Senator Kerry Blogs at the Democratic Daily!

Please be sure and read Senator Kerry's post at the Democratic Daily. It is time for new leadership in the Senate and John Kerry is working hard to support candidates that will lead with integrity and true American values for all of us. This is what Senator Kerry had to say:

"Posted by John Kerry
May 26th, 2006 @ 1:41 pm

Remember Brownie? This morning Senate Republicans might as well have given him a federal judgeship.

If there’s anything the last five years have proven — from Iraq to Katrina – it’s that competence matters.

Federal judgeships cannot be political gifts to political cronies.

But that’s what happened this morning – Brett Kavanaugh is now a judge on the D.C. Circuit. And Washington barely seemed to notice – in spite of the noise we Democrats made about his outrageous nomination.

Am I overstating the case? You tell me.

Mr. Kavanaugh’s legal experience consists largely of three years with Ken Starr and responsibility in the White House Counsel’s Office for selecting right-wing judicial nominees.

Now he’ll be a judge on one of the most important federal courts with huge impacts on worker rights and employee safety, clean air, and clean water. But not once in his hearings did Mr. Kavanaugh point to any experience in these areas of the law. Brett Kavanaugh doesn’t have the experience for this job. An attorney who has played a central role in only five court cases isn’t ready to manage one.

What are we stuck with? Judges on the D.C. Circuit — the court to which Mr. Kavanaugh was just confirmed — averaged over 26 years of legal experience at the time of their confirmation. Kavanaugh will be a glaring exception. In his 15-year legal career, he has only played a central role in five cases—and was the lead counsel in only three of those.

So why did he get the job? Kavanaugh has been a key member of the Bush Administration from day one. Now the President’s Staff Secretary, he began his White House career in the Office of Legal Council. During his tenure there, his primary responsibility was selecting and preparing federal court nominees. Given his past recommendations, judges like Priscilla Owen, Janice Rogers-Brown, and William Pryor, and his central role in pushing the federal judiciary far to the right of mainstream American, I don’t think I’m going out on a limb predicting the kind of judge Kavanaugh will be.

In his three years with Ken Starr, not only did he help craft the articles of impeachment against President Clinton, he publicly defended Starr after it was over, calling him an “American hero” who fell victim to a “presidentially approved smear campaign against him.”

Federal judges are supposed to be above the political fray. Most come to us with unimpeachable qualifications. But this judgeship reeks of political payback.

I voted against Kavanaugh’s nomination as did 35 other senators. Every one a Democrat. But it wasn’t enough.

So here’s what has to happen.

Soon we will be asked to vote on the nominations of Terrance Boyle to the Fourth Circuit and Mike Wallace to the Fifth Circuit. Boyle’s nomination is opposed by an unprecedented group of at least 30 law enforcement associations, and Michael Wallace’s nomination received the first ABA rating of unanimously “not qualified” since President Reagan. If we are to stop the ideological court-packing that is taking place under this Administration, if we are to stop this culture of cronyism and protect the integrity and independence of our federal courts, we need to stand strong against these nominees, you need to speak out, write to your senators and your newspapers. Force a debate.

But the real answer? We don’t have enough Democrats in the Senate. Want to end the cronyism? Win the Senate this November.

End of story – that’s the only real and lasting answer."

Thank you Senator Kerry! We needed you in 2004 and we need you in 2008 even more.

America needs honesty and integrity in Washington. We need qualified judges looking out for our rights and our freedoms. Not more cronies from the Republicans!

We got your back John!

Bob

Senator Kerry Addresses Kenyon College Commencement

As reported on Scoop, Senator Kerry addressed the graduates of Kenyon College on Saturday, May 20, 2006. this is the text of his speech:

Monday, 22 May 2006, 12:43 pm
Speech: U.S. Senator
Sen. John Kerry - Kenyon College Commencement

John Kerry Delivers Kenyon College Commencement Address
By Senator John Kerry
Kenyon College
Saturday 20 May 2006

Class of 2006 - fellow survivors of November 2, 2004. I'm happy to be here at this beautiful school, which had my admiration long before that night when the country wondered whether I would win - and whether you would vote.

