More Power
Posted on | October 6, 2006
Congress passes a bill requiring minimum qualifications for the head of FEMA, seeking to avoid the tragedy and embarrassment of another Michael Brown. Our Leader signs it into law:
To shield FEMA from cronyism, Congress established new job qualifications for the agency’s director in last week’s homeland security bill. The law says the president must nominate a candidate who has “a demonstrated ability in and knowledge of emergency management” and “not less than five years of executive leadership.”
Bush signed the homeland-security bill on Wednesday morning….
Were you waiting for the other shoe to drop? You weren’t disappointed:
….Then, hours later, he issued a signing statement saying he could ignore the new restrictions. Bush maintains that under his interpretation of the Constitution, the FEMA provision interfered with his power to make personnel decisions….
Bush’s signing statement challenged at least three-dozen laws specified in the bill. Among those he targeted is a provision that empowers the FEMA director to tell Congress about the nation’s emergency management needs without White House permission. This law, Bush said, “purports . . . to limit supervision of an executive branch official in the provision of advice to the Congress.” Despite the law, he said, the FEMA director would be required to get clearance from the White House before telling lawmakers anything.
Bush: above the law since 1946. He’s just promised us more heckuva-job Brownies.
