Michael Mukasey urged Congress to give him a spanking new ass-cover:

Congress should explicitly declare a state of armed conflict with al Qaeda to make clear the United States can detain suspected members as long as the war on terrorism lasts, U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey said on Monday.

Mukasey urged Congress to make the declaration in a package of legislative proposals to establish a legal process for terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo, in response to a Supreme Court ruling last month that detainees had a constitutional right to challenge their detention.

“Any legislation should acknowledge again and explicitly that this nation remains engaged in an armed conflict with al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated organizations, who have already proclaimed themselves at war with us,” Mukasey said in a speech to the American Enterprise Institute.

“Congress should reaffirm that for the duration of the conflict the United States may detain as enemy combatants those who have engaged in hostilities or purposefully supported al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated organizations,” he said.

Meaning, of course, that up until now detentions have not been legal, so it’s bypass the Supreme Court time again. No news in that. What struck me, though, was the dead dictator upon whom this administration is patterning itself. W’s love for the “Pinochet Model” of mass privatization is well known, but it is not Agosto Pinochet whom Mukasey’s wishes evoke. No, it would be the grandaddy of cold war South American thugs,

Paraguay’s own Alfredo Stroessner, who ruled for 35 years starting with a coup in 1954. Now Paraguay had an exemplary constitution, but there was a clause that enabled the president, in times of grave national emergency, to declare a “state of siege.” To avoid abusing this special authority, if the president wished to renew the state of siege, an extension had to be approved by the legislature three months after the state of siege was declared. Stroessner was big into extensions. As his Washington Post obituary put it:

The general brought early stability and foreign investment to the Paraguayan economy. With time, he shrugged off his less savory policies as “the cost of peace” and kept his country in what he called a constant “state of siege” that overruled his democratic constitution.

There were commies in them thar hills, ya see, so for more than 30 years, exceptions had to be made. Just as Mukasey wants it now. Because there are terrorists here, there, and everywhere. As long as somebody’s mad at us. Or forever. Whichever ends sooner. The comparisons to the reign of W continue throughout Stroessner’s obituary.

Elections:

“El Excelentisimo,” as he sometimes trumpeted himself, was elected every five years with near-universal approval that he took for a clear mandate. However, voting fraud was rife, and he tended to receive overwhelming support from dead constituents.

Except in Paraguay, dead constituents make voter caging, bogus and/or broken machines, etc. etc. unnecessary.

Dealing with unlawful combatants/communist threats:

With a network of informants and the backing of the military, he tortured dissidents, both real and perceived.

A Paraguyan senator, Carlos Levi Rufinelli, a member of the token opposition party, told the New York Times in 1975: “I was a prisoner 19 times, and I was tortured six times. Most of the time, I did not know what they wanted. They did not even know what they wanted. But when they put the needles under your fingernails, you tell them anything, you denounce everybody, and then they say, ‘See, you were lying to us all the time.’ “

And of course, crony capitalism:

All the while, the country became astoundingly corrupt. Payoffs were essential to all commerce, with much of the swag going to top military officers. Paraguay became a sanctuary for smugglers in arms, drugs and everyday goods such as whiskey and car parts.

Good thing about term limits. It probably takes more than eight years for a dictator to really get his act going. Stroessner’s regime was able to accomplish more than Bush, Mukasey, et. al. could ever wish. Google Joelito Filartiga.

Time was, the Albany office of the Department of Motor Vehicles lived up to its stereotype: dingy, chaotic, and staffed with ornery people — or, to be fair, people probably rendered ornery by their dingy and chaotic surroundings.

The DMV was among the smudgy faces of gummint that righties used to sell their contracts with America for the rich to hoi polloi. Liberals, long known for giving America equality, suffrage, prosperity, and global leadership, became known for spawning — nasty bureaucrats.