Your website has a profile of a very smart math major in the class of 2006. Joe Neilson. He said that once, after a statistics course here, he realized "the probability of any event in our lives is about zero." "I probably spent a week," Joe said, "annoying my friends by saying: "What are the odds?" Well Joe, what were the odds that we'd be linked by those long hours - not that I keep track - 560 days ago? Like everyone that night, I admired the tenacity of Kenyon students. But what you did went far beyond tenacity.

My wife, Teresa, is honored by the degree you grant her, today. But she's also here to honor you because when you grow up in a dictatorship as she did, when you don't get a chance to vote until you're thirty-one , when you see your father voting for the first time in his seventies, you know what a privilege it is to cast a ballot.

Through that long night, we in Massachusetts watched you in Gambier. We were honored. We were inspired. We were determined not to concede until our team had checked every possibility. If you could stay up all night to vote, we could certainly stay up that next day to make sure your vote would count. In the end, we couldn't close the gap. We would have given anything to have fulfilled your hopes.

And I also thank those who cast a ballot for my opponent. I wish all Republicans had been just like you at Kenyon - informed, willing to stand up for your views - and only 10 percent of the vote. Actually, all of you, through your patience, and good humor showed Americans that politics matters to young people. And so I really do thank every student here.

I especially want to thank someone who isn't a student. Because at the meeting Hayes was kind enough to mention - and I did take notes - the alums made it clear how much they'd been influenced by great friends, great teachers. Or a great coach.

I know what it's like to be on a team before an important game. I know how crucial that last practice can be. For the field hockey team, that November 2nd was the last day before the Oberlin game. Winning meant getting into the league championship - and from there to the NCAAs. So I can understand why players were upset after hours waiting in line at the polling place that afternoon. When Maggie Hill called her coach to ask if she should come back to practice - you'd expect the coach to say 'you better believe it.'

This coach had a different reaction. "I'll cancel practice," she said, "and I'm sending the whole team to vote." In that one moment she became a hero to me, and an example to many. It takes a special coach to know there are more important things than a big game. We should all express our gratitude to Robin Cash. Her values are the values of Kenyon.

By the way, for parents who may not remember - Kenyon played brilliantly - and won that Oberlin game 3-zip.

Now, it's not as if seeing brilliance here at Kenyon is a surprise. Like everybody, I know that when you look at a resume and see a Kenyon degree, you think, "Smart. Committed. Good writer." And maybe, "Likes to see a lot of stars at night."

But there's more. The Kenyon alums I met with were so eloquent about what it meant to be here, where all your friends live, study, and play along a one mile path in a town surrounded by cornfields. One said, "I came here on a cold, rainy October, but after my interview I saw professors having coffee at the deli, and heard everybody so excited about the Tom Stoppard play they were putting on - I fell in love with the place." Someone else said, "Intelligent conversation permeates the whole campus." Another said - and I don't think he was kidding - "Nobody gets drunk at Commencement."

We talked until I got dragged into an intelligence briefing from the White House. Believe me, I learned more at the Kenyon meeting.

What they said sounded very familiar. And important. Because there are other places where you can find a small community - where the bonds you forge will never dissolve. You can find it on a tiny boat in the rivers of Vietnam's Mekong Delta. You can even find it in the Senate - sometimes.

Someone described to me what it's like walking into Gund for dinner after your girl friend breaks up with you. You see every single person staring to make sure you're all right. I thought, "Sounds like walking into the Democratic Caucus after that first New Hampshire poll."

The fact is, the Kenyon grads in Washington didn't agree on everything. But they agreed that Kenyon is a place where you have the luxury of examining an idea not for whether it sounds good but for whether it is good.

Actually, one Kenyon parent told me something that bothered him. His son took Quest for Justice his first semester here. That's not what bothered him. But, the class met early in the morning, and his son made every class. After years of pushing his kid to get out of bed, the father wanted to know, "What changed?" His son said, "Dad, I could disappoint you. But not Professor Baumann."

