NationStates Jolt Archive

I just read this article (and added the second one, which is a bit older), and I have to say I had no idea just how deep this went.

I mean, I'm not an expert in American politics and political history, but this just seems outrageous to me. There are offices and departments fundamentally being changed in their scope and function. Have other presidents before done the same thing? And will it be reversed?

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,474911,00.html
It's not only the U.S. attorneys who are threatened by partisan politics. Since Day One, the Bush administration has been quietly dismantling the DOJ's Civil Rights Division.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,402588,00.html
A three-year-old executive order that vastly expanded his powers illuminates how the vice president and his minions led us into war.

I just read this article (and added the second one, which is a bit older), and I have to say I had no idea just how deep this went.

I mean, I'm not an expert in American politics and political history, but this just seems outrageous to me. There are offices and departments fundamentally being changed in their scope and function. Have other presidents before done the same thing? And will it be reversed?

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,474911,00.html

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,402588,00.html

I believe it is revolutionary in the same way Roger Moore's portrayal is to fans of the James Bond novels: Shockingly, horribly, wrong.

As I'm sure has been mentioned here, the President, whoever he or she is, has broad powers to dismiss people he becomes dissatisfied with, including U.S. Attorneys and any member of his cabinet.

You may want to be a bit skeptical when reading an article that calls the vice President's aides "minions" and implies that he was himself responsible for the decision to go to war in Afghanistan or Iraq. The responsibility is with the President, who has his own advisors who have not always been on the same page as the VP. It's usually your far-left and far-right who like to pretend VP Cheney is overlord of all government activity at all levels of administration.

It's usually your far-left and far-right who like to pretend VP Cheney is overlord of all government activity at all levels of administration.
I'm not so much talking about that as about the fact that by essentially lifting the VP to the same level of intelligence access as the President, you're fundamentally changing what that office is all about.

I just read this article (and added the second one, which is a bit older), and I have to say I had no idea just how deep this went.

I mean, I'm not an expert in American politics and political history, but this just seems outrageous to me. There are offices and departments fundamentally being changed in their scope and function. Have other presidents before done the same thing? And will it be reversed?

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,474911,00.html


http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,402588,00.html

Oh, it's outrageous alright, but not in the way you mean. Spiegel is either smoking drugs, a gang of sociopathic liars or else dispatching its articles from an alternate universe with no idea that this universe is different. In the case of the first article President Bush has done nothing that previous presidents haven't done before. Mr. Clinton, for example, fired 50+ persecuters in one sitting. The fact that these guys serve at the pleasure of the President is something that goes back to the beginning of the Republic. Spiegel seems to be echoing the leftist papers here without quite understanding what it is that they're echoing.

The older article is even sillier. When Mr. Cheney had his hunting accident he immediately phoned both the police and the local newspaper. A number of reporters from the bigger outlets then had little temper tantrums because they weren't called as well and Spiegel is apparently joining them here. But reporters are not public officials no matter what Spiegel thinks.

Seriously? If this is the best Spiegel can do than I would advise you to dump them and find a better news source. I hope they at least do a better job with local news and sports than they did with this. :rolleyes:

I'm not so much talking about that as about the fact that by essentially lifting the VP to the same level of intelligence access as the President, you're fundamentally changing what that office is all about.

True enough. The office has traditionally been about smiling and waving and helping get the president elected, more than anything else.. the VP puts himself in a good position to run for president later on, but has little input, ordinarily. Cheney did very little to improve President Bush's image in 2000 and 2004, and was mainly chosen to compensate for his lack of foreign policy experience, having had little as governor of Texas. Bush mentioned this in the 2000 debates and on the stump, so it's never been a secret that he was bringing in a past Sec. Def to advise him. So from the outset, the role of the VP was probably going to be a bit more extensive than usual. Suspicion of Cheney as having undue influence may have some theoretical basis given that fact, but the influence he's actually had has been greatly overstated by partisan media, who often ignore instances where there has been disagreement.

Oh, it's outrageous alright, but not in the way you mean. Spiegel is either smoking drugs, a gang of sociopathic liars or else dispatching its articles from an alternate universe with no idea that this universe is different. In the case of the first article President Bush has done nothing that previous presidents haven't done before. Mr. Clinton, for example, fired 50+ persecuters in one sitting. The fact that these guys serve at the pleasure of the President is something that goes back to the beginning of the Republic. Spiegel seems to be echoing the leftist papers here without quite understanding what it is that they're echoing.

Clinton did it at the start of his term, was honest about why he did it, and didn't obfuscate the whole process by refusing to allow his aides to speak to the Congress.

I'm not so much talking about that as about the fact that by essentially lifting the VP to the same level of intelligence access as the President, you're fundamentally changing what that office is all about.

Not really. The VP's main job is to sit around and wait for the President to die. But if he's left out of the information loop then you are going to have a dangerous transition period if what took the President down is something the new President needs to act on fast. So *of course* you make sure the VP knows what the President does. That's simple sense. Been that way for a long time. :)

Clinton did it at the start of his term, was honest about why he did it, and didn't obfuscate the whole process by refusing to allow his aides to speak to the Congress.

So in other words you like the way he did it better because he's a Democrat and you're a Democrat but even you agree that Clinton did it also. :p

I mean, I'm not an expert in American politics and political history, but this just seems outrageous to me. There are offices and departments fundamentally being changed in their scope and function. Have other presidents before done the same thing? And will it be reversed?

part of the problem is that we have on of the worst forms of representative democracy around in the first place, one which puts tons of power to do this sort of shit into the hands of a small clique as a matter of fundamental law and tradition. usually they are slightly more restrained in their use of that power than il bushe has been. but bush also had control of the leg, so was able to push farther than anyone else has tried (when there wasn't actual military battles taking place in the borders of the country, at least).

and even that wasn't enough, because they're enacting the nixonian dictatorship that the right has been working for since the 70s, and therefore has to occasionally defy even their own congress. expansion of presidential power as a primary goal, if you will. it's all about unchecked and uncheckable power to do anything they want, with only the slightest pretension of there being any grounding for this dictatorship in usian law.

