Bush on the Constitution: 'It's just a goddamned piece of paper'
By DOUG THOMPSON
Dec 9, 2005, 07:53
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pagehttp://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_7779.shtml
Last month, Republican Congressional leaders filed into the Oval Office to
meet with President George W. Bush and talk about renewing the controversial
USA Patriot Act.
Several provisions of the act, passed in the shell shocked period immediately
following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, caused enough anger that liberal groups
like the American Civil Liberties Union had joined forces with prominent
conservatives like Phyllis Schlafly and Bob Barr to oppose renewal.
GOP leaders told Bush that his hardcore push to renew the more onerous
provisions of the act could further alienate conservatives still mad at the
President from his botched attempt to nominate White House Counsel Harriet
Miers to the Supreme Court.
I dont give a goddamn, Bush retorted. Im the President and the
Commander-in-Chief. Do it my way.
Mr. President, one aide in the meeting said. There is a valid case that
the provisions in this law undermine the Constitution.
Stop throwing the Constitution in my face, Bush screamed back. Its just a
goddamned piece of paper!
Ive talked to three people present for the meeting that day and they all
confirm that the President of the United States called the Constitution a
goddamned piece of paper.
And, to the Bush Administration, the Constitution of the United States is
little more than toilet paper stained from all the shit that this group of
power-mad despots have dumped on the freedoms that goddamned piece of paper
used to guarantee.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, while still White House counsel, wrote
that the Constitution is an outdated document.
Put aside, for a moment, political affiliation or personal beliefs. It
doesnt matter if you are a Democrat, Republican or Independent. It doesnt
matter if you support the invasion or Iraq or not. Despite our differences,
the Constitution has stood for two centuries as the defining document of our
government, the final source to determine in the end if something is legal
or right.
Every federal official including the President who takes an oath of
office swears to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States."
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia says he cringes when someone calls the
Constitution a living document.
"Oh, how I hate the phrase we havea 'living document, Scalia says. We
now have a Constitution that means whatever we want it to mean. The
Constitution is not a living organism, for Pete's sake.
As a judge, Scalia says, I don't have to prove that the Constitution is
perfect; I just have to prove that it's better than anything else.
President Bush has proposed seven amendments to the Constitution over the
last five years, including a controversial amendment to define marriage as a
union between a man and woman. Members of Congress have proposed some 11,000
amendments over the last decade, ranging from repeal of the right to bear arms
to a Constitutional ban on abortion.
Scalia says the danger of tinkering with the Constitution comes from a loss
of rights.
We can take away rights just as we can grant new ones, Scalia warns. Don't
think that it's a one-way street.
And dont buy the White House hype that the USA Patriot Act is a necessary
tool to fight terrorism. It is a dangerous law that infringes on the rights of
every American citizen and, as one brave aide told President Bush, something
that undermines the Constitution of the United States.
But why should Bush care? After all, the Constitution is just a goddamned
piece of paper.
© Copyright 2005 by Capitol Hill Blue
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