That Was Easy!

The NY Sun discusses Judge Walton's thirty page opinion in which he explains, with no apparent irony, that Libby's points of appeal are not even close or complicated questions.

On a related front, some commentators on the left cannot fathom the notion that Fitzgerald's prosecution of Libby may have been politically motivated - surely, they note, Ashcroft and Comey were good Republicans, as was Judge Walton?

Hmm.  That would be especially cogent if all politics was partisan politics.  Folks able to embrace the concept of factional disputes within an Administration will find these tidbits from the WaPo series on the Cheney Vice-Presidency to be interesting.

First, from Nov 2001:

To pave the way for the military commissions, Yoo wrote an opinion on Nov. 6, 2001, declaring that Bush did not need approval from Congress or federal courts. Yoo said in an interview that he saw no need to inform the State Department, which hosts the archives of the Geneva Conventions and the government's leading experts on the law of war. "The issue we dealt with was: Can the president do it constitutionally?" Yoo said. "State -- they wouldn't have views on that."

Attorney General John D. Ashcroft, was astonished to learn that the draft gave the Justice Department no role in choosing which alleged terrorists would be tried in military commissions. Over Veterans Day weekend, on Nov. 10, he took his objections to the White House.

The attorney general found Cheney, not Bush, at the broad conference table in the Roosevelt Room. According to participants, Ashcroft said that he was the president's senior law enforcement officer, supervised the FBI and oversaw terrorism prosecutions nationwide. The Justice Department, he said, had to have a voice in the tribunal process. He was enraged to discover that Yoo, his subordinate, had recommended otherwise -- as part of a strategy to deny jurisdiction to U.S. courts.

Raising his voice, participants said, Ashcroft talked over Addington and brushed aside interjections from Cheney. "The thing I remember about it is how rude, there's no other word for it, the attorney general was to the vice president," said one of those in the room. Asked recently about the confrontation, Ashcroft replied curtly: "I'm just not prepared to comment on that."

According to Yoo and three other officials, Ashcroft did not persuade Cheney and got no audience with Bush. Bolten, in an October 2006 interview after becoming Bush's chief of staff, did not deny that account. He signaled an intention to operate differently in the second term.

This next vignette is from July 2004 [corrected from 2005] well after the Fitzgerald appointment in Dec 2003 but reflective of ongoing trouble in paradise:

Ashcroft, with support from Gonzales, proposed a lawyer named Patrick Philbin for deputy solicitor general. Philbin was among the authors of the post-Sept. 11 legal revolution, devising arguments to defend Cheney's military commissions and the denial of habeas corpus rights at Guantanamo Bay. But he had tangled with the vice president's office now and then, objecting to the private legal channel between Addington and Yoo and raising questions about domestic surveillance by the National Security Agency.

Cheney's lawyer passed word that Philbin was an unsatisfactory choice. The attorney general and White House counsel abandoned their candidate.

"OVP plays hardball," said a high-ranking former official who followed the episode, referring to the office of the vice president. "No one would defend Philbin."

And of course the March 2004 story about Comey heading off Gonzales' attempted meeting with Ashcroft at the hospital is well-known.  Cheney and Libby had been advocates of the  contentious NSA around which this incident centered.

So one might infer that there had been little love lost between Ashcroft and Cheney for quite some time.

Comments

[windansea]

don't mess with Darth

[David Walser]

On a related front, some commentators on the left cannot fathom the notion that Fitzgerald's prosecution of Libby may have been politically motivated - surely, they note, Ashcroft and Comey were good Republicans, as was Judge Walton?

Of course, many on the left think all "good Republicans" think alike.

[Appalled Moderate]

Tom:

1. There's an assumption among many of yur commenters that all Republicans should think alike.

2. On your small point -- it would seem Ashcroft should be ticked off. He works for the President, not the Vice President, and Cheney playing gatekeeper to Ashcroft's concerns about Cheney's policies is a recipe for the sorts of disasters this administration has brought us.

Nevertheless, your post assumes that Libby was the only target of Fitz's investigation, and therefore Ashcroft might be content to entangle the veep in an investigation. Problem is, Fitz was eying both Libby AND Rove, and your theory assumes Ashcroft would want to nail the architect of permanent Republican majorities based on fundamentalists with beliefs similar to John Ashcroft.

3. On the larger point, aren't you just a little bit troubled by the VP's role in this administration?

[Pal2Pal (Sara)]

Repeated from previous thread:

Does anyone know off the top of your head what age is considered "of age" to sign a contract in Florida? This would be for a car contract plus insurance on the car. Calif. is 18, is Florida the same?

[clarice]

No, AM, I'm not. Here's why not--the DoS and DoJ are full of people who are anti-administration and living in a pre 9/11 world. BECAUSE they were cut out of the loop we have achieved a miracle--6 years without another attack. God Bless Cheney and Yoo and Addington and Libby for that!

Now--if we could only get JAG cut down to size..

[Crust]

Tom, sure it's possible for Republicans to hate each other. And Ashcroft and Cheney may well be an example of that; certainly Ashcroft is not a card carrying member of the Dick Cheney fan club. Though it does sound as AM says that Ashcroft's reasons for feeling this way are substantive.

OK, so the fact that Walton is a Republican does not necessarily clear him of pre-existing animus against Libby. Fair enough, I guess. And certainly there is by now no love lost between Walton and Libby. But do we have any reason for thinking that Walton's view of Libby has anything to do with anything other than what Walton thinks of the case and Libby's defense?

