to break and enter homes, to intercept purely domestic communications, or to herd citizens into concentration camps reminiscent of World War II, for example, have not been ruled out if the commander in chief believes the measures would help defeat al Qaeda or sister terrorist threats. Volumes of war powers nonsense have been assembled to defend Mr. Bush's defiance of the legislative branch and claim of wartime omnipotence so long as terrorism persists, i.e., in perpetuity. Congress should undertake a national inquest into his conduct and claims to determine whether impeachable usurpations are at hand. As Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist 65, impeachment lies for "abuse or violation of some public trust," misbehaviors that "relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself." The Founding Fathers confined presidential war powers to avoid the oppressions of kings. Despite championing a muscular and energetic chief executive, Hamilton in Federalist 69 accepted that the president must generally bow to congressional directions even in times of war: "The president is to be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States. In this respect, his authority would be nominally the same with that of the king of Great Britain, but in substance much inferior to it. It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces; while that of the British king extends to declaring war and to the raising and regulating of fleets and armies -- all which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature." President Bush's claim of inherent authority to flout congressional limitations in warring against international terrorism thus stumbles on the original meaning of the commander in chief provision in Article II, section 2. The claim is not established by the fact that many of Mr. Bush's predecessors have made comparable assertions. In Youngstown Sheet & Tube v. Sawyer (1952), the U.S. Supreme Court rejected President Truman's claim of inherent power to seize a steel mill to settle a labor dispute during the Korean War in reliance on previous seizures of private businesses by other presidents. Writing for a 6-3 majority, Justice Hugo Black amplified: "But even if this be true, Congress has not thereby lost its exclusive constitutional authority to make laws necessary and proper to carry out the powers vested in the Constitution in the Government of the United States." Indeed, no unconstitutional usurpation is saved by longevity. For 50 years, Congress claimed power to thwart executive decisions through "legislative vetoes." The Supreme Court, nevertheless, held the practice void in Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha (1983). Approximately 200 laws were set aside. Similarly, the high court declared in Erie Railroad v. Tompkins (1938) that federal courts for a century since Swift v. Tyson (1842) had unconstitutionally exceeded their adjudicative powers in fashioning a federal common law to decide disputes between citizens of different states. President Bush preposterously argues the Sept. 14, 2001, congressional resolution authorizing "all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations or persons [the president] determines" were implicated in the September 11 attacks provided legal sanction for the indefinite NSA eavesdropping outside the aegis of FISA. But the FISA statute expressly limits emergency surveillances of citizens during wartime to 15 days, unless the president obtains congressional approval for an extension: "[T]he president, through the attorney general, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order... to acquire foreign intelligence information for a period not to exceed 15 calendar days following a declaration of war by the Congress." A cardinal canon of statutory interpretation teaches that a specific statute like FISA trumps a general statute like the congressional war resolution. Neither the resolution's language nor legislative history even hints that Congress intended a repeal of FISA. Moreover, the White House has maintained Congress was not asked for a law authorizing the NSA eavesdropping because the legislature would have balked, not because the statute would have duplicated the war resolution. As Youngstown Sheet & Tube instructs, the war powers of the president are at their nadir where, as with the NSA eavesdropping, he acts contrary to a federal statute. Further, that case invalidated a seizure of private property (with just compensation) a vastly less troublesome invasion of civil liberties than the NSA's indefinite interception of international conversations on Mr. Bush's say so alone. Congress should insist the president cease the spying unless or until a proper statute is enacted or face possible impeachment. The Constitution's separation of powers is too important to be discarded in the name of expediency. http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/bfein.htm
here is former Dean of the Chicago Law School, Geoffrey R. Stone http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0512210141dec21,1,3284631.story?ctrack=1&cset=true Bush has the audacity to assert that his authorization of NSA surveillance of American citizens on American soil was "lawful." It was not. It was a blatant and arrogant violation of American law. If Bush wanted the authority to undertake such surveillance, he should have gone directly to Congress and sought such authorization, publicly. He did not do this, because it would not have been granted. So, instead of acting in accord with his pledge to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States," he acted surreptitiously and unconstitutionally.
