For years now, the NY Times has been championing Henry Waxman’s idiotic case against Dick Cheney on his right to keep private the notes of meetings that led up to the creation of the Energy Bill. The case is now over, Cheney has been vindicated, but to Gail Collins and company, he is still guilty.
This administration, and any administration, should have the right to meet privately to receive advice. Making all hearings public risks the chance of encouraging grooupthink, keeping people from giving advice they feel correct but that could be hurtful to them, and we simply need an executive branch that is able to receive unjaundiced advice when it wants.
In this case, the Times and Democrats did not like the energy bill, so instead of attacking the legislation itself, they attempted to create an impression of wrongdoing with HOW the bill was made. It was absurd, and the courts agreed. However, with the NY Times, this administration is always wrong:
Fortunately, the new ruling, turning mostly on the precise wording of the statute, at least appears to leave room for Congress to revise the Federal Advisory Committee Act to make it harder to shield the activities of future White House task forces from public scrutiny. Representative Henry Waxman, the California Democrat, has introduced a bill to do that, and also reverse other administration actions undermining open government and the public’s right to know.
Of course, having now achieved his legal victory, nothing stops Mr. Cheney from voluntarily coming clean about the secret deliberations of his task force. Just don’t hold your breath.
“Turned on the precise wording of the statute” means that Cheney followed the law, and the NY Times has been full of shit since day one, acting as Waxman’s attack dog. Hacks.
ppgaz
Well, there are two arguments in this situation.
One is the “government guys have private meetings” argument. It has some attractiveness, but I’m not sure that I really buy it. If we simply hold it up to the “sunshine” principle (see: FOIA) then it reveals the holes in the case. Sure, officials can have “private” meetings …. but the other is that when you have two guys whose power base came from the frigging OIL BUSINESS … when you have the head honcho at Haliburton (pillar of public trust that they are) holding the meetings … and when you have the whole thing presented as a “show” designed to bamboozle the public into thinking these guys are just doing a good thing, when in fact, their records are 100% “riding for the brand” of Big Energy ….. then, honestly, the “can’t we have a private meeting” spin starts too look like “thou dost protest too much.” Just another example of their continuous, smug, lying through their teeth.
Conservation is for wimps, remember? So say Mr. Haliburton and Mr. Saudi-Spokesperson Bush.
Let’s see … conservation is for wimps, and why can’t those Saudis increase their production? Hmm.
I say, these two assholes are part of the problem, not part of the solution. Failure to conserve the worlds most precious and absolutely irreplaceable resource strikes me as being criminal neglect. For that reason, I think Cheney deserves a lot more drubbing on this subject that he has gotten. Look at the “record” coming from the famous meetings. Is this the record of people who have the world’s best interest at heart? You can sell me the Brooklyn Bridge before you can sell me that loaf of baloney.
rilkefan
John, I had thought that people wanted to see the list of participants, not the meeting notes. That’s what “limited fact-finding into the panel’s structure and membership that had been ordered by a federal trial judge” sounds like to me. But then, I’m a Democrat.
Remind me to what extent this parallels the argument over the privacy of the Clinton health care task force.
[email protected]
ppgaz:
You don’t drive, I hope.
Or heat your home in the winter, air-condition it in the summer, and otherwise use more than your share of our precious energy resources.
Because if you do, you might consider acknowledging that we’ve got a big problem, that has no simple answer. And that drubbing “these two assholes” all you like will not move us one step toward solving it.
But hey: It’s fun, though, isn’t it?
JPS
[Well, that was not the way I meant to sign that one. That’s what I get, I guess.]
John Cole
Rilke- Other than Cheney being an actual member of government and Hillary being a nothing but an unelected individual? Several things, but you already know them…
willyb
As John has pointed out, the Federal Advisory Committee Act does not apply to Cheney’s energy task force since it did not contain non-federal officials as members. The fact that the DC Circuit ruled 8-0 shows that this suit was frivilous.