And that brings up one of the things I want to talk about. For the Election Day event that united us was a disappointment. There's no way around it. Even as we flew in over Columbus this morning, I was looking down at the Ohio landscape, thinking: we came so close. So what. You cannot go through life without disappointment. No team, no politician, no writer, no scientist - no one avoids defeat.

The question is: what do you do next?

It's simple: you pick yourself up and keep on fighting. Losing a battle doesn't mean you've lost the war. Whether it's a term paper, an experiment or a race for President, you will learn from experience, and experience breeds success.

That's important, because frankly there are so many things to fight for. By that, I don't just mean the things we fight over in the halls of Congress. Kenyon produces graduates that produce our literature and drama - like E.L. Doctorow did with The March, 54 years after leaving Gambier. Or Allison Janney did on West Wing - the first show ever to portray politics with something approaching the complexity it deserves. Your challenge is to produce and perform the rich imaginative works that move and illuminate your time. Kenyon has vastly expanded its science programs. And your challenge is to fight in laboratories against enemies like the tiny HIV virus that has created the most devastating epidemic in human history - killing more people every two hours than there are in this graduating class. At a time when we read about the high-tech jobs of a globalized world, your challenge is to find a way to educate the millions of Americans who can't get those jobs because they can't read well enough to understand how to get online.

And now, we are engaged in a misguided war. Like the war of my generation, it began with an official deception. It's a war that in addition to the human cost - the tragedy of tens of thousands of Iraqis and Americans dead and wounded - will cost a trillion dollars. Enough to endow 10,000 Kenyons. Money that could fight poverty, disease, and hunger. And so, your challenge is also to find a way to reclaim America's conscience. I have no doubt you will. For one thing you have great role models. Like your parents, sitting out there under the trees. You may laugh looking at the old photos of your dad in a ponytail, and your mom in bellbottoms and that crazy, tie-dyed shirt. But their generation too faced the task of ending a war. And they did.

And went on to invent Earth Day, march against racism, bring women into the workplace and become the first generation to usher in an acceptance for all people regardless of race, religion, gender or sexuality.

They honored democracy by making government face issues of conscience - and I ask you to applaud them for making the world better BEFORE they made it better by making you what you are!

And of course, in addition to those sitting behind you - you have great role models sitting among you. Students from this class who had a dream, took a chance, and have already achieved great things.

I know, because sitting here is a student who dreamed of being published, and felt ambitious enough to send a poem he'd written for class to the Chatauqua Literary Journal. And so Sam Anderson became a published poet at the age of 21.

I know, because sitting here is a student who, watched a cousin struggle with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, dreamed of finding a way to help - and designed a project that involved her with the leading DMD researcher in the world. Now Amy Aloe's been invited to work in his ground-breaking lab.

I know, because sitting here is a student who dreamed of returning to the country of her birth, the country that shaped a part of my life. And in Vietnam, Nhu Truong could examine not just issues, but the more difficult job of examining herself..

They all took a chance. If you ever despair of making a difference you'll have Kenyon people to remind you of what's possible if you take that chance.

And not just from the class of '06.

One of the alums mentioned that every week, a group of them meet to talk about issues. They don't think alike about every idea, he said. But they share a passion for ideas they learned here. Another asked me to tell those of you suspicious of government, that "it's made up of a lot of people like us, trying to make things better."

The group included one alum who's well known here - and getting well known in Washington. But a while back he was just a nervous 24-year old, sitting silently in a meeting with a new Secretary of State. Until he got up the nerve to raise his hand and make a point. "Who's that young, red-haired kid?" Condoleeza Rice said afterward, to an aide. "Keep your eye on him." No, she didn't mean he was a security risk. He'd said something that, as a Washington Post reporter put it, "crystallized her thoughts about foreign policy." And now Chris Brose, Kenyon 2002, travels everywhere with Secretary Rice, not just crafting her speeches but talking about policy. I wish the policies were a little different, but he's making a mark. He's making a difference. You know, during World War II, my father was flying planes in the Army Air Corps. While he was away on duty, my mother was volunteering to care for the sick and wounded. She sent him a letter about it. "You have no idea of the ways in which one can be useful right now," she wrote. "There's something for everyone to do." She was right about her time. And what she wrote is right about yours too.

