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Cheney Says Uncle
Apparently that letter from David Addingtion to Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) yesterday really did constitute a wholesale retreat from the "fourth branch" argument. No more will you hear Cheney's lawyers claim that the vice president isn't in the executive branch, reports Mike Allen at The Politico:
The White House has no plans to reassert the argument there is any vice presidential distinction from the executive branch, the officials said.Two senior Republican officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the rationale had been the view of the vice president’s lawyers, not Cheney himself.
But as Addington made clear in his letter this morning (by a transparently weak argument), that doesn't mean that the vice president will submit to review by the National Archives' Information Security Oversight Office. So the game's still on. Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-IL) is still planning a vote late today or tomorrow on cutting off the VP's office $4.8 million in executive-branch funding. We'll keep you updated as that approaches.
Comments (47)
Anonymous wrote on June 27, 2007 12:39 PM:This is BS: "the rationale had been the view of the vice president’s lawyers, not Cheney himself."
legal counsel speaks for OVP, not themselves.
Why is there a split between OVP legal counsel and the leadership: Does VP not have confidence in the OVP legal counsel?
Anonymous wrote on June 27, 2007 12:40 PM:Bus, meet David Addington.
Anonymous wrote on June 27, 2007 12:43 PM:To argue that the "views" of the letter do "not" represent OVP or Cheney are absurd. Look at this:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/ethics/dc/code/DC_CODE.HTM#Rule_1.4
DC Bar Rule 1.4
"(a) A lawyer shall keep a client reasonably informed about the status of a matter and promptly comply with reasonable requests for information."
- Why was OVP counsel "not" keeping OVP client "informed" before issuing the letter?
"(b) A lawyer shall explain a matter to the extent reasonably necessary to permit the client to make informed decisions regarding the representation."
- Why did the OVP legal counsel issue a letter which the OVP leadership does not agree?
- Since when did the OVP leadership not have confidence in Addington's legal judgement; or ability to independently respond to a legal question?
- Why does OVP think it has to second guess its legal counsel?
- What's the plan of OVP leadership to find legal counsel it does trust?
Rusty wrote on June 27, 2007 12:44 PM:Shouldn't this sudden retreat make it obvious to anyone who is watching Cheney's office that the VP is operating under a policy of "just do what you want, then make sh*t up to justify it"?
Anonymous wrote on June 27, 2007 12:46 PM:If DNC wants to block OVP funding, they can expect more Presidential vetoes and GOP efforts to cancel the conference committees.
Time for the DNC to realize the GOP will play hardball, and "being nice" with the GOP isn't going to get the DNC anything.
Let the GOP "block" the bill that would "zero out" OVP funding: The OVP and President will still get nothing.
Time for the DNC to explain why it is not willing to lead, as it refused to do as a minority, to do what the GOP is now doing: Block, as a minority, conference committees. DNC needs to explain why it failed to use these methods to block the MCA, Patriot Act, and other things:
Gary wrote on June 27, 2007 12:56 PM:http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/6/27/11916/4419
Paul, read emptywheel's take at the Next Hurrah. No one is crying Uncle. Mike Allen, pro GOP fluffer, has once again regurgitated spin and passed it off as a scoop.
Same. As in same XXXX, different day.
Cranky wrote on June 27, 2007 2:17 PM:I'm surprized anyone continues to use Politico as a News source. They have print more mistakes and or one sided arguments while claiming to be non-partisan than most of the worse CT sites on the Web. I know others have reported on this issue so you are probably safe with this use of them.
Anonymous wrote on June 27, 2007 4:15 PM:I know I quit quoting them months ago without independent sources to confirm.
I rather think nothing will change. Cheney's lawyer says he'll stop being an assh*le hoping everyone will think this incident is over. But it'll be business as usual for Cheney. How could it be any other way? This *is* Dick Cheney, after all.
d
Rvan wrote on June 27, 2007 6:06 PM:Cheney probably wanted this to whole thing to happen as a diversion. I wonder what he's really up to...
ziggy wrote on June 28, 2007 1:54 AM:One more reason why the Dems should have gone ahead with impeachment of Bush/Cheny once they reclaimed the Congress. Not that those two haven't pushed the US over the precipice already, but entertaining their half-baked notions of government is enough to destroy this Republic.
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