[manys]

It is paternalistic and condescending to assert that anybody is living in a "pre-9/11 world." If you're trying to make a point, try to do it without meaningless buzzwords.

[cathyf]

On the larger point, aren't you just a little bit troubled by the VP's role in this administration?

Well, you think it's better to have breezebrain losers (the only kind willing to take a job "not worth a bucket of warm spit") a mere heartbeat away from the presidency? You ridicule Bush I for picking Quayle, Nixon for picking Agnew, but you don't like Carter, Reagan, Clinton or Bush II picking more substantial running mates and offering them more substantial roles in their administrations?

[windansea]

recipe for the sorts of disasters this administration has brought us.

you mean real actual disasters or the ones trumped up by the MSM etc?

lets see, economy is good, unemployment is low, no attacks on US soil since 9/11, tax receipts are up, deficit is down by 35%, a lot of people think Iraq is a disaster, but the guys actually fighting the war don't.

[Sue]

3. On the larger point, aren't you just a little bit troubled by the VP's role in this administration?

I know you didn't ask me, but I'll answer anyway. No.

[Crust]

windansea:

recipe for the sorts of disasters this administration has brought us.

you mean real actual disasters or the ones trumped up by the MSM etc?

...deficit is down by 35%...

Hello. This country was running a surplus when Bush came to power, remember? (In fact, it was even running a surplus if you excluded the Social Security surplus. But please try to avoid "lock box" jokes.)

[Foo Bar]

This next vignette is from July 2005

You mean July '04. Ashcroft was gone by July '05.

[clarice]

As I recall Kerry was so desperate to get McCain on his ticket he offered him control of both DoS and Dod.

[RalphL]

"Maybe if Libby had been standing inside a pentagram with an "eye of newt" in his pocket..."

Then he would have been indicted for Gross Bodily Harm.

Sue, about your comment on Yon, I remember reading in NRO(?) that some Army colonel was deliberately restricting embedded approvals, which I think is a big mistake. The grunts may not like to have a reported in tow, but it does serve a purpose and it may keep them getting in some kinds of trouble.

[Appalled Moderate]

cathyf:

I don't mind the VP being put in sort of a special projects role -- like Gore or Bush, Sr. I have real objections to the VP assuming the role of executive. He is not independently elected nor is he confirmed by Congress, nor is he easily removed. (Clarice can provide you with the instapundit cite)

As for the point in Tom's article, it's pretty bad that the nation's chief legal officer is not allowed to make his legal objections to the President. Instead, the guy who made the flawed policy gets to keep the guy who is protesting the flawed policy from talking to the President. Good heavens -- expecting Cheney to be able to agree that "my policy is Constitutionally flawed" is like expecting Walton to recognize that his rulings on Libby are close issues. This is a horrible process.

[Sue]

Hello. This country was running a surplus when Bush came to power, remember?

It was? Then where was the money being kept? In what bank was that surplus sitting? Where was it spent? It was a projected surplus, from 1999 no less, and based itself on absolutely nothing changing, including the dot.com burst, a recession and 9/11. But you knew that, didn't you? You just like buzz words yourself.

[RalphL]

"But do we have any reason for thinking that Walton's view of Libby has anything to do with anything other than what Walton thinks of the case and Libby's defense?"

What he said about the amici brief, for one.

His anger that Libby did not take the stand, as is his right.

[RalphL]

AM, perhaps Bush uses Cheney to take the heat for him?

[boris]

It was a projected surplus, from 1999 no less

I recall a lot of fudging to make the downturn appear to have started when Bush took office rather than before BJ left. Regardless it made itself apparent well before a single Bush economic policy went into effect.

Dimorats like stuff like that you know. The upturn BJ took credit for started before he took office. The donwturn they blame on Bush started before BJ left.

[windansea]

dude...where's my disasters?

[gmax]

Hello. This country was running a surplus when Bush came to power, remember?

Typical liberal trying to forget that a small inconsequential thing like the 9/11 attack even occurred. Are you a Truther too?

[Sue]

Dimorats like stuff like that you know. The upturn BJ took credit for started before he took office. The donwturn they blame on Bush started before BJ left.

We have never operated on a surplus and the democrats know it. It is a buzz word. When you take away Peter to pay Paul, you still owe Paul. But don't look behind the magic curtain...that way you can still believe in wizards...

[Sue]

When you take away Peter to pay Paul

When you take away from Peter to pay Paul. Sounds better than just taking away Peter. ::grin::

[Sue]

Well crud. I should stop trying to do 2 things at one time.

When you take away from Peter to pay Paul, you still owe Peter.

Or something like that.

Did my point lose its edge with all this explaining? ::grin::

[Sue]

The funniest part of the surplus was I went to bed one day and we were operating with a deficit, woke up the next morning and somehow we had a surplus. And I am only slightly exaggerating the time frame.

[Crust]

RalphL, there's no question Walton got angry. What I'm saying is that I don't know of any reason to think that was due to a pre-existing animus against Libby or Cheney.

Ashcroft at least arguably had an animus against Cheney. But Walton's anger may just be a reaction to the case. That is he may be angry simply because he thinks the amici brief is frivolous, etc. His anger isn't necessarily a proxy for something else. Whereas if, say, he were a major Kucinich donor one might have cause to wonder if his anger had to do with something else.

[Rocco]

A federal judge is adding the heft of a 30-page legal opinion to his decision last week

Does this mean Walton is nervous about his decision last week?

