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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (514359)	12/22/2003 8:33:57 AM
From: Kenneth E. Phillipps	Respond to of 769667

In The Northwest: Cheney epitomizes the imperial vice presidency By JOEL CONNELLY SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST Entire forests have been consumed since the Vietnam War so historians can write dense tomes debating virtues of what academics term the "imperial presidency." Given President Bush's down-home tastes, and impatience with trappings, our current administration has been forced to develop something entirely new in America -- an imperial vice presidency. Dick Cheney is coming to Bellevue tonight, intervening in a contested 2004 Republican Senate primary to anoint Rep. George Nethercutt as the White House choice. He is speaking to a reception, and giving a "prereception" for "Founders Club" members (an $8,000 donation) and "Hosts" ($4,000). The big givers are being permitted into the vice presidential presence for a photo opportunity. Cheney is a secretive sort, not given to the imperial pomp of fanfares or carriages. It's my suspicion, however, that it's been years since this gentleman has stepped into a cold car. Rather, in viewing the vice president, our citizenry can see the deeper meaning of things imperial -- the prerogatives of privilege. Such as: The Royal Hunt: The vice president is an outdoorsman, not on the public lands where he wants to put oil rigs, but at private reserves such as the 10,000-acre Rolling Rock Club in southwestern Pennsylvania. A couple Mondays back, the club released 500 pen-raised pheasants for a morning hunt. Cheney and companions shot about 400 of them. The vice president blew away 70 of the birds himself. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette pieced together some details, but found that club employees were under orders not to talk with the media. Apparently the vice president went on to shoot mallard ducks. Such hunts are matters of legacy and of privilege. Remember the 1950s pictures of Prince Philip and Indian maharajas, waiting in a high platform as terrified native beaters drove terrified tigers beneath their guns. The Royal Rationale: Nobody has ever provided a scintilla of supportive evidence, but Dick Cheney claimed last year that Iraq was a looming nuclear menace to the United States. At a VFW convention, he argued that "they continue to pursue the nuclear program they began so many years ago ... we now know that Saddam has resumed his efforts to acquire nuclear weapons. ... Should all his ambitions be realized, (he could) subject the United States or any other nation to nuclear blackmail." The vice president amplified his remarks a few weeks later. Cheney told CNN that nuclear technicians were "still in Iraq" and that Saddam was working on what he called "fissile material." Where is the material? Where are the technicians? Where are the documents that show Saddam was again trying to acquire nuclear weapons? Rep. Jim McDermott gets in hot water -- as he damned well ought to -- for off-the-wall remarks. Cheney, however, is able to apply the oldest of royal dictums: Never complain, never explain. The Royal Silence: The vice president convened like-minded men in the spring of 2001 to hammer out a national energy strategy. It's now embodied in pending legislation that contains more than $30 billion in corporate subsidies. Dick Cheney has kept details of the discussions secret, and whether such generous political donors as Enron's then-chief, "Kenny Boy" Lay, served as informal members of the task force. Other rulers have fallen victim to the rule of law, Richard Nixon being forced to turn over the White House tapes, Bill Clinton having to fight Paula Jones' sexual harassment suit while in the White House. Cheney has stonewalled freedom of information requests on the task force and participants. The vice president is a longtime critic of what he calls diminution of presidential power, dating to when he was a Gerald Ford courtier in the mid-1970s. Cheney is taking the issue to the Supreme Court. In a briefing defending secrecy, the government -- our government -- argues: "Legislative power and judicial power cannot extend to compelling the vice president to disclose ... the details of the process by which a president obtains information and advice from the vice president." Pledges of secrecy are a tradition of royal service, whether as a member of the household staff or as a Cabinet minister called by the queen. It'll be interesting to see if this principle is extended to the House of Bush. The Royal Connection: Working under a no-bid contract, the Halliburton Co. has been supplying everything from meals for U.S. troops to gasoline for Iraqi citizens. It has contracts worth more than $1.7 billion in Iraq. Pentagon auditors have reported that a subsidiary overcharged the Pentagon by about $61 million, that Halliburton was charging $1.09 per gallon more for gasoline shipped in from Kuwait than from Turkey. The company says it expects to be cleared by the Defense Department. But it was revealed on Friday that Halliburton's own auditors warned of problems with the fuel delivery contract. The company claims that the internal audit is confidential. After serving as defense secretary from 1989 to 1993, Cheney was hired by Halliburton in 1995. He served as chief executive until 2000, quitting to run for vice president. "I've severed all my ties with the company, gotten rid of all my financial interest," Cheney told NBC in September. Not quite so. The vice president still receives deferred compensation from Halliburton. Cheney's Halliburton benefits, according to his 2001 financial disclosure, include three batches of stock options comprising 433,333 shares. The vice president had an income-generating deferred compensation account valued at $500,000 to $1 million. (He has pledged to give after-tax income to charity.) Cheney's total assets were valued at between $19.1 million and $86.4 million. Not bad for a life of public service punctuated by five years in the corporate world. Of course, Cheney can remember what Prince Bernhard of The Netherlands declared after disclosure of "commissions" he received from Lockheed: "I am above such things."