In a few minutes you will walk across this stage for your diploma. You'll line up on the steps of Rosse Hall to sing for the last time. You'll turn in your hoods, go back and finish packing. Maybe sell that ratty sofa to somebody from the class of 2007. And then you'll watch the cars pull away. I know you've heard too many times the old saying that commencement is not an end but a beginning. The truth is, it's both. It is a day to feel sad about leaving Gambier. It's a day to feel eager about what lies ahead. Because you have a special mission. Those who worked to end a war long ago, now ask you to help end a war today. Those who worked to end poverty ask you to finish what we have left undone. We ask you to take a chance. We ask you to work for change. Promise yourselves, promise your parents, promise your teachers that you will use what you have learned. Don't doubt for an instant that you can. Only doubt those pessimists who say you can't. For all along the way, I promise, that while you leave the campus, Kenyon will never leave you.

You will be linked by the experiences vividly brought to life today by Hayes Wong, who experienced them with you.

As you fight for justice in this world, you will be linked by the insights you all had in courses like Quest for Justice. You will be linked to classmates whose success you predict will take the world by storm - and to some whose success takes you by surprise. You will be linked by the times you sat on a bench in Middle Path and argued about politics with people whose views you opposed - and learned you could disagree and still be friends. At some point you'll see that this small campus that changed you has already produced enormous change in the world.

But much more is urgently needed.

Remember that the bedrock of America's greatest advances-the foundation of all we take for granted today - was formed not by cheering on things as they were, but by taking them on and demanding change. No wonder Thomas Jefferson himself said that "dissent is the highest form of patriotism."

So if you're not satisfied with the dialogue today, if you feel your issues are being ignored, speak out, act out, and make your issues the voting issues of our nation.

You might say, "who's he kidding? We can't do that." Well, I remember when you couldn't even mention environmental issues without a snicker. But then in the '70s people got tired of seeing the Cuyahoga River catch on fire from all the pollution. So one day millions of Americans marched. Politicians had no choice but to take notice. Twelve Congressmen were dubbed the Dirty Dozen, and soon after seven were kicked out of office. The floodgates were opened. We got the Clean Air Act, The Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water. We created the EPA. The quality of life improved because concerned citizens made their issues matter in elections.

So it's up to you now to take up the challenge of your times if you want to restore a politics of big ideas, not small-minded attacks.

Make no mistake - you'll meet resistance. You'll find plenty of people who think you should just keep your mouths shut or that by speaking out you're somehow less than patriotic. But that's not really new either. When we protested the war in Vietnam some would weigh in against us saying: "My country right or wrong." Our response was simple: "Yes, my country right or wrong. When right, keep it right and when wrong, make it right."

Graduates of the Class of 2006, you know how to make it right - and you will see that it came from what you learned here: from a class so compelling you were awake at the crack of dawn to learn - from that night Teresa and I will never forget when you waited patiently till 4:15 at a polling place in Gambier - or from a coach who knew that her mission was to teach you how to win on and off the field.

Congratulations - and God Bless."

Thank you Senator Kerry!

Keep on picking yourself up and keep on fighting! America needs you to provide leadership, wisdom, and integrity to the highest office in the land!

Bob

The Language of America is Freedom!

America is about Freedom.

The First Amendment to the Constitution states:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Does Freedom of Speech include the language that it is spoken?

Or what about the Fourteenth Amendment, Section 1:

" Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Doesn't that mean that every American has rights protected by the Constitution? Equal rights including having government treat him or her equally regardless of the language they speak?

Certainly it is important that we strive to communicate with each other in a common language. And certainly English is the major language of this country. And certainly we need to find ways to teach English in our schools to those who do not speak this language, offer English courses to older non-English speaking immigrants and encourage things that will add to understanding each other and not pursue things that divide us.