Somewhere in the middle of the Cuomo administration, everything changed at the Albany DMV. The office was made more spacious. Lines moved rapidly to the reception desk, where you’d get a number, deli style, that also told you your expected wait time. Benches were hard wood, but no less comfortable than a typical church pew, and news feeds scrolled along the wall next to an electronic bulletin board that indicated which number was ready to go to which counter. And it made a loud “ding” every time a new number came up.  Best of all, the staff was helpful, even friendly (and as for the one or two not so friendly, at least they were colorful).

All it took were a couple tweaks, and this face of government turned into one freckle-faced kid in summer. So if all it takes are a couple of tweaks, why is Michael Lerner getting so ponderous on us?

Liberal programs emphasize economic needs and political rights. I’m a liberal, and support those programs. And they’ve proved very effective when it comes to delivering “objective” caring - the elimination of discrimination, leveling the playing field for competition in the public arena (at least among middle class people), and delivering economic aid for the poor.

…What liberals miss is that their government programs often lack any interest in fostering “subjective caring” - the experience of being cared for and about by those who deliver “objective caring.” Over the past 70 years, many people have come into contact with government employees (e.g. in the post office, the DMV, zoning and permit offices, INS, IRS, welfare and unemployment agencies) where subjective caring is rather scarce.

People often leave these encounters angry that their taxes are paying the salaries of disrespectful or emotionally deadened government employees whose one-dimensional following of the rules often ignores the subtleties of human life. These encounters leave many people open to the “downsize government” strategy of the political Right.

Just like a “liberal” to resurrect a right-wing straw man (person?) on the brink of the Republican Party’s going the way of the Whigs. All it takes are a couple of tweaks! Although I must admit, that subjective/objective caring thing does make one sound oh so academic.

Back in the day, when Michael Lerner was a FOB*, his “Politics of Meaning” had some buzz — until pundits ranging from Katha Pollitt to Maureen Dowd jumped all over its squishiness, and Lerner went the way that FOH* Jean Houston would go later.

Maybe Lerner sees a second shot at meaning for himself, as a FOBO, perhaps?

Instead of funding churches and worrying about possible indoctrination, it would make more sense to recast government programs and our public education systems so that they were required to see others as successful not just as maximizers of material self-interest and gratifications, but as love-oriented beings whose needs could be addressed without invoking any particular religious tradition.

Senator Obama should be seeking to have government programs and employees be judged effective in part by the degree to which they convey genuine caring and love. Far from being a slippery slope toward breaking separation of church and state, this direction is the most effective way to head off the assault on government that gains many enthusiasts from among those who have experienced government programs as missing the key elements of their humanity.

“Have government programs and employees be judged effective in part by the degree to which they convey genuine caring and love?”  Yeah, that’s Chicago politics.

Better to let dead memes stay dead. We don’t need meme zombies invading a countryside slowly coming to its senses. Oh, and I don’t want the DMV to love me. I just want some courtesy and efficiency.

*In the 1990’s there were such things as “Friends of Bill” and “Friends of Hillary.” Over the course of the Clinton presidency, these titles became ironic of course, because hey, the 1990’s were ironic.

In the real world , this would appear to be a non-story:

In an e-mail to the McCain campaign, Opinion Page Editor David Shipley said he could not accept the piece as written, but would be “pleased, though, to look at another draft.”

“Let me suggest an approach,” he wrote Friday. “The Obama piece worked for me because it offered new information (it appeared before his speech); while Senator Obama discussed Senator McCain, he also went into detail about his own plans. It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain that mirrors Senator Obama’s piece.”

In a statement released Monday, The New York Times said it is “standard procedure on our Op-Ed page, and that of other newspapers, to go back and forth with an author on his or her submission.”

I’ve had editors, and of course it is “standard procedure to go back and forth with an author on his or her submission” everywhere. I have one editor who routinely returns my submissions loaded with red ink markings and usually a note to the effect of “Terrific piece. Here are a few suggestions!”

It would seem to me that the author of Faith of My Fathers would know plenty about editors. Certainly more than I.