[clarice]

Taranto BOTWT:
"In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens (joined by David Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg) declared:

I agree with the Court that the principal should not beheld liable for pulling down Frederick's banner. . . . I would hold, however, that the school's interest in protecting its students from exposure to speech "reasonably regarded as promoting illegal drug use," . . . cannot justify disciplining Frederick for his attempt to make an ambiguous statement to a television audience simply because it contained an oblique reference to drugs. The First Amendment demands more, indeed, much more.

But when it comes to regulating core political speech, in the view of Stevens and his fellow dissenters (along with Stephen Breyer), the First Amendment doesn't demand so much. This is Souter speaking for the quartet in his Wisconsin Right to Life dissent:

Campaign finance reform has been a series of reactions to documented threats to electoral integrity obvious to any voter, posed by large sums of money from corporate or union treasuries, with no redolence of "grassroots" about them. Neither Congress's decisions nor our own have understood the corrupting influence of money in politics as being limited to outright bribery or discrete quid pro quo; campaign finance reform has instead consistently focused on the more pervasive distortion of electoral institutions by concentrated wealth, on the special access and guaranteed favor that sap the representative integrity of American government and defy public confidence in its institutions.

In other words, Congress has to restrict political speech because it's so important. Funny, but we thought that the exact reason the Founding Fathers said Congress couldn't restrict it."

[MikeS]

3. On the larger point, aren't you just a little bit troubled by the VP's role in this administration?

No!! Dick Cheney got over 62 million votes in the 2004 election. I'm much more troubled that a political appointee, even a member of the Cabinet, would be rude to the Vice President.

Further, I'm concerned that you don't think the VP should have a role in government. Or perhaps you just don't think that the President should decide what that role should be.

[Pal2Pal (Sara)]

What I'm saying is that I don't know of any reason to think that was due to a pre-existing animus against Libby or Cheney.

Dr. Sanity would be the best to give you Walton's underlying motivations. I think it is obvious that he has deeply rooted issues with those of privilege and financial resources. And that he is deeply biased in favor of the prosecutor. I think he is also an anti-semite bigot in addition to his raging reverse snobbery.

[Crust]

I have to say those were some mighty creative defenses of winorsea's bizarre claim that the deficit is down by 35% under Bush. Going from a surplus of $236 billion in 2000 (yes, an actual surplus) to the monster deficits of the Bush era is somehow a decrease in the deficit. That must be the new math.

[PeterUK.]

Then again it doesn't take too many of these weevilling their way through your bank balance to put you in the red.

[Rick Ballard]

"Did my point lose its edge with all this explaining? ::grin::"

No but I prefer the old way when speaking of Democrats - "rob Peter to pay Paul", although I suppose we could update it to "rob Peter and Paul to propitiate Gaia" (with a small cut to the priests, of course).

[Carol_Herman]

For what it's worth, Sara, you cannot rent a car in California if you are under 25 years of age.

Dueling contracts? A separate age category for car rental companies? Dunno

[Crust]

Sara, if Walton was driven by anti-semitism as you say, why was he much easier on (Jewish) Ari Fleischer than on (non-Jewish) Karl Rove?

[Other Tom]

"There's an assumption among many of your commenters that all Republicans should think alike." Name one, AppMod. After you've done that, take a stab at naming "many."

The question about the bank in which the surplus was sitting remains unanswered. In the meantime, the deficit as a percentage of GDP remains trivial by historical standards.

Please, someone--anyone--provide a listing of those who have been harmed by the deficits that have been run since the days of FDR.

[Rocco]

What do you think of this suit Clarice?

[PeterUK.]

Mr Ballard,
I suspect Gaia has done a runner with the money,it is like November here,cold dark and wet.

[MikeS]

That must be the new math.

Well revenue took a drastic drop in 2001, which was due to...many adverse factors.

Revenue continued to fall in 2002 and 2003. Revenue turned sharply upward in 2004 and has continued its upward trend.

The whole time from 2001 to the present spending has increased every year.

[topsecretk9]

And although he calls Cooper a "stand-up guy," Pearlstine says he botched his sources. "He was less than perfectly discreet after he got Karl Rove on the phone on Friday, July 11, 2003, to talk about Plame," Pearlstine says—Cooper e-mailed his bureau chief Michael Duffy and deputy Jay Carney about the conversation with Bush's brain. Six days later, "more than two dozen Time Inc. employees ... had had access to e-mails in which Matt had named Rove as his source."

Plus, "Matt was not only wrong to treat the conversation as if it were 'confidential,'" Pearlstine writes, "He also violated the rules for 'deep background' when he attributed the information about Valerie Plame to administration officials." Rove later complained to Pearlstine about Cooper, telling him at a conference in Aspen in September 2005, "Our ground rule was 'deep background' ... I never asked to be treated as a confidential source. Everyone would have been better off if Matt had just agreed to testify about our conversation.'"

Viveca Novak is also on the block for failing to tell her bosses about a discussion she had with Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, during which the attorney said that Rove was not Cooper's source. Pearlstine claims Novak's "sloppy work habits" relieved Rove from testifying before Fitzgerald. "As the Plame episode developed, Time itself would be embarrassed by a reporter who had become too close to a source."

http://www.radaronline.com/exclusives/2007/06/norman-pearlstine-valerie-plame-matt-cooper.php

[RichatUF]

Crust-

This country was running a surplus when Bush came to power

Smoke and mirrors. The "surpluses as far as the eye can see" show with Clinton and the paint brush had little to do with Clinton. And the largest expenditure cuts was the DOD and the IC. And why should anyone want the Gov't to run a surplus.