As reported yesterday in the New York Times (May 19, 2006):

WASHINGTON, May 18 — The Senate voted on Thursday to designate English as the national language. In a charged debate, Republican backers of the proposal, which was added to the Senate's immigration measure on a 63-to-34 vote, said that it was equivalent to establishing a formal national anthem or motto and that it would simply affirm the pre-eminence of English without overturning laws or rules on bilingualism.

But is it that simple?

As the article continues:

Under the Inhofe proposal, the federal government is directed to "preserve and enhance the role of English as the national language of the United States of America." It does not go as far as proposals to designate English the nation's official language, which would require all government publications and business to be in English.

Instead, it says government services and publications now offered in other languages would be unaffected. But the proposal declares that no one has "a right, entitlement or claim to have the government of the United States or any of its officials or representatives act, communicate, perform or provide services or provide materials in any language other than English."

Again, the Republicans seek to limit "rights". To limit communication. To limit services. And yes to limit understanding itself.

Instead of a compassionate government, the Republican leadership seeks another wedge issue to promote the "purity" in America. Instead of reaching out to all Americans in understanding, speaking in their own language, this Republican leadership wishes to whip-up the crowds of Xenophobic Americans threatened by those different than themselves.

America is not under attack by foreign-speaking immigrants! America is under attack by right-wing xenophobic extremists who do not understand the very inscription on the Statue of Liberty. They seek to rewrite the very text itself:

"Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Perhaps adding the line, "give me your English-speaking refugees!"

President George W. Bush speaks for the Republicans when he advocated the singing of the National Anthem in English:

When the president was asked at a Rose Garden question-and-answer session whether the anthem should be sung in Spanish, he replied: "I think the national anthem ought to be sung in English, and I think people who want to be a citizen of this country ought to learn English and they ought to learn to sing the national anthem in English."

But America is not about English. It is about freedom!

The freedom to be different. To speak freely. To write freely. To vote freely.

And yes, the freedom to speak in any language we choose.

And the government that we elect is sworn to uphold the freedoms so specifically written into the Constitution.

But this President and this Republican party threatens our very freedoms. They exploit our fears of things we don't understand and advocate for the "purity" of our nation. Whether it be our language, our religion, our political views, our foreign policy, or even our sexuality, the very most private of freedoms, Republicans seek to regulate and mandate conformity to their narrowest views of freedom.

America can and must do better! We need to stand tall and protect our freedom from those that seek wedge issues to divide us. To make any American feel second-rate. To place any American under conditions of second-class citizenship is unconscionable.

Bob

Senator Kerry Talks to Stephanie Miller on the Air!

Listen here for the John Kerry interview with Stephanie Miller!

Visit the Stephanie Miller website for more on this.

Bob

Just Say "No" to Fear!

I wanted to share with all of you a column I recently had published in SitNews, from Ketchikan, Alaska.

May 14, 2006
Sunday


Dan Thomasson of the Scripps Howard News Service recently wrote in SitNews (5/12/06) that Democrats were calling for revenge and impeachment and investigations. He is using the new Republican talking points that are once again trying to frighten Americans from doing what is right and needed urgently: throwing the scoundrels who have given us the mess that is now our American political scene out of office!

This Administration has regularly relied on provoking fear among the electorate to further their political shenanigans. In defense of the illegal collection of calling information from millions of Americans, this President calls upon the fearful picture of 9/11 and claims we haven't had another attack have we?

They have used fear to advance their privatization schemes trying to frighten Seniors about the solvency of their Social Security checks and then advocating diverting funds from the Social Security Trust Fund towards private accounts; an action that any observant American would realize would only hasten the demise of that Trust Fund.

They have used fear to deprive us of civil liberties, bypassing FISA courts when law demands it.

They used fear and lies to get us into an unnecessary war in Iraq, distorting intelligence, fixing the facts according to the Downing Street Memo, and outing a CIA operative who herself was involved in research on WMD's, compromising our own intelligence community to advance their own political agenda.