So why is teh nooz (i.e. CNN) all about this framing? Because the McCain campaign told them they should?

New York Times rejects McCain essay.

Why, that’s almost as bad as that wingnut wurst-mill, Newsmax:

NY Times Censors McCain Op-Ed

Huh? Rejects? Censors?

Teh nooz just wants to indulge this tantrum, I guess. Even Dan Abrams is calling the while flap “a win for McCain” because he gets to pick on the NY Times.

After all, we’re talking about a bona fide war hero here, a manly man among manly men. And he has this macho thing to say:

Waaahhh waaahhh waaaaahhh. That librul old NY Times likes the other guy best. No fair!! Waaahhh. Fight my battles for me, CNN. C’mon you guys! Beat up that mean old NY Times like you did when they wrote about Vicki Iseman.  I want to say what I want to say my way and. I. want. to. do. it. NOW!

So to the barricades, teh nooz! There’s a damsel manly man in distress. Editors scare him. Either that, or Dan Abrams is right. Kind of.

The McCain campaign’s one remaining defining characteristic is its preference for cheap shots. A “win” is when they can land one.

You can read McCain’s draft here.

Yep. Needs work I’d say.

On Chris Matthews’ Sunday Gaborama, an icicle of insight:

Howard Fineman drops a 10 megaton bomb, ready to detonate if only anyone notices. (Like that’s gonna happen!)

“You want to cover over your two terms with a third term the way Ronald Reagan did with George HW Bush.”

In other words, every Republican Presidential Administration since 1980 has been either a criminal enterprise, or a cover-up of a criminal enterprise. Thus was every Republican presidential administration for the past 40 years a criminal enterprise or a cover-up — since Gerald Ford couldn’t actually cover anything up after Nixon’s tapes were outed, he did the next best thing by pardoning the criminal. Oh, and he left us with this legacy:

But to Fineman’s point, there was this:

Lawrence E. Walsh concludes his account of prosecuting the Iran-contra affair on a decidedly sour note: ”What set Iran-contra apart from previous political scandals was the fact that a cover-up engineered in the White House of one President and completed by his successor prevented the rule of law from being applied to the perpetrators of criminal activity of constitutional dimension.” ”Firewall” is about how and why Walsh failed, for which he blames himself a little, Congress and conservative judges somewhat, but above all Reagan Administration officials who constructed a ”firewall” around the President after the illegal arms sales to Iran and the diversion of the proceeds to the contras were first revealed in November 1986.

… According to Walsh, Attorney General Edwin Meese was the cover-up’s architect, but he was assisted by Vice President George Bush; the chief of staff, Donald Regan; the Director of Central Intelligence, William Casey; [Caspar] Weinberger; and other top administration officials.

and this:

Six years after the arms-for-hostages scandal began to cast a shadow that would darken two Administrations, President Bush today granted full pardons to six former officials in Ronald Reagan’s Administration, including former Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger.

Mr. Weinberger was scheduled to stand trial on Jan. 5 on charges that he lied to Congress about his knowledge of the arms sales to Iran and efforts by other countries to help underwrite the Nicaraguan rebels, a case that was expected to focus on Mr. Weinberger’s private notes that contain references to Mr. Bush’s endorsement of the secret shipments to Iran.

… But in a single stroke, Mr. Bush swept away one conviction, three guilty pleas and two pending cases, virtually decapitating what was left of Mr. Walsh’s effort, which began in 1986. Mr. Bush’s decision was announced by the White House in a printed statement after the President left for Camp David, where he will spend the Christmas holiday.

And, of course, the mystery of mysteries, the grandaddy of modern GOP priorities and tactics, the conspiracy theory nobody complains is a conspiracy theory, really — this.

