President Bush’s thumb-in-your-eye approach to congressional oversight was on full display last week when he made 17 recess appointments, a tactic used by presidents to avoid the Senate confirmation process.
It doesn’t help matters that many of the appointees are widely considered unqualified.
Topping the list is Julie Myers, a credentials-lite government lawyer from Kansas named to head the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. Bush also named a political crony, Ellen Sauerbrey (in photo), to lead State Department refugee relief efforts.
Critics point out that some of these appointees are about as qualified for their posts as Michael Brown was to run the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Didn’t Bush learn from that fiasco?
Posted by Randy Scholfield
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13 Comments
Every Administration and every government from Federal, State, to Local has people who are appointed or hired for positions they are not clearly qualified for. You can say that about any company also.
We can nitpick all day and find all kind of unqualified people everywhere.
There is an abundance of evidence showing continued abuse of power by the “not-so-bright” goon in the White House.
These so-called appointments of unqualified people are all part of definite pattern of reckless immature behavior which are hurtful to the better interests of the United States.
Yeah, you can find unqualified people at every level of every organization, including the military. And in some cases it’s probably true that everybody, including the Boss, knows they’re unqualified.
But to go around Congress to make these kinds of appointments? That’s folly, imo. It’s pretty hard to shrug your shoulders at that kind of _repeated_ presidential behavior.
I think you can make two conclusions (at least) here, neither of which is new and both of which serve in part as just another data point in President Bush’s growing set of underwhelming leadership trends.
One, President Bush obviously does not believe that Mike Brown’s words and actions during Hurricane Katrina constitute a failure of any kind on the part of FEMA or his administration (alternatively, he believes the political fallout from “you’re doin’ a heckuva job, Brownie!” can be overcome). Trend: denial of responsiblity leads to a lack of accountability in the Bush administration.
Two, President Bush does not think the executive branch of US federal government is subject to the checks of Congress. Trend: the President does not believe in the balance of powers denoted by the phrase “checks and balance” of constitutional power.
By his actions, President Bush _invites_ the kind of cynicism and the level of vitriol currently displayed in American civic discourse. I don’t think there can be any other conclusion, really.
$0.02
Yawn…aren’t recess appointments done by every president?
Regarding the qualifications of the appointees, well, Randy, you told us about what their critics say. To be fair, can you tell us what their supporters say? I didn’t think so.
These people are PERFECTLY qualified. They make Bush look intelligent by comparison!
I love the “what’s good for the goose is good for the gander” arguments that get trotted out for this president. They’re a sign of a desperate psychological need to justify one’s obvious repulsion at their own actions. Sure, presidents used recess appointments before, but none of them abused it like Shrub. Sure, incompetence is present in every institution, but rarely has one administration completely inverted the dynamic to the point where the higher one goes on the food chain, the less those people know anything about what they’re doing.
And Flike, the President hasn’t read the Constitution, so it’s not a matter of whether he believes in checks and balances. He is ignorant of the concept entirely. His inner circle has read the constitution and they have been trying to dismantle it ever since Richard Nixon. They believe in a Corporate American Empire and the only way to get that is to disenfranchise the middle class by stripping them of any access to the Constitutionally gaurenteed redress of grievances.
Bush has nothing to lose, so he’ll continue to take care of his cronies, like he always has. At least we can say he’s consistant and predictable. Get used to seeing more of the same for the next three years. 2008 can’t come soon enough for me.
Report: Iraq war costs could top $2 trillion
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0110/dailyUpdate.html
You can only have an Imperial Presidency when you have an accomodating Congress. So far, the Congress has played their part.
Will the recent legal problems Congress has encountered get them to make changes? We will see. I am not holding my breath and expect to see cosmetic efforts that will not make the ugly picture that much prettier.
I invite readers to take a look at the URL I have listed below. I’ve noticed that there is not a “Billionaires for Bush” chapter here in Kansas and view this as a serious oversight. Check out some of the user names on the Chapters – they’re a riot.
Quinn you should be a little more fair towards Bush. After all, can you really expect him to read the ENTIRE Constitution when he just learned to spell his name 5 years ago?? Will you be reasonable.
PS. Never mind understand it.
Ed! Wait until we go into Iran. Looks like we might do just that after the 2006 elections.
Hopefully by after the 2006 elections congress will have enough members loyal to the United States to stop all funding to the Pentagon without a complete overhaul.
Goodbye Rumsfeld and all of his Israeli firsters. Selling our top-secrets to China will once again become a crime, while all of our soldiers will be coming home in one piece.
We can negotiate a peace with Iran and the rest of the Arab world by simply putting Israel back across the green-line, removing their {our} nuclear weapons and forming an Independent Palestinian State with East Jerusalem as its Capitol.
See how easy all that can happen?
The only reason Iran needs nuclear weapons is to protect itself from Israeli aggression.
If Iraq had had nuclear weapons or WMDs we would not have attacked. We have proved to Iran that they need nuclear weapons and they do in order to protect themselves from Bush and his gang.