They even use fear of homosexuals, blatent homophobia, to advance their political agendas by claiming marriage is "under attack" that two gays getting married will somehow undermine our own marriages. That we need to pass laws and Constitutional Amendments to "protect the sanctity of marriage" when what they really mean is that we should reach down into our ugly reservoir of hate and insecurity and pass laws to hurt two people who wish to express their love for one another and have the state prevent them from doing so. Shameful.

They use fear and threaten our privacy by checking the books we take out of the library and the internet searches we wish to perform by unchecked investigations into the private lives of every American.

I am tired of being frightened by politicians.

I will not allow myself to be afraid anymore.

America is too great a country to allow desparate despots to undermine our Freedoms, our love of each other, our protection of our liberty and our desire to live in a world where war is a thing of the past, where mutual respect and tolerance prevails, and where the law and Constitution are meaningful.

It is time to send the Republicans in the House, the Senate, and yes in the Presidency packing. Bring back government for the people, by the people and of the people.

Just say no to fear.

Robert Freedland

Senator Kerry Mistakenly Attributes Quote to Jefferson!

Mark Steyn has pointed out that the Kerry comment on "Dissent is the greatest form of patriotism" is not actually a quote from Thomas Jefferson.

The column relates:

"According to the Jefferson Library: "There are a number of quotes that we do not find in Thomas Jefferson's correspondence or other writings; in such cases, Jefferson should not be cited as the source. Among the most common of these spurious Jefferson quotes are: ‘Dissent is the highest form of patriotism.'"

So Kerry was wrong when he stated:

"In the infancy of the Republic, in 1798, Congress enacted the Alien and Sedition Acts to smear Thomas Jefferson and accuse him of treason. Newspapers were shut down, and their editors arrested, including Benjamin Franklin’s grandson. No wonder Thomas Jefferson himself said: “Dissent is the greatest form of patriotism.”

No actually, it was the historian Howard Zinn, who in an interview with TomPaine.com stated:

"While some people think that dissent is unpatriotic, I would argue that dissent is the highest form of patriotism. In fact, if patriotism means being true to the principles for which your country is supposed to stand, then certainly the right to dissent is one of those principles. And if we're exercising that right to dissent, it's a patriotic act."

Senator John Kerry made a mistake.

I should like to apologize for him.

Now let us hear from the Republicans about apologizing for our President who:

"In a first-term press conference, [the president] said he could not remember any mistakes."

But John Kerry mis-attributed a quote.

Our current President and the Republicans in Congress ignore signing statements where the President advises members of this Administration to break the law.

But Senator Kerry windsurfs.

And this President and the Republican Congress turned a Government Surplus into massive Federal Deficits during wartime by making irresponsible tax-cuts to benefit the top 1% of taxpayers.

But Senator Kerry's wife is a near-billionaire.

And this President and his Administration have broken the law against illegal wiretapping by ignoring Congressional requirements to go to the FISA courts before tapping Americans' phones and communication.

But Senator Kerry doesn't connect well like the Prez.

And this President "fixed the facts" to get us into a war that wasn't related to 9/11, never had evidence about WMD's, and has lied about why we are there to the American people. This President and his Administration has authorized torture of enemy combatants, rendition of individuals to third party secret jails where they can be tortured off American soil, undermined our environmental protections, loosened protection by appointing lobbyists to regulatory positions, threatened scientific investigation by putting roadblocks in embryonic stem cell research, has threatened our religious freedom by mixing religion and politics, and has sought to divide us by creating wedge issues to deny individuals of freedom and civil liberties.

But John Kerry first voted for the war and then against the war!

So you tell me who has made more mistakes that have cost America dearly! You tell me why Senator Kerry shouldn't be President in 2008! America needs his leadership, his passion for freedom, and his understanding about international relations more than ever before. And we can handle an occasional misquote.

But what we can't tolerate anymore is the attack on our very American freedom that this President and his cronies have launched.

We got your back John!

Bob

Founding Fathers Warned about the Imperial Presidency!