Troops in Afghanistan. Negotiations with Iran. Barack Obama gets to see how his foreign policy ideas might work, since the Republicans are busy adopting them. Of course, the people putting these ideas in play are the same people who accidentally leaked this to everybody in the USA:

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki supports US presidential candidate Barack Obama’s plan to withdraw US troops from Iraq within 16 months. When asked in and interview with SPIEGEL when he thinks US troops should leave Iraq, Maliki responded “as soon as possible, as far as we are concerned.” He then continued: “US presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes.”

And ever the politician –

…Maliki was careful to back away from outright support for Obama. “Of course, this is by no means an election endorsement. Who they choose as their president is the Americans’ business,” he said. But then, apparently referring to Republican candidate John McCain’s more open-ended Iraq policy, Maliki said: “Those who operate on the premise of short time periods in Iraq today are being more realistic. Artificially prolonging the tenure of US troops in Iraq would cause problems.”

Nonpartisan — uh huh. And as many have pointed out, the United States has been clear about respecting Iraq’s wishes.

That goes until they ACTUALLY ASK US TO LEAVE. So far.

I guess what separates a naif from a foreign policy expert is understanding this truth of the universe:

There is neither strength nor wisdom in spitting into the wind.

The wind is blowing the ball into the R side. Whaddaya gonna do, boyz?

UPDATE: This was quick. Ball back to al-Maliki. Iraqi Administration sings “I’m Your Puppet:”*

… a spokesman for al-Maliki said his remarks “were misunderstood, mistranslated and not conveyed accurately.”

Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the possibility of troop withdrawal was based on the continuance of security improvements, echoing statements that the White House made Friday after a meeting between al-Maliki and U.S. President Bush.

How’s that song go?

*I’m Your Puppet
Linden Oldham/Dan Penn
© 1965 Screen Gems/EMI Music Inc. (BMI)

Pull the string and I’ll wink at you, I’m your puppet
I’ll do funny things if you want me to, I’m your puppet

I’ll be yours to have and to hold
Darling you’ve got full control of your puppet

Pull another string and I’ll kiss your lips, I’m your puppet
Snap your finger and I’ll turn you some flips, I’m your puppet

Your every wish is my command
All you gotta do is wiggle your little hand
I’m your puppet, I’m your puppet

I’m just a toy, just a funny boy
That makes you laugh when you’re blue
I’ll be wonderful, do just what I’m told
I’ll do anything for you
I’m your puppet, I’m your puppet

Pull them little strings and I’ll sing you a song, I’m your puppet
Make me do right or make me do wrong, I’m your puppet

Treat me good and I’ll do anything
I’m just a puppet an you hold my string, I’m your puppet
Yeah, I’m your puppet

Walking, talking, living, loving puppet
I’m hanging on a string girl, I’ll do anything now

I’m a walking, talking, living, loving puppet, and I love you

I’m a smiling happy face when you want me to
Even make you happy when you’re feeling blue.

Oh, yeah.

Rep. Linda Sánchez  makes a good case for it:

Again last week, we saw the arrogance of former White House advisor Karl Rove when an empty chair sat for him in front of the House Judiciary subcommittee where he was required by subpoena to testify. Not only did he refuse to appear before the committee — let alone testify — but he defiantly left the country thereby blatantly ignoring his obligations under the congressional subpoena served on him. When he did return to the country, Rove found the time to gab with TV reporters on a summer press tour in Beverly Hills, but failed to stop by the Judiciary Committee in Washington.

…Mr. Rove should not be able to hide behind the president to avoid the American public. Americans are fed up with this administration flouting the law. They expect Congress to hold people accountable and that is exactly what we intend to do. Letting Mr. Rove get away with this would set a dangerous precedent. I have recommended that we hold Mr. Rove in contempt of Congress. If we need to revive the inherent contempt procedure which gives Congress the authority to arrest those who defy Congressional subpoenas, then so be it.

The courts have made clear that no one, not even the president, is immune from compulsory process. Any person who scoffs at the law and who has committed an offense that is punishable by jail time should be put in jail. This includes Karl Rove.

Robert Greenwald has a nifty video:

and a petition for you to sign for the Judiciary Committee!

