Waxman Writes Mean Letters... And Then?
Submitted by Abijah Adams on Mon, 12/03/2007 - 18:17.
Rep. Henry Waxman of California is testing the impartiality of Bush's shiny new Attorney General, Michael Mukasey. Fredo, the last weasel who called himself Attorney General operated as the personal lawyer for his compadre, George Bush, national interest be damned. Mukasey? We shall see.
Waxman wrote a letter as Chairman of the Oversight Committee to Mukasey complaining that the White House has prevented Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald from handing in to the Committee notes from the investigation of the Valerie Plame CIA leak crime. The notes in question are of interviews with White House officials, including Mr. Bush.
I recognize that President Bush and his counsel may not want this information provided to Congress. But the role of the Attorney General is to administer the laws with impartiality. The Justice department provided the exact same information to Congress during the Clinton Administration. There is no special standard for President Bush that exempts him and his senior advisors from responsible congressional oversight.
In a few days, when Mukasey turns around and Cheneys Waxman, maybe then Waxman'll remember that there in fact is an overarching 'special standard' that exempts President Bush and his senior advisors from responsible congressional oversight.
What it's called has moved beyond academic, vague Nixonian theory of the "Unitary Executive" or "Imperial Presidency", it's not even snide IOKIYARism. No, the doctrine now governing this Presidency and capping these past 8 years is one of "Fuck Yourself."
So, what will Waxman do? More strong words in a separate envelope?
Or, what if the Chairs of the House Appropriations Committee, Dave Obey and John Murtha convened hearings about Bush's latest signing statement on a military appropriations bill? You didn't hear about that? Oh yeah...
What if in those hearings House Democrats called to attention that the 11 sections of the law that Bush claims he can ignore, have to do with congressional oversight and are there for a reason? Namely checks and balances...
And then Waxman can gavel a hearing with nobody at the table to testify on behalf of the White House. And then the three together can have a press conference where they say that George Bush has locked himself in the White House and is unlawfully covering up his actions and crimes, ignoring legitimate inquires into executive malfeasance...
And then what if Waxman says that he's suggesting to House Speaker that under historic and undisturbed law, Congress will enforce its own orders against recalcitrant witnesses without involving the executive branch and without leaving open the possibility of presidential pardon. And a Supreme Court majority would find it hard to object in the face of entrenched legal principles upheld by the court as recently as 1934...
And then what if Pelosi, instead of referring a standard contempt citation to the U.S. Attorney (who we can't trust), instead cites inherent contempt, and orders the House Sergeant-at-Arms to take defiant the witnesses into custody for their refusal to cooperate with legitimate inquires into executive malfeasance and has them held until they agree to cooperate...
And after the detained Bush administration official petitions the Supreme Court for writ of habeas corpus, and the courts dismiss the case under the "political question doctrine," as they did in the Reagan-era Burford case in 1982, then the witness can serve as vivid reminder that when America elects Republicans, the Republicans break everything, the law, the world, cities, decency and thus we should never, ever, ever, ever, ever, do it again...
Or Waxman could write another letter.
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