Recess

The reason the Founders granted the Presidential power of the recess appointment is because Congressmen would have long periods outside of Washington and there was no bullet train or airplane to get them back quickly if an important position needed to be filled. Surely the recess appointment was not supposed to be an end run around the advise and consent clause of the Constitution. Yet George W. has used the recess appointment clause over 100 times to put through radicals who would not win a vote of confirmation in the Senate. Not only was Sam Fox, Swift-Boat funder, made ambassador to Belgium on this recess appointment, but an advocate for Social Security privatization was made deputy commissioner of Social Security, and an anti-regulatory maven put in charge of regulatory policy at the Office of Management and Budget.

Bush may be a CEO President, but he certainly governs like a lawyer, looking for any loophole in the Constitution to allow him to do what he wants. These loopholes are seen as idiosynchracies from a bygone age, but shouldn't they be closed by now? Would there EVER be a situation when an emergency recess appointment would have to be made? When you couldn't get the Senate back in session for its confirmation duties? Of course not.

We pretty much need a new Constitutional Convention in this country to take a look at everything once again. That's the REAL legacy of this President.

P.S. Apparently the Sam Fox appointment may be illegal:

To fight the Fox appointment, Democrats are questioning the Bush administration's plan to have Fox serve in a voluntary capacity -- receiving no pay for his duties as ambassador. This is an important legal technicality, as federal law prohibits "payment of services" for certain recess appointments. However, if the recess appointee in question agrees that he or she will take an unpaid position and not sue the government at a later date for compensation, then the appointment can go forward, at least as the White House sees it.

So as long as Fox -- a multi-millionaire -- agreed not to sue the Bush administration later for not paying him, the White House would be comfortable with giving him an unpaid, "voluntary service" recess appointment as ambassador to Belgium.

But here's the rub that makes Democrats view Bush's recess appointment of Fox as a major-league no-no: Federal law prohibits "voluntary service" in cases where the position in question has a fixed rate of pay, as an ambassadorship does. That's how the Government Accountability Office, an arm of the Democratic-controlled Congress, interprets the law.

In other words, according to senior Democratic Senate aides, the salary is a "statutory entitlement" and cannot be waived. While Fox would not be receiving a salary, he would still be entitled to live in government-owned housing and receive other benefits due any ambassador.

"How to reconcile this clear conflict between the pay restriction, which says that Fox cannot be paid, with the voluntary services provision, which says that the State Department cannot accept voluntary services from Fox?" queried one senior Democratic aide who asked for anonymity to speak frankly about the matter.

"That is the $64,000 question," he added.