The Disenfrachised Voter
Exactly why shouldn’t we be able to see a list of names? You give no argument against that John, and that is what this is all about to me. Why must their names be held in secret? It is total bullshit if you ask me. I have every damn right to know who my elected officals are meeting with, especially when they are creating legislation.
Gary Farber
How do you feel about simply requiring the exectutive branch revealing who is in attendance at such meetings, John? Is that an unreasonable demand that would bring down (or damage) our democracy,if it were a requirement?
Justin Faulkner
First I’d like to point out that there are competing values here: the value of executive confidentiality and the value of open government (public’s right to know what their government is doing).
So what “wording” was at issue here? I don’t think it’s quite as simple as you say, John, and the NYTimes doesn’t quite get it either.
FACA imposes open-meeting and disclosure requirements on “advisory committees,” exempting groups “composed wholly of full-time, or permanent part-time, [federal] officers or employees.”
The allegation was that “because nonfederal employees and private lobbyists regularly attended and fully participated in the Group
willyb
“I have every damn right to know who my elected officals are meeting with, especially when they are creating legislation.”
I always thought the Congress created legislation???
sojourner
Why shouldn’t we have the right to know who attended the meeting? Why shouldn’t we know who was given the opportunity to provide input into the Bush energy policy and who didn’t? Why shouldn’t we know if the Bushies repaid their campaign donors with legislation (including enormous tax cuts) that put money in their pockets? Why shouldn’t we know if Iraq was on the agenda?
Why is the Bush administration so secretive? Could it be that they have something to hide? Nah… Not these good Christians. Except, whoops, they appear to be hiding a good deal.
Aaron
Re-read John’s post.
If we list out every meeting’s attendees what you will get is certain people not attending meetings for fear of being dragged through the mud.
Stormy70
Plus, if one of them is a gay Republican, it would be open season.
Mike Jones
I find the “executive confidentiality” argument singularly unconvincing. These folks are (allegedly, at least) doing the people’s business. The people should have a right to know who’s doing their business. If that means that occassional good advice is lost because the giver doesn’t want to be made public, that’s a price I’m willing to pay. I think the alternative – bad/self-serving advice given under cover of secrecy – is much more prevalent.
willyb
“Suppose, hypothetically, that the non-voting attendees simply told the voting members how to vote, and they then did so. Should the advisory committee still be exempt?”
You answer your own question…This is an ADVISORY committee. Are you suggesting that the results of a vote are automatically turned into law or something?
What were the motives of the special interest groups that brought this suit? What public interest were they serving? Are we to the point that most American believe that the public has a right to pick the people that the president gets his advice from and know everything that they discussed?
This case was frivolous from its inception, and I suspect brought only so it could be used by these special interests, and their allies in the MSM, to give them a “basis” for uttering false charges and misrepresentations maliciously calculated to damage the administration
Justin Faulkner
Oh god, please spare us the conspiracy nonsense, willyb! I’m so sick of it!
I’ll respond to the one actual argument that you make; no, of course an advisory committee’s findings or recommendations are not automatically made law. This was a task force that set out to draft energy policy that the President would propose to Congress. While Congress does have the constitutional authority to pass something completely different, or pass nothing at all, we have seen that Republican legislators in Congress are very willing to simply rubber stamp the President’s proposals.
The point, though, is that there is a law that says advisory committees DO have to disclose who was present, among other things, unless they meet the qualifications for exemption. Petitioners in this case made the claim that the influental participation by those who were not federal employees made them *de facto* members.
Obviously, the DC court did not find in favor of this argument. But that doesn’t make the case frivolous. Get real.
ppgaz
Hmm. Cheney “followed the law.”
Al Gore found “no controlling legal authority.”