RalphL-

...your comment on Yon, I remember reading in NRO(?) that some Army colonel was deliberately restricting embedded approvals...

Yon ran afoul of BG Brooks and wrote about it in a few places. BG Brooks seems to have a problem with journalists, espically independant ones.

RichatUF

[Paul]

I wish Cheney were in charge to the degree the Wash Post claims.

One of my biggest disappointments is Condi Rice. She was excellent during the first term. Then Bush sends her to State, presumably (but maybe not) to fix things at State. Instead, the State Dept fixes Condi.

The unfair thing is when someone is criticized for their policy when it is not fully implemented. One could criticize Cheney for something or other, but how often have his views actually been totally accepted by the President? And how often have they been tempered by opposition from, say, Colin Powell.

Bush has often seemed to figure the best policy is to split decisions down the middle. You might sort of please more people that way, by compromising, but then you never properly test one side or the other's recommendations.

Or consider Rumsfeld. He became Bush's sacrificial lamb for the insurgency problems in Iraq and for the US's "occupation." The fact is, Rumsfeld wanted to get in, topple Saddam, and get out fast. It was the Powell, "You broke, you bought it" argument that Bush accepted, not Rummy's. But Rumsfeld got the blame for Powell's idea.

In the end, Pres Bush may well turn out to be more a Powell moderate than a Cheney/Rumsfeld cowboy.

[Other Tom]

Since my response to AppMod about the current health care "system" was posted just before the previous thread was put to bed (thus perhaps denying him the opportunity to respond), I think I'll update it and present it right here:

AppMod, I would invite you to re-read what I said earlier: I certainly did not say that I "don't care" about the uninsured. I care about each of them, simply because each is a child of God and some mother's son or daughter. I do say that I don't care about the fact that they are uninsured.

As you suggest we will, I suppose, pay for them through cost-shifting, but only to the extent that we have volunteered to do so, being a rather sentimental and generous people. Why it follows from that fact that a single-payer system is the "solution" to some supposed problem is a bit beyond me. Single-payer systems have been tried, and indeed are still displaying themselves to us, in many places around the world. Please tell us which is your favorite. (And keep in mind that I can get a CT scan for my dog in a week, and a Canadian will wait six months--not for his dog, but for himself.) While some of those who elect to remain uninsured in this country may very well die of preventable illnesses, it is a certainty that many in that crown jewel of single-payer systems, Britain's national health service, die while on the waiting list for procedures we here can receive almost immediately.

Going back to first principles--or at least first causes--let us inquire how health "insurance" came to be tied in some way to employment. That odd notion dates from wage-and-price controls (an absolutely success-free species of government intervention) during WWII, when an omniscient congress decided that for an employer to pay for an employee's health insurance would not count as an in-kind wage. And here we are today...

Consider also the odd fact that one cannot buy a policy of health insurance issued by a provider in a state other than that of one's residence. Why should that be so? Consider further that it is unlawful to issue a policy of insurance in New York that does not cover podiatry services. Is that because the people of New York have been outraged to discover that podiatry services were not covered? No, it is because of the podiatrist lobby, which is utterly unopposed. And why should a New Yorker be forbidden by law to purchase a policy of insurance (if in fact he wants one) issued by an Idaho insurer? Who knows? I suppose that would be wrong...

I cans't imagine why anyone would describe the current "system" as a free-market one, but there is little doubt in my mind that were it to become freer it would be improved, for reasons discussed above just for starters. And when someone tells me about how it is that the free market doesn't "work," that simply means to me that he doesn't like the outcome, and would like other people to have less freedom as a consequence. ("Unreimbursed ilnesses" is one of the great howlers of this calendar year. Do we all begin with the certitude that every illness must be "reimbursed" by someone else? Let's also assume, just as sensibly, that every man is entitled to a BarcaLounger at taxpayer expense. And why the hell not?)

[Other Tom]

"When others counseled compromise, Gore urged decisive action. Clinton commented that 'Al is always on the side of encouraging me to do what I think is right.' Others in the administration grasped the closeness of Gore's relationship to Clinton, and whenever they feared that the president had gotten off track, they talked with the vice president. Clinton liked to say that he had the most powerful vice president in history."

--www.senate.gov.

Tell me, AppMod, weren't you just a little bit troubled by the Vice President's role in that administration? More powerful than anyone in the history of the Republic up to that time? Where, when and how did you express such concerns? May we review any of your concurrent writings voicing those concerns?

[clarice]

Which source was Cooper too close to?
Wilson?

Crust, there was nothing for the judge to bbe tough on Ari about. He gave his tesimony, he answered the cross examination and he was off on his bubble-headed way.
I think the judge only hates people obviously more bright than he is..and he really hates Wells as much as he hates Libby..

[MikeS]

Tell me, AppMod, weren't you just a little bit troubled by the Vice President's role in that administration?

I think we should call you DoubleO T

[boris]

Name one, AppMod.

Pretty sure AppMod considers me some kind of local thought police enforcement.

[Pal2Pal (Sara)]

Sara, if Walton was driven by anti-semitism as you say, why was he much easier on (Jewish) Ari Fleischer than on (non-Jewish) Karl Rove?

Gee let me see ... Fleischer has IMMUNITY and Rove never testified.

