At a hearing last week of the California State Lands Commission, which I chair, we passed a resolution critical of an effort to bypass our independent jurisdiction in approving new oil drilling proposals.

An editorial in last weekend's Los Angeles Times buttresses my position and explains what's at stake:

"[In late January,] the Lands Commission rightly rejected the plan on a 2-1 vote, and that should have been the end of it. [...]

Admittedly, the state could use the money. But that's not a good enough reason to subvert the authority of the Lands Commission, sell California's coastline in exchange for empty promises, ignore the wishes of Santa Barbara residents and dismiss the outcome of a long process of analysis and public hearings. The Lands Commission, in fact, was created in 1938 to bring more transparency to the awarding of oil leases after a scandal involving the Department of Finance."

National and state implications over the flip...

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Elections are thought of as a panacea. Thinking that winning an election is the cure for the ills of the Bush administration misses the core of the problem. The crisis created by the administration is bigger than just the man in office. The administration has placed the office of the presidency in conflict with our system of three separate branches of government.

Expecting the next president to cure the problem is asking the patient to cure himself. When the disease is too much unchecked power, what incentive is there for a president to operate and cut out his or her own power tumor? A power tumor in the presidency is not a threat to the office of the president, but a threat to the other branches of government. The malignancy is on our system of checks and balances, not on the human being occupying the office.

The system can only work properly as long as those in power constantly work to preserve the constitutionally established limits on the power of each branch. In the case of the executive branch, when the limits are disregarded or left unchecked, the system's protection against tyranny is breached.

There is a crisis in the executive branch. The Bush administration has breached our protections against tyranny by taking for itself enormous amounts of governmental power through intentional violations of constitutional and statutory law.

Charlie Savage, of The Boston Globe, won the Pulitzer Prize for his series reporting on the President's claim of authority to disobey the law.

President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.

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I have read much on the subject of impeachment, participated in lengthy discussions with peers and foes, commented on blogs and generally paid attention to the political pulse of this action. What it comes down to for me is a pragmatic and idealist issue of the law and the enforcement of the rules of law in our land. I do care for strategy. I do care for caution, and picking the right battles to ensure the right outcomes. But I care more about America and her soul, than any maneuvers to guarantee power. Without the base respect and enforcement of our laws to the highest levels of our representative government, what do we have left? Not a democracy. Not America...Something less than America.

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Dear Friends, I am a Democrat running for the US Congress from Kansas District 1.

As a school teacher, I always found it exciting to elaborate on why our founding fathers, which had just beaten the most powerful army in the world, were so meticulous about assuring that no branch of government would become too powerful.

The founding fathers wanted to ensure the new national government would not operate above the law and that ALL citizens' individual rights would be protected from the abuse by the national government...

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