But both of them exhibited, first, lousy judgement in participating in something that had all the appearance of a shitty thing … not that anyone in DC would ever be actually dented by doing a shitty thing …. and second, by acting shocked — shocked! — that anyone would question their motives later. In other words, how DARE you citizens criticize us big shots? We didn’t get to be big shots by caving into pressure from the likes of you!
It’s 2005, folks. Politics is theater. The Cheney harangue is about theater. It’s about exposing the guy as a Good Old Boy member of the of the Good Old Boy Oil Club who called a club meeting to eat some good food and talk “energy policy.”
If Cheney had wanted private meetings to get private advice, he could have had them. He might have started with asking that the thing not be billboarded as a big event with plenty of talking points going out to Faux News.
Conservation is for wimps. Pussies. Remember that one of these days when you are paying $5 a gallon for gasoline or when oil hits $75 a barrel.
I’d say, drop the Cheney harangue, and instead, just put his photo on every gas pump in the United States. “Brought to you by the folks who brought you Haliburton.”
Sounds fair to me.
willyb
“Obviously, the DC court did not find in favor of this argument. But that doesn’t make the case frivolous. Get real.”
Take your own advice. Why didn’t ONE of the judges agree with petitioner?
Aaron
ppgaz,
You are aware a high price is the markets way of making sure there is conservation. That’s why some people support a stiff gas tax.
BTW, seeing the Newsweek story used anonymous sources, should we now demand that they release all their sources’ names?
Justin Faulkner
You obviously are misunderstanding what the word “frivolous” means. Using Bill Frist & Tom DeLay as a legal dictionary, are we?
frivolous: lacking in any arguable basis or merit in either law or fact
If the case was frivolous, the DC District Court would have dismissed it out of hand, and it would certainly never have reached the Supreme Court.
Justin Faulkner
You obviously are misunderstanding what the word “frivolous” means. Using Bill Frist & Tom DeLay as a legal dictionary, are we?
frivolous: lacking in any arguable basis or merit in either law or fact
If the case was frivolous, the DC District Court would have dismissed it out of hand, and it would certainly never have reached the Supreme Court.
Justin Faulkner
John, the duplicate comment occurred when the flood control mechanism told me to “try again.”
willyb, I might point out that while I don’t entirely agree with this decision, I accept its legitimacy. Why is this important? Because that’s an example that Republicans should be following with respect to ones they don’t like, not calling for impeachment or intimidation.
willyb
“frivolous: lacking in any arguable basis or merit in either law or fact”
So what was the merit of this “case” if the petitioners could not get ONE judge on their side? What would the petitioners have achieved if they had won? Are you suggesting that ANY ARGUABLE BASIS is the correct standard for spending the public’s time and money?
I think the petitioners in this case had little chance to win, but if they won, the spoils of their victory would be political cannon fodder. That’s frivolous to me!
“willyb, I might point out that while I don’t entirely agree with this decision, I accept its legitimacy.”
That’s big of you! We should all go out and litigate issues that have little weight or importance except for the political ramifications.
rilkefan
Willyb, please note that this case was about a judge’s order to make Cheney give up the names; that it was decided on narrow procedural grounds; that there was recently a unanimous decision against a president which members of the court later admitted was stupid; that you ought to think about Justin Faulkner’s measured comments; and that sunshine laws have wider implications than political coup-counting.
Shawn
My two cents… There are a lot of good arguments on both sides here, but what I keep coming back to is illegal vs. unethical.
It’s not against the law in my state to cheat on my spouse, but I don’t do it. Why? Because it’s wrong.
We can split hairs all we want, but ethics are sorely lacking in our government, on both sides. Just because something isn’t illegal, doesn’t make it right.
John Cole
Hmm. Cheney “followed the law.”
Al Gore found “no controlling legal authority.”
Gimme a god damned break. I drove to the store a while ago. I did not speed or run any red lights. I followed the law. You got a fucking problem with that? Nice try at a lame bit of equivalency, ppgaz.
