[QUOTE=Hamlet]
I don’t see the job of Attorney General of the US as the President’s legal lap dog. The Attorney General represents the United States and the US Constitution, not some fantatical PResident with delusions about the extent of his power. In that role, Gonzalez has been atrocious. His stance on torture and the NSA program especially prove to me he is unconcerned with the actual Constitution and law, and more concerned with being Bush’s lickspittle.
[/QUOTE]
Right on. I think the legal opinions of Yoo and Gonzales have exaggereated GW’s delusions about the extent of Presidential power. All sorts of precedents have been set such as a little torture is acceptable in a pinch and national defense requsires that individual liberty be sacrificed. These will come back to bite citizens in the future when some new megalomaniac uses the precedents as a rung on the upward ladder of goverhmental power vis à vis the public.
[QUOTE=tomndebb]
HEY! You think this is some kind of hallway? Wipe your feet before you track that stuff through here!
[/QUOTE]
What are you, the fucking hall monitor?
[QUOTE=Hamlet]
The Attorney General represents the United States and the US Constitution
[/quote]
The oath of office for *all * federal officeholders, AG included: “I (name), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”
Yep. He didn’t swear to support and defend the President but the Constitution.
[QUOTE=ElvisL1ves]
The oath of office for *all * federal officeholders, AG included: "I (name), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.
[/quote]
When I made that affirmation in 1944 there was no “So help me God.” in it.
Added in 1962 for enlisteds and 1959 for officers, around the time God was inserted into the Pledge of Allegiance.
[QUOTE=Hamlet]
I don’t see the job of Attorney General of the US as the President’s legal lap dog.
[/QUOTE]
Well yeah, but you can be sure that El Presidente Himself certainly views the job that way, and that nobody disagreed would be permitted to hold the job.
[QUOTE=ElvisL1ves]
Added in 1962 for enlisteds and 1959 for officers, around the time God was inserted into the Pledge of Allegiance.
[/QUOTE]
That’s curious because the inclusion of the “swear (or affirm)” is still in there and the “affirm” is to allow those who object to taking a religious oath to serve.
You don’t want to take a religious oath so you make the affirmation and end it with “So help me God.”
What a world.
[QUOTE=David Simmons]
Right on. I think the legal opinions of Yoo and Gonzales have exaggereated GW’s delusions about the extent of Presidential power. All sorts of precedents have been set such as a little torture is acceptable in a pinch and national defense requsires that individual liberty be sacrificed. These will come back to bite citizens in the future when some new megalomaniac uses the precedents as a rung on the upward ladder of goverhmental power vis à vis the public.
[/QUOTE]
Let’s just ask the Bush-lovers what they think President Hillary Clinton will do with all that power.
(Stand back as heads explode.)