George W. Bush is reading your mail without a warrant:
President Bush has quietly claimed sweeping new powers to open Americans’ mail without a judge’s warrant, the Daily News has learned.
The President asserted his new authority when he signed a postal reform bill into law on Dec. 20. Bush then issued a “signing statement” that declared his right to open people’s mail under emergency conditions.
That claim is contrary to existing law and contradicted the bill he had just signed, say experts who have reviewed it….
Most of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act deals with mundane reform measures. But it also explicitly reinforced protections of first-class mail from searches without a court’s approval.
Reporter James Gordon Meek is right. You have to poke around for it (look for subsection 1010), but right in the middle of the text of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act is this text:
The Postal Service shall maintain one or more classes of mail for the transmission of letters sealed against inspection. The rate for each such class shall be uniform throughout the United States, its territories, and possessions. One such class shall provide for the most expeditious handling and transportation afforded mail matter by the Postal Service. No letter of such a class of domestic origin shall be opened except under authority of a search warrant authorized by law, or by an officer or employee of the Postal Service for the sole purpose of determining an address at which the letter can be delivered, or pursuant to the authorization of the addressee.
That language has been passed by both offices and it’s been signed, making it the law of the land. But of course, there’s always been the supreme law of the land, the United States Constitution. The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
That’s it. By specific, enacted law as well as by the Constitution, George W. Bush should not, can not, must not have your mail opened unless there is a warrant issued upon probable cause. And yet here is George W. Bush’s signing statement:
The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials…
In other words, “I’ll follow the law except when I think it’s necessary to violate the law. To hell with the Constitution, and to hell with warrants.”
There you have it. George W. Bush has issued a public declaration in which he openly declares his intent to violate the constitution and federal law.
If they won’t impeach him for this, what will it take?
To restore the rule of law, to restore respect for the Constitution of the United States, it is time to impeach the president.
Did you read Lewis Lapham in this month’s Harper’s? He reminds us that impeachment is justified (he notes that Bush’s signing statements have exempted him from over 1,000 federal laws), but that the Democrats in Congress won’t do it. Nancy Pelosi declared the idea “off the table.” Lapham also quotes Robert Reich, who wrote, “…it would be far better if Democrats used their newfound power to lay out a new agenda for America. There’s no point digging up more dirt.”
To which I say, “Bullshit.” When did we all become so afraid of a little dirt? Honestly.
An impeachment essay by Lapham from last February:
http://www.harpers.org/TheCaseForImpeachment.html
In case no one has noticed, we are at war. Who is going to remove a president during a war? Would this backlash with the public and put a Republican in the white house in ’08?
There are some precedents for what Dubya is doing, related to war. Might be completely legal if you think about it the right way, or if you get the supreme court to think about it the right way. Gosh, how could you get the supreme court to do that?
The nation is not agreed that war is not in our strategic national interest right now, nor that leaving Iraq will not cause a power vaccuum in the region and a situation even less in our national interest than before. Also this time around there is no draft–you saw how few people showed up at the march, even though it was billed more as an anti-W protest than an anti-war protest.
The impeachment question should be approached in the same way as the Iraq question, costs and benefits. The cost of trying to impeach Clinton was huge. What about the cost of Watergate? Nixon policy-types who were once starry-eyed about bringing the conservative agenda to fruition found their dreams stymied becasue the total focus during Watergate was damage control. There were no resources, energy and focus to enact their agenda.
Clinton impeachment: huge cost. War in Iraq: huge cost. Democrat in white house 2008: priceless.
On the plus side, if the impeachment stuff kept Clinton from enacting HIS policy during his last couple years in office, impeachment might be one tactic to keep Dubya from doing more damage until the election.
Also might want to think if this is just engaging in sectarian violence, keeping in mind that Americans fight by flinging their lawyers at each other. Many think the Clinton impeachment was just payback for Nixon, in fact some Republicans have been caught saying so in unguarded moments, so would Bush impeachment be payback for Clinton? It’s hard to let go of the anger at Dubya, but you have to think of the best interests of the nation.
Alan,
What are the “best interests of the nation?” The corporate sector (and the military-industrial complex) wants to keep it this way (since they’re making tons of money), but to the poor families who’s kids have died or been permanently disfigured from this illegal, immoral, mismanaged and unprovoked “war”, the taxpayers (us working poor mostly) who see no improvement in infrastructure, little help, the steady depletion of our tax dollars for a “war without end” which is going badly, and a mounting debt which will be passed on to our grandchildren (if China doesn’t call it in first and thereby crush our economy) it doesn’t seem to be in our/their best interests.
Well, you just asked the $64,000 question, Tom. Those who downplay terrorism often have another motive for doing so, like stopping the war, or electing Democrats. Those who voted for the war know quite well that there was a very real attack on this nation and that the public expect their leadership to “do something”.
There are those who say there has been no new attack on our soil becasue all the terrorists are congregating on Baghdad. there might be something to that
If you look at the war between the states, the south suffered disproportionaley because the conflict was played out on their soil. If a conflict with radial Islam is inevitable, some would prefer it take place in the Middle East and not here.
At the same time, the revolving door between haliburton/the cabinet/the intelligence services is troubling, the no-bid contracts are troubling, the national war debt is potentially crippling.
Ignoring for the moment that rich kids for some reason don’t volunteer to fight wars, those who are in Iraq DID volunteer.
All of these are problems and all are intertwined. As usual, no easy answers.
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If they won’t impeach Bush for this, what will they impeach him for? Nothing, quite clearly. Under the leadership of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, the Democrats aren’t standing up for what’s right. They’re just taking whatever stand gives them the most power. They’re in it for themselves, not for us.