Swamp Zombie
So we are really to believe that President Bush just sat around after 9/11 thinking, "How can I aggrandize my powers?" […]
This is the fever swamp into which American liberalism is on the verge of descending.
Vice President Dick Cheney, in January 2002:
[I]n 34 years, I have repeatedly seen an erosion of the powers and the ability of the president of the United States to do his job. We saw it in the War Powers Act. We saw it in the Budget Anti-Impoundment Act. […]
And one of the things that I feel an obligation, and I know the president does too, because we talked about it, is to pass on our offices in better shape than we found them to our successors. We are weaker today as an institution because of the unwise compromises that have been made over the last 30 to 35 years.
Definition of "aggrandize" here.
Cheney brags 10 days ago about responding to Sept. 11 by "restor[ing] the legitimate authority of presidency" here. Money quote:
"At the end of the Nixon administration, you had the nadir of the modern presidency in terms of authority and legitimacy," he said. "There have been a number of limitations that have been imposed in the aftermath of Vietnam and Watergate."
