And then attach a signing statement which says that he doesn’t have to obey the withdrawl date? After all, Bush has signed other bills into law, and attached signing statements which said he wasn’t limited by what the bill said (the anti-torture bill comes to mind), so why threaten a veto now? Just slap a signing statement on it and be done with it.
Congress has yet to challenge the legality of signing statements, and any such effort would be tied up in the courts for years, so it’s not like he’d have to worry that he’d be shut down.
Because people are watching him now. His previous signing statements are water under the bridge from a time when the legislative branch was majority Republican. Now both Congress and the people are against him.
Because then he couldn’t accuse the democrats of undermining the war. IMO, Bush’s top priority is now finding someone else to blame for Iraq. War Czar, Democratic Congress, his successor, he doesn’t care, as long as he can point the finger at someone else. Everything with him is political. Everything he does is calculated to give him the maximum political advantage.
What are the mechanics of the money being made available to the Executive Branch? If Congress appropriates money subject to conditions, and Bush issues a signing statement saying he’s ignoring those conditions, can Congress prevent him from spending the money?
It’s not like we’re talking bags of hundred-dollar bills, after all: we’re talking about spending authority - a line on an electronic balance sheet.
Or to ask a similar but even more basic question: what (other than the threat of impeachment) is to prevent Bush from spending money on whatever he wants, whether Congress has appropriated the money or not?
Because the signing statement doesn’t mean anything; it’s just his personal opinion. It’s no more meaningful than if he just said it to his own reflection in the bathroom mirror.
If Bush signs the funding bill, it’s the law and must be obeyed.
You can’t challenge the legality of signing statements because there isn’t anything to challenge. It would be like challenging the color of his tie.
You COULD challenge *something George Bush actually did * that was in contravention of the law.
Even if congress hypothetically were able to override the veto, why would Bush cede his absolute CIC authority to congress? I would imagine he’d just take the money and keep the troops where they are, and ignore the provision for redeployment as an encroachment upon what he sees as the Unitary Executive.
All expenditures from government funds need the signature of a Disbursing Officer. That’s an official autorized to pay out federal funds in accordance with the appropriations made by Congress. Disbursing Officers are personally liable for all money paid out and are on the hook if it is improperly paid.
Yes, in the stratospheric financial levels its only a line on a balance sheet. But sooner or later a soldier must get a check that he can turn in to a bank and get actual cash. Suppliers of materiel must also be given a check convertable to cash. That line on a balance sheet becomes a transfer of money from a US Treasury account to the account of a person or business.
As I see it, the weakness of the House Bill is that there doesn’t appear to be any requirement for the President to keep the Congress informed as to the progress of the withdrawl planning. A way to really control the way the Iraq war money is spend and to hold the President to the line would be to use a “progress payment” method. That is, give GW a bunch of withdrawal progress benchmarks with the release of money tied to him having achieved the required progress toward withdrawal.
Otherwise GW could accept the requirement to withdraw, spend the money and then when withdrawal deadline comes say, “Sorry, we need more time and money to plan an orderly withdrawal.”
I can’t decide which is funnier: imagining Bush doing Travis Bickle (“You talkin’ to me?”) or Vincent Vega (“You’re gonna go home, jerk off, and go to bed”).
Of course signing statements matter; agencies within the executive look to them to determine exactly how they are going to interpret and execute the relevant law.
But a signing statement wouldn’t work here because, unlike in many cases of signing statements, if the Bush adminstration attempted to disregard a deadline for withdrawal, it would be (a) obvious (Congress would notice if it was the day after the withdrawal deadline and troops were still in Iraq); and (b) something to which Congress can effectively respond (Congress could immediately defund the war).
Sure they could, but would they? It seems to me that Congress would be in the same position as it is now. With the troops in Iraq Congress simply must provide sufficient money for them to defend themselves.
I don’t see any way other than impeachment for Congress to control a President who refuses to accept his obligation to insure that the laws are faithfully executed. I doesn’t look as if Congress as presently coinstituted is going to impeach Bush and certainly not convict him in any case.
Cite that Bush can generate a reflection in the mirror?
I think there’s a little difference between making a signing statement that he has no intention of enforcing part or all of a law that he signed and spending money with no authorization from Congress. He can do the former until someone takes him to court about not following the law, the latter isn’t in his power.
Spending money contrary to Congress’ authorization isn’t in the President’s legal power. However, I’m quite sure that there is a disbursing officer (or officers) attached to the President’s Office and we’ve seen how willing subordinates are to do the bidding, legal or not, of superiors in this administration. I see no reason to believe that at least some DOD disbursing officers wouldn’t be equally compaisant. They might later go to jail but the money would have been spent and the prospect of going to jail doesn’t seem to be a deterrent. After all the enforcement agency that would investigate their misdeeds, the Justice Department, is also part of the executive branch.