There is nothing illegal, unethical, or even wrong about letting the executive branch receive confidential advice. The proof is in the bill. If you find a qui pro quo in the bill- have at it. But the legislation advanced has been open and right there in front of you from day one.
This has been nothing but a smear by Henry Waxman and his proxies from the get go.
Kimmitt
No, I think it’s a valid point — if one is going to get upset about things which kinda oughta be illegal but which really aren’t, one ought to follow all the way through.
Of course, if your position is that it shouldn’t kinda oughta be illegal, then you’re all good, but you do have to respect other folks who do make legalistic arguments to support their guys.
Jerry
Does anyone else need a magnifying glass held up to the screen to read this blog?
Rick
Comments, yeah. Pretty pee-wee point size.
Cordially…
Andrei
“Because if you do, you might consider acknowledging that we’ve got a big problem, that has no simple answer. And that drubbing “these two assholes” all you like will not move us one step toward solving it.”
Yeah. We do have a big problem. A very big problem. And ppgaz, IMHO, has every right to drub the assholes that can’t seem to take a real leadership position to find a way out of it.
What galls me more than these sideline shows accusing journalists of hackery is the audacity for ex-Haliburton exec Cheney to have meetings with his old buddies — who don’t seem to be offering any real solutions to our energy problems — to get their “advice” on what the country should do moving forward. Worse, in many ways our energy policies are funding the very people we are fighting wars with. Utterly irresponsbile, and the public is so distracted with non-stories while the heart of the problem is being completely ignored.
If we beleive we are as great a nation as we promote ourselves to be, anyone in a leadership position truly interested in finding a long term solution to our energy problems could take a stand and ask the American public to shoot for the moon. The heart of the problem is our laziness in not wanting to change our current infrastrucutre and find other ways to live than depending so largely on oil.
Cole calls the NY Times “hacks.” Who cares? What about the hacks who are supposedly advising this administration on an energy policy that has an end game where we *lose*. (Unless of course you believe that oil supply is inifite or that the problem will only come to roost once you are long dead, so who cares.) That end-game is appearing to be a legacy that will leave future generations comparing our time in history to the hubris that brought down the Romans.
Finally, Cole says, “This administration, and any administration, should have the right to meet privately to receive advice. Making all hearings public risks the chance of encouraging grooupthink…”
What the fuck do you call the circle jerk of Cheney getting advice from execs and power players at Haliburton? If that’s not groupthink or receiving jaundiced advise of the highest order, I don’t know what is.
willyb
rilkefan:
I appreciate Justin Faulkner’s measured comments. He seems to be saying that the wrong judgment was reached (the decision is bullshit), but that he respects this bullshit decision. I
John Cole
I simply fail to understand why who said what is germane. The outcome is clear and transparent, in the form of the energy bill.
Rocky Smith
All administrations should have the option of private meetings with whomever they deem it is needed to meet with for advice on various subjects. I think you leftists protest too much. This isn’t something new. It has happened throughout several decades of both Democrat and Republican administrations. They need candid advice at times. Whatever laws come from such meetings are public knowledge.
Besides that, you democrats, you MIGHT get one of yours elected to the Presidency again some day. They might decide they need private meetings too. You can’t have EVERYTHING be done in public!
Andrei
“They need candid advice at times.”
Again… how on earth is Cheney getting *candid* advice from the guys he was a CEO for in the very recent past? He’s a recent ex-executive at Haliburton fer crissake. And Haliburton is a company that has a vested interest in not changing the current energy policy. That is if Haliburton wants to stay in business.
My God… You guys can promote “privacy” all you want with regards to getting policy advice for the executive branch. There’s a legit debating point in that sentiment. But can we quit with the crap phrasing like “unjaundiced” and “candid” policy advice?
What Cheney got in these closed door meetings is anything but.
Andrei
“I simply fail to understand why who said what is germane. The outcome is clear and transparent, in the form of the energy bill.”
