Quote Originally Posted by Ashliana View Post
The answer to both of these is one and the same, and you should already know the answer. Our system is government is set up to allow our executive branch to handle the implementation of law, and affords them A) certain levels of discretion, and B) their own interpretation of the law (one of the functions of the DoJ's Office of Legal Counsel, the same group that essentially authorized the torture program under George W. Bush despite the US having signed treaties expressly banning torture).

There are remedies built in to the system for the executive branch overreaching their bounds--the other two branches of government, and the ability of people to elect new leaders. If you're going to rail against Obama for his implementation of the ACA, I presume that you likewise railed against the use of signing statements by presidents of any political persuasion, and especially against willful attempts to circumvent the law, like Reagan's Iran-Contra fiasco.

In any case, if the discretion and interpretation of law wasn't needed, we wouldn't have an executive or judicial branch to begin with--everyone would just blindly enact Congress' bills to the letter of the law. We've decided as a society that the other branches serve a purpose, and that's one of them.
What Cat Boy is saying is... Bush's "torture" program was legal.