Bush administration memos on presidential powers stun legal experts (LAT)

[struggle4progress]

Secret memos from the Justice Department said that only the president could set rules in the war on terrorism -- which law professors say flies in the face of the Constitution.
By David G. Savage
March 4, 2009

... Yale law professor Jack Balkin called this a "theory of presidential dictatorship. They say the battlefield is everywhere. And the president can do anything he wants, so long as it involves the military and the enemy" ...

"I agree with the left on this one," said Orin Kerr, a law professor at George Washington University. The approach in the memos "was simply not a plausible reading of the case law. The Bush <Office of Legal Counsel> eventually rejected <the> memos because they were wrong on the law -- and they were right to do so" ...

A March 2002 memo, for example, said that holding prisoners in wartime "is an area in which the president appears to enjoy exclusive authority, as the power . . . is not reserved by the Constitution in whole or in part to any other branch of government."

Duke University law professor Walter Dellinger said the Constitution gives Congress considerable power for making wartime rules ...

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/washingtondc/la-na-bush-memos4-2009mar04,0,643986.story

[deutsey]

1. Yep, all us crazy lefties were all paranoid, weren't we?

:evilfrown:

[Demeter]

2. Just Because I'm Paranoid Doesn't Mean He Wasn't Out to Get Me

[bemildred]

3. Sometimes standing on a grassy knoll with a tin-foil hat is the way to go. nt