Dick Cheney Rewrites the Constitution - Vol. 3 Issue 73

Last night Jon Stewart nailed it yet again, naming a new Daily Show segment, “You Don’t Know Dick!” The latest mind-boggling statement by Vice President Cheney has a bathetic quality to it. The noose is tightening: everyday there are new revelations of Cheney’s secret malicious influence on Bush administration policy. It was one thing when the Republicans controlled Congress and Cheney could control the flow of information while knowing Congress would remain silent. Now, the Vice President’s office is being confronted with aggressive, relentless and appropriate investigations. Congressional subpoena power is an awesome thing and Cheney is about to understand that.

Since the story broke that Cheney is claiming that the office of the Vice President is NOT part of the Executive branch of government, all hell has broken loose. According to The Christian Science Monitor, at issue is the work of the Information Security Oversight Office – a small part of the National Archives whose job it is to oversee the government-wide security classification system. Cheney’s office provided this information in 2001 and 2002. Then it stopped. Prodded by an outsider’s complaint, last spring the National Archives sent letters to Cheney’s office requesting the classification data. It received no response. The Information Security Oversight Office collects data on how much US material is classified and declassified. Pursuant to a signed presidential executive order, agencies of the executive branch are REQUIRED to hand this information over.

Cheney’s argument is that the Vice President office is exempt from the executive order, since it has both executive branch and legislative functions. Per the US Constitution, the vice president serves as president of the Senate, and may vote to break ties in that chamber. THAT is simply amazing! Rep. Henry Waxman (D) of California rejected this assertion as absurd. Representative Waxman is chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, which is investigating the classification matter. See, CSMonitor.com.

“The vice president can’t unilaterally decide he is his own branch of government and exempt himself from important, commonsense safeguards for protecting classified information,” said Waxman on June 22. Waxman has also asserted that Cheney, in response to this controversy, has suggested that the Information Security Office be abolished.

Cheney’s position is quite interesting given the vice president’s involvement in so many crucial national security decisions, such as US policy on interrogation and detention of terror suspects, the manipulation of intelligence leading to the Iraq War and his insistence on excessive secrecy. A large number of classified documents might indicate an unusual degree of activity on the part of the vice president’s office. The great unraveling of this Vice President’s criminal conspiracy to control and manipulate public information has begun. It will be amusing to watch these two unlikely warriors (Cheney and Waxman) go to war. Get your tickets early!

Knowing that the best disinfectant is sunlight, I remain

Savant

<< Back to main