Watergate lawyer hits out at Cheney
Secrecy about energy talks hints at cover-up, former
Nixon aide says
Oliver Burkeman in New York
Tuesday February 12, 2002
The Guardian
The lawyer who led the Nixon White House's attempt to conceal
incriminating evidence during the Watergate scandal has
accused US Vice-President Dick Cheney of sinking to the same
depths in the Enron affair.
John Dean, who served as the White House counsel under
Richard Nixon, said Mr Cheney's efforts to withhold details of his
energy taskforce had put George Bush's administration in
"cover-up mode".
In a stinging opinion article in yesterday's New York Times, Mr
Dean, who was briefly imprisoned for his role in Watergate,
wrote that Mr Cheney's stonewalling "has a familiar ring to
someone who served in the Nixon White House. It is the sound
of someone who has something to hide."
He scoffed at Mr Cheney's claim that he was keeping the
information secret as a matter of principle. "Richard Nixon was
most vocal about maintaining this or that principle... when he
had the most to hide," Mr Dean wrote. "I cannot but wonder
what truly motivates Mr Cheney's newfound interest in
[principles]."
The vice-president is resisting a legal action from Congress
ordering him to reveal what happened at meetings of his energy
task force last year. Such meetings can only remain secret if all
those attending are government employees, but it is widely
suspected in Washington that Enron executives, or other
industry figures, may have wielded influence there.
Mr Cheney's actions placed him "knowingly or not in cover-up
mode", Mr Dean said.
In a longer version of his article, published on the website
Findlaw.com, he said of Mr Cheney and his legal advisers:
"They don't care if their argu ments are baseless. They are
simply trying to cloud the air with smoke to obscure what would
otherwise be a clear-cut legal answer - [Congress] has a legal
right to the information it seeks, period."
The condemnation comes as Congress digested the news that
Enron's former chairman, Kenneth Lay, will assert his
fifth-amendment right to silence when he is called to testify on
the affair today. On Sunday, Mr Lay made his first public
appearance in a week, attending a Methodist church service in
central Houston, where he told a reporter that things had been
"very tough" but, "with God's help, we'll get through".
This week's edition of Newsweek magazine quoted Mr Lay as
telling a friend: "They are trying to trip me up. They want to put
me in jail. Every fibre of my body wants to talk and tell my side
of this." He was worried for the health of Enron's former chief
executive, Jeffrey Skilling, who testified before Congress last
week, the friend said.
Mr Skilling's mother joined members of Congress in dismissing
her son's claim to have known little of Enron's troubles, the
magazine reported. "When you are the CEO, you are supposed
to know what's going on with the rest of the company,"
77-year-old Betty Skilling said in an interview.
A Republican congressman, James Greenwood, spoke for many
of his colleagues when he summarised Mr Skilling's responses
to questioning as "the dog ate my homework".
The US department of labour said yesterday it planned to
demand the removal of Enron officials who manage the
company's pension fund. The assistant labour secretary, Ann
Combs, said she would seek agreement to replace them with
independent experts.
guardian.co.uk |
