I thought I'd post this article and open a discussion on this...
White House lets Leahy’s deadline pass
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/...007-08-20.html
Vice President Dick Cheney’s office on Monday responded separately from the White House to a Senate subpoena for documents on warrantless wiretapping and resurrected the controversial contention that Cheney is not part of the executive branch.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) set Monday’s subpoena deadline after granting an extension request by the White House. Presidential counsel Fred Fielding, as expected, told Leahy in a letter that a second delay, until after Labor Day, would help Congress and the administration “expeditiously seek a means of accommodation that will negate the need for an assertion of executive privilege.”
But the response from the vice president was more surprising, because the White House was believed to have abandoned the argument that Cheney is a hybrid entity with both executive and legislative powers.
Cheney’s lawyers first crafted the argument to bolster his lack of compliance with an executive order on the safeguarding of classified information, a tactic that backfired amid Democratic anger and derisive jokes on late-night talk shows. Yet Cheney counsel Shannen Coffin wrote to Leahy on Monday that “the issuance of the subpoena to this office was procedurally irregular” because the judiciary panel only authorized Leahy to issue summonses to the Executive Office of the President (EOP) and the Justice Department.
Leahy dryly noted that the White House website currently lists the vice president as a part of the EOP, also distributing copies of a 1978 executive order that describes the vice president as part of the EOP.
Telling Coffin to look at the White House website “may seem too glib an answer,” Leahy told reporters. “My answer would be look at the law. But these are people that don't look at the law very often.”
Stung by a furious backlash after they approved a White House-written fix to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), House and Senate Democratic leaders both have signaled their plans to take up a new bill remodeling the administration’s eavesdropping program in September. Leahy said that he and Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) are prepared to move forward on a new FISA bill that strengthens the courts’ role in wiretapping regardless of whether the White House responds to the subpoenas.
Leahy’s subpoenas seek details on the legal justification for the warrantless eavesdropping, for which the White House is expected to assert executive privilege. Even former Attorney General John Ashcroft’s advisers were unable to gain complete information on the wiretapping program in 2004, according to notes released last week by Robert Mueller, director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Leahy also asserted that he is prepared to pursue a contempt vote against the White House when Congress returns, although he appeared inclined to continue negotiating with Fielding for the time being. A contempt vote in either chamber would effectively move the subpoena dispute to the courts, with a final ruling unlikely before President Bush leaves office.
White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe told reporters on Monday that Fielding continues to work toward a deal with Democrats, indicating that the White House did not consider meeting Leahy’s second deadline.
“An August 20th deadline was not in the original request,” White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe told reporters on Monday. “But I think Mr. Fielding's letter lays out specifically how we're going to work with them and hopefully come to some sort of accommodation.”
For those who haven't been following this, or anyone who is not familiar with the American system of government, here is a brief summary...
There are three branches of government. The Executive (the President and his office), the Legislative (Congress), and the Judicial (the courts). Each branch has the power to provide oversight into the other two. This keeps any one branch from being able to single handily run the government.
That being said, the bush administration is claiming congress doesn't have the power to subpoena records, because since cheny, the Vice President also acts as head of the Senate in Congress, he is part of congress, therefore congress cannot provide over-sight into itself, and has no right to subpoena the records of the President.
Those same records are being requested in the courts by various other groups, who claim they can prove the bush administration has been acting illegally. The same bush administration claims 'Executive privilege' which means since they are part of the Executive branch, those files have been deemed top secret as a matter of National Security, and have to be held secretly within the government.
The only problem is that even though they are deemed secret, that gives the over-sight board in congress access to them, however as mentioned the bush administration is arguing that they are part of congress as well, so congress is denied access as well as the courts.
Bottom line is the documents requested in the other two branches of the system are both being fought by the bush administration, claiming it is actually two branches, which shields any of the other two branches from even investigating any wrong-doings on their part. They have so far successfully been able to create a whole new American government, with no checks and balances, where the Executive branch can ignore requests from the courts because they claim to be privileged because of their executive status and at the same time in the congressional hearings claim they are part of the legislative body, therefore immune to over-sight.
Anyone else bothered by this? If your American, you should be. One branch of your government has effectively removed all over-sight and claims it is above any court as well as above the over-sight of Congress, meaning it in itself is now the American government, and no one or no other part of the government right now can do anything to stop it or change it, or look into any illegal activities.
This effectively makes the President a modern day emperor, since as of right now there is no one he has to report to, no one providing over-sight, and no parts of the government which can stop the behaviour of one man.
Yet, not one news agency in America is reporting on this, and no one seems to care that all the power of the government has effectively been channeled into one single branch...
Checks & Balances