Think it will make a difference? As Rep. Sánchez says, “The courts have made clear that no one, not even the president, is immune from compulsory process.” To date, Congress has sure seemed to me to have pulled in the exact opposite direction.

I’d say sign it anyway.

This month there are those recognizing this fourth anniversary (the decision was announced, actually, a week ago):

Palestinian leaders today said they would seek UN sanctions against Israel after the international court of justice ruled that the barrier being built around the West Bank was illegal and should be pulled down.

Announcing its findings, the court said the “security wall” infringed the rights of Palestinians, adding that Israel should pay compensation for the damage it had caused.

It was big news in a lot of places, except we had a presidential election going on. Besides, we officially sided with Israel:

Israeli officials insisted they would not accept the court’s ruling, saying the barrier provided a vital security bulwark against Palestinian suicide bombers. They argued it has already saved hundreds of lives since building work began.

…The Israeli position was supported by the US administration, which argued that the international court of justice was not the right place in which to address the issue. “We do not believe that that’s the appropriate forum to resolve what is a political issue,” White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.

At least the Israelis had a rationale. The United States faces no such threat from the Tohono O’odham nation. Who?

Calling it an affront to religious freedom, representatives of an Arizona Indian tribe have asked the federal government to halt construction of a border fence across the tribe’s Arizona reservation.

Leaders of the Tohono O’odham nation say the fence, currently being built along the U.S.-Mexican border by the Department of Homeland Security, will prevent members of their nation from crossing into Mexico for traditional religious ceremonies.

“This wall and the construction of this wall has destroyed our communities, our burial sites and ancient Tohono O’odham routes throughout our lands,” said Ofelia Rivas, according to the Washington Times.

Rivas argued that the fence will violate the 1978 American Indian Religious Freedom Act, which guarantees free exercise of traditional religious practices for Native Americans. She said that the fence would disrupt such practices by limiting travel to and from O’odham land in Mexico.

The Tohono O’odham reservation straddles the Mexican border for 75 miles in Arizona, and extends south into Mexico. According to the 2000 census, 18,000 people live on the reservation, which spans an area roughly the size of Connecticut.

For the sake of comparison, Connecticut’s land area is 5544 square miles; the West Bank’s is 2270.  So we’re not talking about some two-horse town here, exactly.

I guess, if the Tohono O’odham nation would bring this dispute to the Hague, DHS could argue that we stole the land fair and square, and so what are they doing on our border?

Ever since I was little I voted. Even when I was in (what at the time was called) Junior High, there were these big honking lever voting machines we’d use for student council voting — just to give us a feel for how the real grown-ups voted. I voted on those same big steel lever machine in in 2006 because  (drumroll)

I am from New York.

And New York is among the very last states to move from big honking steel lever voting machines to something consistent with new voting machine requirements. Too bad. Reality has set in.

New York state is in the process of replacing its lever voting machines with new voting equipment, but the state revealed recently that it has found problems with 50 percent of the roughly 1,500 ImageCast optical-scan machines… that Sequoia Voting Systems has delivered to the state so far — machines that are slated to be used by dozens of counties in the state’s September 9 primary and November 4 presidential election.

Douglas Kellner, co-chair of the New York State Board of Elections, expressed frustration with the vendor, saying it appeared that Sequoia was using the state’s acceptance testing process to find problems with its machines in lieu of a sound quality-control process.

“There’s no way the vendor could be adequately reviewing the machines and having so many problems,” he told Threat Level. “What it tells us is that the vendor just throws this stuff over the transom and does not do any alpha- or beta-testing of their own before they apply for certification testing. Then they expect that we’ll identify technical glitches and then they’ll correct those glitches. But correction of those glitches is an extraordinarily time-consuming process. And its very disappointing that this equipment is not ready for prime time.”

