Katrina vanden Heuvel: When the Prince of Darkness Visits (The Nation)

[marmar]

BLOG | Posted 06/01/2007 @ 4:11pm
When the Prince of Darkness Visits


"I want to know when the Prince of Darkness comes to visit Mr. Cheney," the wife of a colleague said in response to the Vice President's most recent power grab.

The most secretive VP in US history has arbitrarily decided that the Secret Service logs of visitors to his official residence at the Naval Observatory are none of the people's business. In September 2006, Cheney's Counsel, Shannen Coffin, wrote the Secret Service that all logs should be handed over to the Office of the Vice President and that the agency "shall not retain any copy of these documents and information…. If any documents remain in your possession, please return them to OVP as soon as possible."

The letter was written as the Washington Post requested the logs under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) – a watchdog group targeting officials who "sacrifice the common good to special interests" – had sued the Secret Service for access to the records under the FOIA as well. CREW is seeking to identify conservative religious leaders who visited both the White House and Vice President's residence and the Coffin letter was filed by the Justice department in an effort to get the group's lawsuit dismissed.

"The latest filings make clear that the administration has been destroying documents and entering into secret agreements in violation of the law," said Anne Weisman, CREW's chief counsel.

Against Cheney's wishes, the Secret Service has retained copies of the records (though it maintains that these records – despite being "created as part of the Secret Service's performance of its statutorily-mandated function of protecting the President and Vice President" – are not subject to disclosure under the FOIA.) The Bush administration maintains that all of these records are protected under the Presidential Records Act of 1978, and it "quietly" signed an agreement to that effect with the Secret Service a year ago as the media sought to investigate Jack Abramoff's White House access. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut?bid=7&pid=201363

[tularetom]

1. Cheney appears to have taken a calculated risk

and it's paying off. The calculation was that neither the media nor the opposition would make a big deal out of this illegal activity. Of course knowing the media and the opposition as he did it was not a big risk at all.

[Rageneau]

2. But had it been records of Monica visiting Bill, we'd see them on Tv tomorrow.