Did do his research before writing letter

This letter is in response to Paul Stukel's Aug. 20 letter.

In responding to my letter to the editor, Stukel suggested I needed to do more research before I commented on the subject of signing statements.

In fact, I did quite a bit of research before writing the letter. A Google search for "presidential signing statements" produces the following documents on the first page:

A 1993 item published by the U.S. government at www.usdoj.gov/olc/sign-ng.htm describes legal and valid uses of signing statements, as well as some of the less clear uses, like those chosen by the president.

At http://writ.news.find-law.com/dean/20060113.html, you'll find a 2006 article by John Dean White House counsel to Richard Nixon, a cautionary article about the president's use of signing statements.

Finally, an article published in the Boston Globe in April 2006 details some of the bills to which the president has attached signing statements, and the intent the administration stated for them. This can be found at http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/04/30/ examples of the presidents signing statements.

Stukel took part of a paragraph out of context and misconstrued that I believe the Bush administration had created the concept of signing statements. That was not my intent, which, in the context of the entire paragraph, should have been obvious.

The Bush administration has used signing statements to indicate the administration's intent to ignore laws created by Congress, the branch of our government with the sole authority to legislate, in a vain attempt to legitimize his failure to live within those laws.

My point remains that this president has, in fact, ignored standing law ratified by Congress, laws that he himself signed. That is one of many reasons why he should be impeached.

David Shroder

Elgin