The former White House counsel for Richard Nixon broke down the legal gyrations of Dick Cheney last Friday in FindLaw's online "Writ" magazine, writing that "it is becoming increasingly difficult to find a law that Cheney believes does apply to him, whether that law be major or minor." Much like you Threat Levelers have already done, John Dean, the White House lawyer during Watergate, analyzed existing law, executive orders and the Constitution to determine that our current vice president's argument that he is not an "entity" or an "agency" within the executive branch and therefore immune to oversight is "absolutely absurd."
Cheney's argument is sophistry at its best, according to Dean. And he might know. Here's more from the column:
"[Cheney's chief of staff and counsel, David] Addington does not cite any authority or language for his new claim that the Vice President is not an 'agency.' In fact, there is none. To the contrary, the order controlling national security classification states exactly the opposite of what Addington claims.
Executive Order 12958 states that the term 'Agency' means any 'Executive agency,' as defined in the statutory language found at 5 U.S.C. 105, and it includes 'any other entity within the executive branch that comes into the possession of classified information.' An entity is any 'body' or 'unit' or 'thing' within the executive branch, and to claim the Vice President's office is none of these is an insult to common sense. So is Addington's claim that the Office of Vice President is not an agency under the law."
Read the whole column here.
