Dahlia Lithwick on the Bush administration's modus operandi

A lot of people have linked to this already--I found it courtesy of Andrew Sullivan. But the article really is excellent. Dahlia Lithwick is a great writer who is able to make obscure and not so obscure legal stories interesting and to tease out their ramifications. She has a great piece over at Slate on the meaning of Bush's use of presidential signing statements.

His signing statements are not aimed at persuading the courts, but at
reinforcing his claim that both courts and Congress are irrelevant.

She makes the point that even though Bush's signing statements may not have legal authority, they have a direct effect on the executive branch for whom these statements indicate how Bush intends them to implement, or not, legislation.

I'm certainly not doing the piece justice here, but I want to post it up. It's well worth a read.