Because it might affect the way a story plays in the media, and whether people would vote for these guys again if the public felt money interests were taking priority over the good of the American public.
People — as a collective — can’t understand an energy bill as written. They can understand a spin on the story in the mainstream media where the perception is that the guys in charge might be acting in a way that’s not entirely kosher or ethical.
Don’t be naive John… Who said what is very germane. It’s what all of power politics is about: perception.
Justin Faulkner
“People — as a collective — can’t understand an energy bill as written. They can understand a spin on the story in the mainstream media where the perception is that the guys in charge might be acting in a way that’s not entirely kosher or ethical.”
I think that’s a pretty good point, politically speaking. It fosters accountability of government officials.
I might point out that there’s nothing *inherently* bad about individuals refraining from giving “advice” that they would otherwise give in private. Sometimes the bright light of public scrutiny is actually needed to keep an administration in line with “the people.” A Republic need not always be the most “effecient” form of government; too much effeciency leads to tyranny.
CJ
John:
“If you find a qui pro quo in the bill- have at it. But the legislation advanced has been open and right there in front of you from day one.”
The problem here is that without knowing who our elected officials are talking to, it will be difficult to determine what the quid pro quo was. I don’t remember the last time Congress came right out and said that this portion of such and such a bill is a reward for some benefit to be named later. It just doesn’t happen.
willyb:
Regarding the outcome of the Schiavo case, you stated that the court’s actions were legal, but that you still felt that they were wrong. Why is it when the tables are turned you become so ungracious? One might think you have an agenda. One thing you had and continue to cherish, apparently, is an utter lack of understanding regarding how the law works. Go get yourself a few hornbooks and do some reading.
CJ
willyb
“One thing you had and continue to cherish, apparently, is an utter lack of understanding regarding how the law works. Go get yourself a few hornbooks and do some reading.”
Nice ad hominem! I’m just curious CJ, do you have to be gracious to understand how the law works? Maybe you could explain how my comments in this thread reflect a lack of understanding of how the law works.
And, oh yeah, you know where you can put your hornbooks.
M. Scott Eiland
People — as a collective — can’t understand an energy bill as written. They can understand a spin on the story in the mainstream media where the perception is that the guys in charge might be acting in a way that’s not entirely kosher or ethical.
You mean, like a badly sourced story about an event that may never have happened that ended up being a catalyst for fatal riots?
Gee, somehow right now I can’t get too worked up about the MSM missing out on their chance to draw moustaches and goatees on their favorite targets.
John is right–the law is public record and therefore not a mystery, even if those who advised regarding it might be. Furthermore, the usual suspects had their chance to make the principals look like Evil Incarnate without the info sought in the lawsuit, and the world still turns on its axis.
willyb
“The problem here is that without knowing who our elected officials are talking to, it will be difficult to determine what the quid pro quo was.”
When you are talking about a quid pro quo between a private citizen and an elected official, you don’t need to qualify the following statement: “it will be difficult to determine what the quid pro quo was.” It will obviously be difficult, with or without a list of names, to determine what the quid pro quo was. But then you are the learned legal mind, so tell me
Andrei
“Gee, somehow right now I can’t get too worked up about the MSM missing out on their chance to draw moustaches and goatees on their favorite targets.”
Seems like you missed the point then, as I said nothing of the sort.
Kimmitt
The outcome is clear and transparent, in the form of the energy bill.
The question is, is the outcome in the form of the energy bill or in the form of the Iraq War? If the former, then it’s just extremely bad government. If the latter, that’s a little more interesting.
wild bird
Henry (wacky)waxman he was the idiot who went after popcorn and the chineese and mexican restruants this idiot should be impeached and the New York Pravda(Times)should be boycotted we dont need that jerk waxman and his rediclous ranting
Justin Faulkner
Here’s a good legal commentary on the case: http://writ.news.findlaw.com/commentary/20050517_klarevas.html