On January 21, 2005, President Bush was sworn in for his second term as President. As part of the swearing in ceremony, the President-elect is required as per Article II Section 1 in the Constitution to state:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."

The Constitution is more than a "Goddamned piece of paper." The Constitution is that document that protects our freedom, determines our nation, and establishes our Democracy.

One of the foundations of the freedom of our nation has been the notion of "Separation of Powers." As explained:

"By distributing the essential business of government among three separate but interdependent branches, the Constitutional Framers ensured that the principal powers of the government, legislative, executive and judicial, were not concentrated in the hands of any single branch. Allocating governmental authority among three separate branches also prevented the formation of too strong a national government capable of overpowering the individual state governments. The Separation of Powers, by which the executive, legislative, and judicial branches are to be independent and not infringe upon each other's rights and duties, is one of the basic doctrines in the US Constitution."

Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist Papers No. 69 explained his understanding of the power of the President and the distinguishing features between the American system and English royalty:

"The President of the United States is to have power to return a bill, which shall have passed the two branches of the legislature, for reconsideration; and the bill so returned is to become a law, if, upon that reconsideration, it be approved by two thirds of both houses. The king of Great Britain, on his part, has an absolute negative upon the acts of the two houses of Parliament. The disuse of that power for a considerable time past does not affect the reality of its existence; and is to be ascribed wholly to the crown's having found the means of substituting influence to authority, or the art of gaining a majority in one or the other of the two houses, to the necessity of exerting a prerogative which could seldom be exerted without hazarding some degree of national agitation."

And yet this President has advocated that government ignore the law, directed subordinates to break the law, and has placed himself above the law itself. In an unprecedented 750 times, this President has added signing statements to 1 out of 10 laws he has signed.

A few examples:

"March 9: Justice Department officials must give reports to Congress by certain dates on how the FBI is using the USA Patriot Act to search homes and secretly seize papers.

Bush's signing statement: The president can order Justice Department officials to withhold any information from Congress if he decides it could impair national security or executive branch operations."

or on Torture:

"Dec. 30, 2005: US interrogators cannot torture prisoners or otherwise subject them to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

Bush's signing statement: The president, as commander in chief, can waive the torture ban if he decides that harsh interrogation techniques will assist in preventing terrorist attacks.

Or how about directing military personnel to break the law and follow the President's wishes rather than what Congress has directed?

"Aug. 5: The military cannot add to its files any illegally gathered intelligence, including information obtained about Americans in violation of the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches.

Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can tell the military whether or not it can use any specific piece of intelligence."

or how about this one:

"Nov. 6, 2003: US officials in Iraq cannot prevent an inspector general for the Coalition Provisional Authority from carrying out any investigation. The inspector general must tell Congress if officials refuse to cooperate with his inquiries.

Bush's signing statement: The inspector general ''shall refrain" from investigating anything involving sensitive plans, intelligence, national security, or anything already being investigated by the Pentagon. The inspector cannot tell Congress anything if the president decides that disclosing the information would impair foreign relations, national security, or executive branch operations.

President Bush is undermining laws made by out properly elected Congressmen and Senators. In fact laws passed by a Congress controlled by his own Republican Party! What is wrong with this picture?

George Washington, on September 17, 1796, warned of the dangers of an unlimited Presidency. Our first President stated:

"It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution, in those intrusted with its administration, to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominates in the human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories, and constituting each the Guardian of the Public Weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern; some of them in our country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way, which the constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for, though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit, which the use can at any time yield."

We shall no longer have a Democratic country if this practice of undermining and yes indeed subverting the very laws of Congress isn't stopped.

Let us remember the words of Alexander Hamilton who described the difference between our form of government and the then-royal run government of Britain.

Our nation does not need a King. We are a nation where every American is bound to follow the law. Two hundred years ago, our very first President warned about those that would try to usurp power into the Executive branch. This President is determined to ignore the will of Congress, to mock its requests, and to obstruct the business of this nation.

America Deserves Better! It is time for change in America! America deserves a President who is sworn to uphold and protect our Constitution and not ignore it.

Bob