This President is so evil. Today he recess-appointed three individuals, including the nefarious Hans von Spakovsky (discussed here), to the Federal Election Commission. In so doing, he bypassed the Senate confirmation process for FEC Commissioners and guaranteed that these three will sit on the FEC until the end of this congressional session (and, not coincidentally, through the 2006 election).
Why did he do this? Probably because he knows that at least the Von Spakovsky nomination could be a huge battle, and he doesn’t want any more confirmation fights. Plus, Von Spakovsky’s nomination would have been an opportunity to bring up lots of stuff that Bush doesn’t want to talk about – like, for example, the notorious 2000 pre-election purge of Florida’s voting rolls, which was inspired by Von Spakovsky’s ideas.
It’s long past time that someone took on this kind of clear abuse of the recess appointment power. As I’ve explained before, the Constitution really doesn’t authorize the President to use the power in this way, although both Democratic and Republican Presidents have been doing this for years. Maybe Von Spakovsky on the FEC will be enough to get some Senator pissed off enough to file suit.
Have I mentioned that I really don’t like this President?
UPDATE: I should have mentioned that among the other people Bush recess-appointed today are Ellen Sauerbrey and Julie Myers, both of whom are spectacularly unqualified for the important posts they will now hold. Myers is so unqualified that she had opposition on the right as well as the left.