Wouldn’t you know? We’ve gotta throw a couple of elections, I guess, until we get the equipment right (and maybe get a legitimate election). 21st Century democracy. Somehow New York — the state of early 20th Century subways after all – just doesn’t feel the same with this newfangled garbage.

Governor David Paterson told the Alliance for School Choice that he’d like to lift New York’s cap on charter schools once and for all. This is not necessarily part of his march rightward past the center and straight into the Swamps of Wingnuttia, because he has had ties to school choice advocates for years.

The governor also said he believes New York charter schools should be allowed to offer pre-kindergarten programs, according to the individual, who didn’t want to be named because he isn’t authorized to speak for the organization.

Paterson has attended Alliance meetings several times over the past few years and school choice supporters held a fundraiser for him last spring. Ties to the school choice movement date back to Paterson’s days as Senate Democratic minority leader. New York maintains a cap of 200 charter schools.

A bit of history — alarm bells went off in 2004:

The first national comparison of test scores among children in charter schools and regular public schools shows charter school students often doing worse than comparable students in regular public schools.

The findings, buried in mountains of data the Education Department released without public announcement, dealt a blow to supporters of the charter school movement, including the Bush administration.

The data shows fourth graders attending charter schools performing about half a year behind students in other public schools in both reading and math. Put another way, only 25 percent of the fourth graders attending charters were proficient in reading and math, against 30 percent who were proficient in reading, and 32 percent in math, at traditional public schools.

Then, last Autumn New York City graded its own schools, issued its report card, but (oops!)

While the city graded 1,224 public schools from A to F for the first time this week, report cards for its 60 charter schools were stamped with a different mark: incomplete.

That’s because charter schools don’t measure student, teacher and parent satisfaction using the same Department of Education surveys, officials say.

Oh?

Those who questioned the immunity of charter schools from the grading scheme said it might wrongly suggest to parents that the schools have something to hide.

“I think it’s a mistake not to assess them the same way public schools are assessed,” said Merryl Tisch, vice chancellor of the state Board of Regents - one of the three charter-granting organizations in the state.

“There have been charter schools that have really struggled along the way,” she said. “What’s wrong with letting people know that?”

But then in a flash, voila! Methodological problems solved!

The city is pulling charter schools into the letter-grade game, and the privately run public schools have quickly jumped to the head of the class, claiming the top two spots in the city and raking in more A and B grades than traditional public schools.

Just 14 of the city’s 60 charter schools were graded this year, but city officials said that next year grades would go to all eligible charter schools.

Of the graded schools, only one received an F, while five earned As and six earned Bs. That means 79% of the graded charter schools got As and Bs, compared to 62% of the city’s traditional public schools.

Two “A”-graded middle schools, the Williamsburg Collegiate Charter School in Brooklyn and the KIPP Infinity Charter School in West Harlem, got the two highest grades in the city, when you look at the numeric scores that justify the letter grades.

“They clearly just knocked it out of the park,” the Department of Education’s executive director of charter schools, Michael Thomas Duffy, said. “It shows what is possible. I think that’s one of the best things that a charter can do, is say, ‘We can take these same students, and we can do amazing things with them.’”

And there was the take-away line. Keep in mind that only two of 60 “knocked it out of the park.”

So how does this stack against the 2004 NAEP Report Card? Is New York City an inspiring exception? Did charter schools get religion after 2004 and ratchet up their quality lickety split?

Or could a closer look at the original data tease out a clue?

To set the context, The New York Times added this tidbit in their own gusharama:

The grades were given only to some of the charter schools overseen by New York City, Mr. Duffy said, and not to any of those located in the city but monitored by New York State or the State University of New York. He said the city was working with the state to receive enough data to assign those schools grades.

This matters because just such a closer analysis published in 2006 found:

On average, the mean scores [in reading and mathematics] for charter schools affiliated with a PSD [public school district] were not significantly different from those for public noncharter schools. However, on average, the means of charter schools not affiliated with a PSD were significantly lower than the means for public noncharter schools, both with and without adjustment.

Can you say “cream?”