[Pal2Pal (Sara)]

I think the judge only hates people obviously more bright than he is..and he really hates Wells as much as he hates Libby.

Exactly. I made the point the other day that Walton is a "Peter Principled Prosecutor" who somehow landed a judgeship and knows he is outgunned in the brains department by the big legal guns and resents their very existence. Whether this is from his childhood and upbringing, his own thug days, or his days in the Justice Dept., I don't know, but it was obviously in play during the trial. Shockingly so, if you want my opinion, which is what it is.

[PatrickR]

'Sara, if Walton was driven by anti-semitism as you say, why was he much easier on (Jewish) Ari Fleischer than on (non-Jewish) Karl Rove?'

What?

[clarice]

PUK, Doncha know Rove testified under the cloak of invisibility?

[Tom Maguire]

AM, perhaps Bush uses Cheney to take the heat for him?

Ultimately Bush is notionally the boss and if he wants to run things this was and no one complains, well, away he goes (And none too soon.)

Rumsfeld was also a famous bureaucratic infighter - just for example, reading State of Denial, apparently he kept the memos from Iraq that were meant to be circulated to the NSC and State to himself.

Cheney's secretive involvement seems like an odd way to run things and the results don't exactly serve as an endorsement of this method. But whether it is out of bounds relative to VPs past, or by how much, I can't say.

[crazy]

Appalled Moderate

When you say "He is not independently elected . . ." are you suggesting we repeal the 12th Amendment, ratified in 1795, that REQUIRES the President and Vice President to be elected separately by the electors? If the original Article II process were still in force that would likely mean Gore and Kerry would have been GW's Veeps. Is that what you're suggesting?

[Appalled Moderate]

OT:

Good heavens, dude. You're keeping me busy....

On OT point 1 -- I've had enough battles with certain of the regulars here to beleieve there is a certain degree of thought policing going on in comments. I'm not going to name names, but I will say that those who are loose with the terms "liberal" or "so-called moderate" with respect to my thoughts are really are trying hard to limit the tent of what is considered non-left wing or Republican. (And this is apart from Iraq, where my "Out Now" puts me to the left of a lot of Democrats)) Sahll I name the number of times that it has happened? I'd rather not -- I haven't kept count, and I don't feel like googling it.

With respect to Cheney vs Gore, I will refer you what I said earlier and amplify a bit. I have no problem with the VP serving as an advisor. The appeal of Cheney in 2000 was that he would serve as a seasoned political advisor to the less experienced Bush. But what we see in the WaPo article TM cites is Cheney serving in an executive role, and using that position to stifle an opposing viewpoint. A President, to function well, needs access to all the viewpoints in his administraton. Cheney stifled at least some of those viewpoints and did so in a way without any precedent I can think of. But, OT, if you can find Gore doing somthing like this (like, say, intercepting the head of the EPA on the way to the President to recommend against ratifying Kyoto), then I'll condemn him.

As for healthcare, I tend to prefer Japan or Britain to Canada -- on the grounds that in those countries, there is a right to additional private insurance. And, also, I really am curious if the Massachusetts experiment ends up working.

Sorry OT -- that's all I have time for.

[Appalled Moderate]

crazy:

I'm suggesting that Bush's use of Cheney as a co=President is a bad idea. Reagan rejected just such an approach in 1980. Pity Bush was not as wise.

[boris]

"so-called moderate"

BINGO !!! Ding Ding Ding we have a winner !

[clarice]

Frankly I think at this stage of the game any political labels have been so debased as to be meaningless. Tell me the difference between a neo-con and a JFK-Henry Jackson Dem or between a progressive and a socialist..

[crazy]

Appalled Moderate

If what you really object to is the way GWB uses his people you should give some serious thought to RalphL's earlier observation that Cheney is Bush's s**t shield.

A President would have to be pretty clueless and awfully helpless to tolerate a Veep like the WaPo describes wouldn't he? Is it possible to be that powerless and clueless and still be President?

[Other Tom]

"He is not independently elected nor is he confirmed by Congress, nor is he easily removed." Both those points are equally true with respect to the President, and thus tell us nothing one way or another about the Vice President.

"But, OT, if you can find Gore doing somthing like this (like, say, intercepting the head of the EPA on the way to the President to recommend against ratifying Kyoto), then I'll condemn him." Would it trouble you if, say the chief of staff did precisely that? (Every White House chief of staff since the Eisenhower years has performed precisely that function.) Chiefs of Staff are not only not independently elected, they're not elected at all, are not confirmed by congress, and are even more difficult to remove than presidents or vice presidents. Does that trouble you? Or are you bothered only when the chief of staff is a Republican who disagrees with you on policy grounds? As for the particular example you cite, I'm not sure of its importance. Do you think things would have come out differently if the EPA administrator (not elected by anyone at all) had actually got to the president? Didn't Al Gore, the most powerful vice president never to have troubled you, actually sign something in Kyoto? What's up with that?

As to my "point 1," I'll take your answer to be "I can't name one, let alone many."

[Other Tom]

"Reagan rejected just such an approach in 1980." Not really. What Reagan rejected was a suggestion by some that he select Gerald Ford as his running mate and campaign with the explicit promise to treat him as a co-equal in power. It was a spectacularly stupid idea, put forward by those who feared Reagan was so incapable of being an actual president that the people needed to be reassured by the calming presence of such a stable figure as Ford to rein him in. Bush has never proposed or campaigned upon such an arrangement, and he is not operating with one.

