Bush out to beef up presidency


Bush says the inherent powers of the presidency have eroded to an unsettling degree over the past 30 years and he is moving to reclaim the lost prerogatives of the nation's highest office. He has drawn a distinct line that he has suggested no one dare cross.
"I have an obligation to make sure that the presidency remains robust and that the legislative branch doesn't end up running the executive branch," Bush said.

Critics counter that the administration's effort is nothing more than a thinly veiled power grab and that the office of the president is more potent now than at any time in recent memory. Bruce Fein, a former Justice Department official who worked in several Republican administrations, said the United States "has never had a more imperial presidency, at least since (President Franklin D.) Roosevelt during his conduct of World War II."
"What the president is claiming is legally and historically absurd and politically stupid," Fein said.