The broad context for all this lies in this short commentary Reed Hundt posted on TPM Café on Oct 01, 2005. I keep it on my desktop for just such an occasion as this:

When I was chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (1993-97), I asked Bill Bennett to visit my office so that I could ask him for help in seeking legislation that would pay for internet access in all classrooms and libraries in the country. Eventually Senators Olympia Snowe and Jay Rockefeller, with the White House leadership of President Clinton and Vice President Gore, put that provision in the Telecommunications Law of 1996, and today nearly 90% of all classrooms and libraries do have such access. The schools covered were public and private. So far the federal funding (actually collected from everyone as part of the phone bill) has been matched more or less equally with school district funding to total about $20 billion over the last seven years. More than 90% of all teachers praise the impact of such technology on their work. At any rate, since Mr. Bennett had been Secretary of Education I asked him to support the bill in the crucial stage when we needed Republican allies. He told me he would not help, because he did not want public schools to obtain new funding, new capability, new tools for success. He wanted them, he said, to fail so that they could be replaced with vouchers, charter schools, religious schools, and other forms of private education. Well, I thought, at least he’s candid about his true views. The key Senate committee voted almost on party lines on the bill, all D’s for and all R’s against, except one — Olympia Snowe. Her support provided the margin of victory. On the House side, Speaker Gingrich made sure the provision was not in the companion bill, but in conference again Senators Snowe and Rockefeller, with White House support, made the difference. The Internet has been the first technology made available to students in poorly funded schools at about the same time and in about the same way as to students in well funded schools.

 Which makes dancing with them that brung ya scary for the rest of us.

Congress’s oversight authority derives from its implied powers in the Constitution. So when Congress wants to oversee anything related to the Bush Administration, the Bush Administration and anyone who worked for the Bush administration who is so inclined, repond thusly:

Now, our president has only done that to Congress since the voters took Congress’ rubber stamp away in the 2006 elections, so at least some intrepid souls such as Rep. Conyers, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, could actually attempt to practice oversight.

You’d think the Supreme Court would be another matter. Three of the five justices who put Bush into power remain on the bench, and the two who have left — Rehnquist and O’Connor — have been replaced with two men even more to the president’s liking. And ever since 1803 the Supreme Court has claimed this thing called “judicial review,” which means they get to say what’s what, constitution-wise, to everyone else.

But even the Supreme Court of Roberts-Scalia-Kennedy-Thomas-Alito and four ever more inconsequential other folks can fail to rubber stamp the will of the Supreme Decider and Commander Guy, once in a while:

The Supreme Court, in a decision 15 months ago that startled the government, ordered the EPA to decide whether human health and welfare are being harmed by greenhouse gas pollution from cars, power plants and other sources, or to provide a good explanation for not doing so.

Times up, White House! And as the Washington Post points out:

To defer compliance with the Supreme Court’s demand, the White House has walked a tortured policy path, editing its officials’ congressional testimony, refusing to read documents prepared by career employees and approved by top appointees, requesting changes in computer models to lower estimates of the benefits of curbing carbon dioxide, and pushing narrowly drafted legislation on fuel-economy standards that officials said was meant to sap public interest in wider regulatory action.

The decision to solicit further comment overrides the EPA’s written recommendation from December. Officials said a few senior White House officials were unwilling to allow the EPA to state officially that global warming harms human welfare. Doing so would legally trigger sweeping regulatory requirements under the 45-year-old Clean Air Act, one of the pillars of U.S. environmental protection, and would cost utilities, automakers and others billions of dollars while also bringing economic benefits, EPA’s analyses found.

In short, the White House is saying to the Supreme Court:

Oddly, I’ve never seen a photo of another head of state making this gesture, especially not more than once! If an ancient Roman military salute came to be known as the “Hitler salute,” then let our unitary executive’s gesture hereinafter be known as the “Bush salute.”

Everybody ready?

Heil Bush!

Did you remember to salute?