We can have Cheney's shredder...
...when we pry it from his cold, dead hands...
I always said that Cheney is smarter, more experienced, and more dangerous than Bush. We will find out some day just how much more he ran that show than simple-minded Bush.
From The New York Times: "Dick Cheney's lawyers are asserting that the vice president alone has the authority to determine which records, if any, from his tenure will be handed over to the National Archives when he leaves office in January....
"The vice president alone may determine what constitutes vice presidential records or personal records, how his records will be created, maintained, managed and disposed, and are all actions that are committed to his discretion by law," according to a court filing by Cheney's office with the U.S. District Court on Dec. 8.
Cheney is being sued by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a government watchdog group that is trying to ensure that no presidential records are destroyed or handled in a way that makes them unavailable to the public.
The 1978 Presidential Records Act requires all presidential and vice presidential records to be transferred to the National Archives immediately upon the end of the president's last term of office and gives the archivist responsibility to preserve and control access to presidential records. The law ended the tradition of private ownership of presidential papers, opening White House records to the public and historians....
A judge in September ordered Cheney to preserve all his records while the suit continued."
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2008/12/18/washington/AP-Cheney-lawsuit.html?_r=1
Who's going to make sure that Cheney obeys that order? Ol' "Fourth Estate" is exactly the sort of arrogant person who could decide to shred his documents and say to a judge -- Go ahead, hold me in contempt...make my day.
If Cheney successfully destroys the record of his time in office, we may never learn all that he was actually up to while he was in our employ. We know he trashed our government...we need to know the particulars to make sure that it never happens again.
Has anyone thought about his computers?
Cheney is a hard ass and will never repent nor recant...he's as good as boasting of his crimes in recent interviews. He very well knows how history will judge him. People who are proud of what they've accomplished don't go to court to prevent it from seeing the light of day.
The American people have already judged, that's why Cheney's approval ratings are below 20 percent.
But, in this country the rich and powerful are never held accountable...unless it's for illicit sex.
Surely he's not worried about his legacy. He already knows that no one will ever pay homage to him. There will be no statues or monuments honoring him...no biographies or libraries glorifying his deeds. No scholarships or schools bearing his name.
Nothing.
Just the mess he left behind.
He exceeded the authority of his office and maneuvered his vice presidency to be, as his lawyers said, "a unique office that is neither a part of the executive branch nor a part of the legislative branch." So he answered to no one...
He contributed to secrecy in government...thought nothing of holding closed-door White House meetings with Enron executives to discuss public energy policies that put the administration in bed with big oil...and an environmental policy that ignored threats to our environment.
He steered tons of military dollars to private contractors like Halliburton in dubious deals with Iraq. He told us he broke his ties with Halliburton...but congressional researchers say he still had lots of stock in the company.
Cheney had a hand in the warrantless wiretapping of every day Americans.
He pushed for war with Iraq just three months after 9/11...using "information" obtained from torture. He told us that Saddam Hussein had high-level contacts with al Qaeda for ten years, and was providing training to terrorists. It wasn't true.
America had always stood for the highest values of decency and the rule of law. Here came Cheney to say that certain acts of barbarism and torture are just fine. At least it produced all the reasons he needed to make a case for war. So that he and his big business and oil buddies could profit.
Cheney engaged in political vendettas. He had a hand in the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson, the plot to do so emanated from his office...all because her husband spoke the truth about the lead up to the Iraq war.
There is more, but all I have stomach for now.
There isn't a shredder big enough to erase Cheney's wrongdoings.