What Cheney does, he does at the pleasure of the president, for better or for worse.

[Pal2Pal (Sara)]

Ironies that make the Nutroots even nuttier:

VIA Instapundit earlier today:

IMPEACH CHENEY IF YOU WANT, but do bear in mind that he’ll preside over his own impeachment trial.

No, really. The Senate has the sole power to try impeachments. The Vice President is the President of the Senate. He presides. The Constitution provides for only one exception in cases of impeachment: “When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside.” That’s because of the obvious conflict-of-interest of having the VP preside when the President is tried. But there’s no similar provision for having someone else preside if the Vice President is impeached.

[PeterUK.]

"Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Don't say nuttin about insurance.

[Appalled Moderate]

ot:

With respect to Cheney, I have been pretty specific what I have objected to. It's essentially this: He creates a policy (quite unlike a typical chief of staff), and then ensures the president hears none of the objections about the policy from other senior staff. You are not going to get a reasonable vetting of a policy by proceeding that way. You will, instead, get a President who only hears that a diversion from the Geneva Conventions is a good idea. It's atrocious management under any circumstances, but is real dangerous when the executive who bears ultimate responsibility for a decision is not known for his curiosity about other viewpoints.

As for Gore and Kyoto, I used that example because it is probably the best example of a prior VP taking a leadership role on a special issue. But Gore was always acting under a specific grant of authority, and when Gore arguably went too far and signed the treaty, Clinton finessed the issue and never submitted it to the Senate.

It is certainly within Bush's power to reign in Cheney. The fact that he didn't speaks volumes about Bush's own leadership skills.

[Appalled Moderate]

PUK:

I'm a bit disappointed, if you are going to address the healthcare issue, you haven't touched on the Uk's NHS. While the poetry at the base of the Statue of Librty is lovely (if disregarded during our immigration debate), it's not exactly a founding document.

[manys]

@Sara: Instapundit is intellectually lazy and in this case has chosen to assert a state of law and politics that the most cursory Google search shows to be imaginary. Indeed, the irony herein is that anybody takes those words at face value.

"That’s because of the obvious conflict-of-interest of having the VP preside when the President is tried. But there’s no similar provision for having someone else preside if the Vice President is impeached."

You swallow this whole but it's just not true. There are provisions for when the VP is not presiding over an impeachment and those provisions say that the role falls to the President Pro-Tempore.

[Semanticleo]

"Speak not to me of blasphemy, man; I'd strike the sun if it insulted me. Look ye, Starbuck, all visible objects are but as pasteboard masks. Some inscrutable yet reasoning thing puts forth the molding of their features. The white whale tasks me; he heaps me. Yet he is but a mask. 'Tis the thing behind the mask I chiefly hate; the malignant thing that has plagued mankind since time began; the thing that maws and mutilates our race, not killing us outright but letting us live on, with half a heart and half a lung."

Ahab..er, um Maguire. There are other whales in the ocean waiting to be slain.

[Maybeex]

Tops: And although he calls Cooper a "stand-up guy," Pearlstine says he botched his sources. "He was less than perfectly discreet after he got Karl Rove on the phone on Friday, July 11, 2003, to talk about Plame," Pearlstine says—Cooper e-mailed his bureau chief Michael Duffy and deputy Jay Carney about the conversation with Bush's brain. Six days later, "more than two dozen Time Inc. employees ... had had access to e-mails in which Matt had named Rove as his source."

I am so happy to see him say that. The emails at trial were hilarious- within 2 emails and a few hours Cooper was naming Rove as his secret source.
Surely he told Wilson.

Of course, now Cooper is a Huffington Post blogger and Facebook friend of Jane Hamsher.

[MikeS]

and then ensures the president hears none of the objections about the policy from other senior staff

Wow! I didn't realize Cheney was doing that. My goodness.

[Maybeex]

AM: " and then ensures the president hears none of the objections about the policy from other senior staff "

Is that even true?
Bush heard Comey directly about his objections to the NSA problems.

[clarice]

On March 7 Libby juror Denis Collins wrote about his experience for Huff Po.That article is missing and I can't find it anywhere. Did anyone keep a copy? Does anyone know how to retrieve it?
Thank you.

[PeterUK.]

"As for healthcare, I tend to prefer Japan or Britain to Canada -- on the grounds that in those countries, there is a right to additional private insurance."

In the UK "National Insurance Contributions"(hollow laugh) are compulsory but health care is rationed.Those over sixty are downgraded for treatment,smokers and those dubbed obese are discriminated against,the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE,gawd another peurile NuLabor acronym) restricts the presription of drugs according to cost,politically determined.
The National Health Service (NHS) is bankrupt,there are more administrators than medical staff.Accident and Emergency departments are being closed down,beds are being reduced,infections such as Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) are rampant in our hospitals,some wards are filthy.Trained doctors and nurses are in short supply.
Quite simply medical staff do their best,but get politicians and bureaucrats involved and they will bugger it up.Health care becomes an instrument of social control,euthanasia by stealth is rearing its nasty totalitarian head,over a certain age you can be starved to death on a doctors say so,quite Orwellian to think on can go to hospital for one thing and end up with DNR,Do Not Resuscitate written or ones chart.

[PeterUK.]

PUK:

I'm a bit disappointed, if you are going to address the healthcare issue, you haven't touched on the Uk's NHS.
Patience Cherub,it takes time to type,I'm not a good typist,but then again, I don't have to be.

