I've been patient. I've tried to see both sides of the argument. I've read The Warrior. I've watched CNN, Fox News, looked at every angle I can. I've prayed, thought, meditated, but I simply won't stand for this anymore. The president has gone too far. Now for those readers who did not just immediately turn to another article or started formulating their response I will tell you why.

I saw the Attorney General of the United States, Alberto Gonzalez, sitting before a congressional hearing on illegal wiretaps. When asked why the president had authorized taping the phones of American citizens without a warrant, or congressional approval, he said he was not "comfortable" in discussing the president's policies. When asked to what extent the president had authorized wiretapping, Gonzalez said he was not authorized to talk about whether or not what the President had done was legal or not. Finally, he said if Congress had any ideas about legislation, the president would be "open to advice." Democracy does not work that way.

The legislative branch is not there to advise the president on legislation, Congress makes the legislation. When Congress, the authority on which our government is based, demands to know what the president is doing, it is the job of the president to tell them. It does not matter whether we are at war. The executive branch never under any circumstance dictates to Congress what it can and can not do. It's in the Constitution and anything else is garbage.

If that was not enough, I read an article on CNN saying that a former Central Intelligence Agency official had said the intelligence community had not recommended war as the course to curtail Saddam Hussein. Yet, the president and vice president had disregarded this advice and gone on with a policy of war based on their own personal reasons. That's bad enough, but the breaking point came when I read that the CIA was accused of trying to sabotage the "president's policies." The national policy of the United States of America is not the personal choice of the president. The sovereignty of the United States does not lie in the person of the president. Governments that insist on unquestioning personal loyalty to the chief executive are not called democracies; they are called monarchies, dictatorships or tyrannies.

The president has no right to treat our government this way. The government and the people are not there to provide him with means to execute his policies, no matter what they are. It does not matter what you may think of the president's politics. This is not about Social Security or the war or abortion. This is about preventing the president from abusing the authority that, we as Americans have granted him to hold for a short time. The president is subject to the law, not the other way around. The president's power derives from our consent, and if we want answers we get them, no excuses. It is time for the president to go in and see the boss, us.