Another Bitch-slap For Bush

According to the Financial Times:

President George W. Bush had shown disdain and indifference for the US constitution by adopting an “astonishingly broad” view of presidential powers, a leading libertarian think-tank said on Monday.

The critique from the Cato Institute reflects growing criticism by conservatives about administration policy in areas such as the “war on terror” and undermining congressional power.

“The pattern that emerges is one of a ceaseless push for power, unchecked by either the courts or Congress, one in short of disdain for constitutional limits,” the report by legal scholars Gene Healy and Timothy Lynch concludes.

The Cato Institute's Wikpedia entry says:

Though officially non-partisan, Cato is heavily linked to the Republican Party and the conservative movement in general. The large donors who fund both Cato and Republican candidates include Fed Ex founder Fred Smith, Australian-born media tycoon and Fox CEO Rupert Murdoch, tobacco-maker Phillip Morris, the John M. Olin Foundation, and Charles Koch. Cato also draws its staff largely from a Washington DC-based pool of Republican writers and lobbyists.