[Pal2Pal (Sara)]

There are provisions for when the VP is not presiding over an impeachment and those provisions say that the role falls to the President Pro-Tempore.

Can you direct me to where in the Constitution these provisions are in regard to impeachment?

[Maybeex]

As for healthcare, I tend to prefer Japan or Britain to Canada -- on the grounds that in those countries, there is a right to additional private insurance.

That's true about Japan, although it is said here among expats that the best hospital here is Narita (airport).

I actually quite like Hong Kong's system, where anyone in the country legally can get treatment as needed for what amounts to just a few dollars a day. All the health care taken care of that way is through government-paid clinics and public hospitals with big public wards.
Anybody with private insurance can get the treatment of their choice. It's definitely a two-tiered system, but it is a social safety net that provides adequate care for all.
My question is whether Americans will be able to deal with not having doctor of choice for some. That was a deal-killer the last go-round.

[Appalled Moderate]

PUK--

Fair enough. I thought you were contenting yourself with a generic slam, which I thought, considering you actually have some first-hand experience with the subject.

[clarice]

Please do,manys! I am sure you know better than Glenn Reynolds.

[Other Tom]

If you prefer health care in Britain to that in the US, it strongly suggests that, unlike PUK, you are innocent of experiencing it.

Bush has chosen to deal with, e.g., prisoner interrogations in the way that he has because he wants to. To believe that he does so because somehow other views were not considered by him is kind of childish. The myth of a president as captive of his advisors is a hoary one, and an idle one to boot. The buck stops with Bush. You may as well stop deluding yourself by thinking that if only he had managed his personnel better, he would have done things differently. Personnel is policy. He chose the personnel.

[clarice]

Dear,Maybee--consider what the poor in HK consider adequare care and what the legislatures and courts in the US would. Already cities and prisons here are being forced to foot the not inconsiderable fee for transgender operations.

[Pal2Pal (Sara)]

To believe that he does so because somehow other views were not considered by him is kind of childish.

Especially in light of the fact that those who attend meetings with the President say he encourages alternate views and enjoys the tug and pull of opposing views.

[Maybeex]

Oh, I know clarice. That's why I believe at the end of the day the US couldn't have single-payer care. As my Canadian friend says, we're either too spoiled or too envious.

It's also why I so object to Michael Moore's SiCKO. Anybody that thinks inflammatory stories and oversimplification is going to get us anywhere is only hurting the debate.

[JM Hanes]

Appalled:

"He creates a policy (quite unlike a typical chief of staff), and then ensures the president hears none of the objections about the policy from other senior staff."

This is pure extrapolation from a speculation. For all you know with regard to Ashcroft, Bush might have decided he just didn't want to hear it, and told Cheney to cut him off at the pass. You have no way of knowing whether Cheney passed along Ashcroft's complaints or not. You may be afraid that Cheney creates policy and maneuvers opposition out of the way behind the President's back, but I have yet to see such claims supported by "evidence" that doesn't ultimately rest on similar assumptions.

It always seems to me like the foundational assumption is that the President isn't sophisticated/smart enough to recognize the political maneurvering going on right under his own nose. When politics has been a multi-generational family business, I find that assumption particularly hard to credit.

[Maybeex]

I'll also add that of course Hong Kong's emergency rooms don't have to deal with gunshot wounds (or violent crime victims) very often. That's gotta keep costs down.
Then again, chopping victims have got to be pretty gruesome to put back together, though the Triads probably have insurance.

[Appalled Moderate]

OT:

You are engaging in more than a little misunderstanding of what I have been saying tonight. On healthcare, I'm in an "I don't know" position more than I am in a "let's ape the UK." Government programs tend to be both overstffed and underfunded, which rarely makes them the ideal approach to anything. Nonetheless, healthcare, as practiced in the US is not sustainable, partly because those baring the cost (employers) really don't want to be in the healthcare business, and those receiving the benefits have no clue about the cost. And the preferred conservative solution -- make everything consumer based and paid for-- is not as easy as you might think, because nobody is willing to buy medical insurance until they think they'll need it, and insurance companies are not going to community rate insurance that health people can opt out of.

As for Bush -- you an I essentially agree that the buck stops with him. I just don't think Cheney has served his chief or his country well, and I believe the management style is dysfunctional.

Fianlly, a President only has so much time in his day, and if he does not make the effort to hear all points of view (including people ouside of his administration), he is going to be captured by his advisors. The great Presidents -- Reagan, Roosevelt, always were talking to people outside of their circle, their advisors. They generally heard all of the options. I just don't see the evidence Bsh does that.

[PeterUK.]

The core problem with the NHS is that it wasn't costed properly,nor was there a hypothecated tax to fund it.The NHS was also founded on doctrinal grounds and some rather shaky thinking,which was that a NHS would increase general health thus reducing demand - we can all see the flaw in that.
There is another systemic problem,political correctness has slewed the whole process.For example an AIDS sufferer from another country can demand treatment,a most costly open ended treatment, that is denied them in their homeland,as can those afflicted with serious ailment.Unfortunately many have not contributed to the system - in brief you cannot have universal health care and open borders.

[Appalled Moderate]

JMH:

I agree Bush may have delegated to Cheney on this. More fool him, if he did.

If Cheney passed along Ashcroft's complaints, he controlled how they were passed along and had the abilty to immediately disrupt and rebut the arguments. Gee, I wish I had the power to describe how people criticize my policy views, and have that be the final say. You'd be surprised how complimentary Other Tom's criticism of my comments tonight would sound!

