Ten Questions Question Number One: Should a president be forced to read out loud all the provisions of a bill he is about to sign into law? If "yes", then Question Number Two: Could that be televised, in order to avoid the kind of pure embarrassment played out on front pages across the country today? I know that most of us would rather practice self-dentistry than listen to George W. Bush stumble along, the camera focused on the lines in his forehead as he furrows his brow down page after page of legalese. The fact that he probably wouldn't understand most of it makes no difference - I know nothing about quantum physics, but I could easily recite a few pages from a textbook - damn the mispronunciations; full speed ahead. Question Number Three: What am I getting at? Fair enough. Let's start with some quotes. Bush met with a consortium of newspaper editors yesterday, and was asked a question, to which he answered, "When I first read that in the newspaper about the need to have passports, particularly today's crossings that take place, about a million for instance in the state of Texas, I said, what's going on here?" George's curiousity stems from the latest Homeland Security rules, which will require Americans and all others to produce their passports as they cross the Mexican and Canadian borders into the United States. "If people have to have a passport, it's going to disrupt the honest flow of traffic. I think there's some flexibility in the law, and that's what we're checking out right now." He thinks there's some flexibility in the law. They're checking it out now. Question Number Four: Am I ever going to answer Question Number Three? The passport measure was included in the last intelligence reform bill, the one Bush signed back in December. It was a highly-touted piece of legislation, long in the making and overwhelmingly supported in the Senate (89 votes for, two against) and in the House (336 pros to 75 cons). Moderate Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine called it "the most difficult bill to bring from conception to birth that I can imagine being involved with." The Commander in Chief seemed to have a pretty firm grasp of the material at the time. "I am pleased the measure also contains many critical law enforcement tools that I have called for that will help make America more secure," he said. "I look forward to signing this landmark piece of legislation into law." Question Number Five: Then why didn't he read it? More disturbing than that, what other provisions (Question Number Six) has he unknowingly etched into our lawbooks? This is the leader of the free world (Question Number Seven), democracy's champion, the rostrum of the conservative vessel that tows America into ever-deeper waters each day? I'm sure plenty of presidents have blithely splattered their signatures across the page as they changed forever the lives of the citizens in their charge without knowing a thing about that which they were signing. I just can't think of any at this particular moment. In any case, I'm sure Bush always has the best of intentions when he uncaps his pen each day. After all, he says, "I thought there was a better way to expedite the legal flow of traffic and people". Question Number Eight: You thought? Question Number Nine: Did you also not know that this same bill "lays the foundation for a de facto national ID card"? The ACLU, which actually read the bill, noticed. They also noticed that earlier versions of the bill established an independent review board to safeguard our civil liberties, but that conservatives eventually watered down the oversight idea considerably. Question Number Ten: Mr. President, aren't you worried that your statements today will bother some Republicans, who will see your confusion as a bit of a backpedal? Some conservative lawmakers didn't feel this bill went far enough in curbing illegal immigration in the first place. Jim Sensenbrenner hysterically called it "a recipe for disaster - the same kind of disaster that occurred on 9/11." Calling for a rollback on the passport rule will surely not sit well with them. I would advise you, dear reader, to buy stock in antacids, because the president's public befuddlement on this matter will do nothing to settle the stomachs of most Americans. It doesn't seem too much to ask of our nation's most important public servant to read the stuff that gets thrown on his desk, even if it was written by his cronies in Congress. I'd like to ask Dubya if this little surprise gives him a firmer resolve to actually read more bills in the future before he attaches his blessings to them, but I'm afraid I'll have to stop with the questions. By this time, he's all out of fingers on which to keep track of them. Paul Heller 04/15/05 << back to the archives
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