[JM Hanes]

Appalled:

"I've had enough battles with certain of the regulars here to beleieve there is a certain degree of thought policing going on in comments."

You know, that's a really loaded term. A lot of people disagree with you, and some of them may even be rude, and representing a minority opinion may make you feel uncomfortablly outnumbered, but to call such a perfectly predictable phenomenon "thought policing" is to collectively insult us all. Dressing it up to a certain degree as an observation doesn't make it any prettier.

[clarice]

"More fool him"? Why. Cheney is smarter than Ashcroft or Powell by a long shot and did what had to be done to keep everyone's pristine sorry asses from being fried.

The bureaucracy nose ringed Ashcroft ten ways to Sunday just as the CIA and State bureaus run those operations--and they were wrong, wrong wrong.

If I were the President I'd want one tough cookie to handle this and Cheney would be my pick , too.(I agree 100% with the poster that Condi goofed from the moment she caved into Powell on the post-invasion plans.And she's gone downhill since.)

[Rocco]

Don't you think the 20 million illegals are part of the reason health care is out of control?

OT I certainly did not say that I "don't care" about the uninsured.

Breathing is selfish too but I'm sure you don't wish to suck the breath out of everyone you meet.

[JM Hanes]

Appalled:

"More fool him, if he did."

Which is pretty much where Cheney the Usurper charges usually end up.

[boris]

Heh, I used it first.

[boris]

The loaded term that is.

[clarice]

Boris, the day this old hag is smart enough to beat you and jmh to the punch is the day I start scouting for a young lover.

[MikeS]

Before tonight I never realized how evil Cheney was. Apparently he has been working overtime behind the scenes to screw stuff up.

If I believed that, I'd be appalled too!

[boris]

The Enforcer:

Allright you folks let's jest move along now. No thinking allowed here.

Jest doin muh job.

[JM Hanes]

Clarice:

"Campaign finance reform has been a series of reactions to documented threats to electoral integrity obvious to any voter, posed by large sums of money from corporate or union treasuries, with no redolence of "grassroots" about them."

The Obvious Penumbra of Threats vs. the Redolence of Grassroots, and the winner is: the Incumbent

[Appalled Moderate]

JMH:

A few points:

1. I am reacting to a tendency over months to label my beliefs as "liberal", "leftist", etc, etc. When a person does that, it's often an effort to avoid consideration of the viewpoint. Yep, that is an attempt to control the argument. It is a few people who tend to do that -- I could name some names, but that's even more inflammatory than just leaving the comment more ambiguous. I will say I did not have you or that Other Tom in mind.

Re Cheney vs. Ashcroft, what we think of the process is going to be colored by what we think of the ultimate policy. It's human nature. But, if you were a CEO, and heard your internal counsel wanted to speak with you directly about a significant compliance issue, I don't think you'd be satisfied if you just let the counsel talk with the VP who is a major supporter of the policy the general counsel wants to talk about.

[clarice]

JMH--I thought that Taranto juxtaposition was incredibly good..short, sweet and compelling. Each year I grow more appreciative of the federalists on the court, if for no other reason they can spot B.S. when they see it.(CFR was a reaction to millions of dollars secretly funneled by Pew to McCain and others to create the impression of a groundswell for reform when there was none--at leat none for the law that passed, another "comprehensive law" that makes things worse than they were.

************Here's a good one:
"Michael Moore's new documentary, Sicko, challenges U.S. healthcare. Yet in the coverage of the film, some interesting facts about Moore appear to be ignored. These facts are addressed on page 53 of the bestselling book by Peter Schweizer, Do As I Say (Not As I Do):

[Moore's] IRS forms make for interesting reading. Over the past five years, Moore's "savings account" has included such evil pharmaceutical and medical companies as Pfizer, Merck, Genzyme, Elan PLC, Eli Lilly, Becton Dickinson, and Boston Scientific. "Being screwed by your HMO and ill-served by pharmaceutical companies is a shared American experience," he recently told the Detroit News ... He may savage HMOs in his film Sicko, but he has also owned shares of Pharmacia Corporation and Tenet Healthcare. He may have liked their price-to-earnings ratio.

Note: The first edition of Schweizer's book is dated November 2005.

If any reviewers have mentioned the above facts in their reviews, I've missed it. If you've found one, maybe you can post the link to the review below."

http://newsbusters.org/node/13711

[PeterUK.]

"Michael Moore's new documentary, Sicko, challenges U.S. healthcare."

Oh! I thought "Sicko" was his life story.

[SunnyDay]

Once upon a time the healthcare system in the US was not for profit. Unfortunately for us, the government decided there was just too damn much money changing hands and not being taxed, and voila! They declared BCBS a for-profit business. Whereupon, BCBS went public and had shareholders to pay. The rest of the industry had no choice but to follow, because the government saw that they also had much money changing hands, and chose to tax them also.

Once they became for-profit enterprises, they chose to do or not do things based on whether or not it was profitable (of course). So government found it necessary to tell them what they could and could not do.And they found it necessary to increase pricing to cover costs and pay their shareholders - else no one would invest in them, and they would go out of business.

And here we are.

[Jane]

Before tonight I never realized how evil Cheney was. Apparently he has been working overtime behind the scenes to screw stuff up.

And I never realized that some people have webcams installed in the VP's office enabling them to state with certainty how he works. I'm feeling quite jealous.