So in other words you like the way he did it better because he's a Democrat and you're a Democrat but even you agree that Clinton did it also. :p

No, that's not what I said at all. I said that Clinton, A) Didn't lie about it, B) Did it at the start of his term, as clearing house for his new program (all Presidents do it), and C) Throughout the course of his term never refused to let an aide testify under oath on an issue regarding Executive policy.

Don't twist my words.

So in other words you like the way he did it better because he's a Democrat and you're a Democrat but even you agree that Clinton did it also. :p

No, I have a problem with how this particular president's administration did it. They specifically fired people involved in sensitive investigations (read involving politicians and current political matters) and seem to have fired them for undertaking investigations and prosecutions of these matters. You say that these people "serve at the pleasure of the President", but involvement with sensitive matters is one of the few prohibited reasons for firing federal prosecutors. The idea is that doing so threatens the remaining prosecutors into prosecuting people for political rather than legal reasons, thus undermining the legitimacy of THE ENTIRE JUDICIAL SYSTEM. The fact that they lied about it just compounds the malfeasance.

No, that's not what I said at all. I said that Clinton, A) Didn't lie about it, B) Did it at the start of his term, as clearing house for his new program (all Presidents do it), and C) Throughout the course of his term never refused to let an aide testify under oath on an issue regarding Executive policy.

Don't twist my words.

Shut up liberal, <insert vaguely related talking point here>.

Shut up liberal, <insert vaguely related talking point here>.

*shuts up and begins gesturing wildly*

Oh, it's outrageous alright, but not in the way you mean. Spiegel is either smoking drugs, a gang of sociopathic liars or else dispatching its articles from an alternate universe with no idea that this universe is different. In the case of the first article President Bush has done nothing that previous presidents haven't done before. Mr. Clinton, for example, fired 50+ persecuters in one sitting. The fact that these guys serve at the pleasure of the President is something that goes back to the beginning of the Republic. Spiegel seems to be echoing the leftist papers here without quite understanding what it is that they're echoing.

For crying out loud; how many times do I have to go over this. . .

Mr. Clinton did not do anything nearly the same as Mr. Bush. All attorneys in the DoJ know that they serve at the leisure of the President, and it is customary to tender your resignation when a new President takes over, even in cases when it is still a member of your own party. For partisan reasons, few of the attorneys that served under Bush I extended their resignations to Clinton upon his election. It was under these circumstances that Mr. Clinton fired them. After replacing them, however, he fired exactly one attorney over the eight years of office, and that was for gross malfeasance.

In Mr. Bush's case, we have the e-mail correspondence that suggests that eight attorneys were fired not because of gross malfeasance, but because they were insufficiently partisan, and in at least one case, the clear implication is that a person was fired because he was not going to prosecute a Democrat before the 2006 elections. That is problematic for two reasons, one lawful, the other honorable. The first reason is that though the attorneys serve at the leisure of the President, firing them in an attempt to inhibit their ability to do their jobs or persuade others to go after people not because they did something wrong but because they are in the other political party constitutes obstruction of justice. It seems fairly clear that this has taken place. Further, there is also what military men might call "conduct unbecoming", in that part of the duty of the Attorney General and the Justice Dept. in general is to serve not just the interests of the political party in power but also justice itself; if you cannot do that or do not do that, you are violating the terms of office given to you. In this, again, the goal seems to be to reduce "justice" to "whatever helps the political goals of the Republican Party".

Now maybe this is all justice really is for you; maybe those commie pinko hippie liberal Democrats are so deranged that any attempt to ensure they never come back into power is "justice". If so, then admit your bias and proceed from there. Don't pretend that you've got an objective view when everyone on the opposite side, and by opposite side I mean "those who have a modicum of support for the concept of 'rule of law'", is just engaging in partisan wankery. Further, would you stop arguing like a damned five-year old? If Clinton doing it = moral, then you are hereby prohibited from ever criticizing or blaming Clinton for anything again, at the peril of being permanently cast into the pit of eternal douchedom. If Clinton doing it =/= moral, then stop pretending that Clinton going about something completely different in any way excuses Bush now.

No, that's not what I said at all. I said that Clinton, A) Didn't lie about it, B) Did it at the start of his term, as clearing house for his new program (all Presidents do it), and C) Throughout the course of his term never refused to let an aide testify under oath on an issue regarding Executive policy.

Don't twist my words.

That's not playing fair.

If conservatives can't twist the words of people they disagree with how are they going to argue? Actually have a point or piece of logic?

If they can't twist your words all they've got left is lying.

It's like the U.S.S.R when Stalin started messing up all the democratic soviet structure.

Oh, it's outrageous alright, but not in the way you mean. Spiegel is either smoking drugs, a gang of sociopathic liars or else dispatching its articles from an alternate universe with no idea that this universe is different.
Well, first of all, both articles come from a US source: Salon magazine. That's clearly written at the top of them, and I would suspect that if you had taken the time to actually read what was written, you would have noticed as much.

In the case of the first article President Bush has done nothing that previous presidents haven't done before. Mr. Clinton, for example, fired 50+ persecuters in one sitting. The fact that these guys serve at the pleasure of the President is something that goes back to the beginning of the Republic. Spiegel seems to be echoing the leftist papers here without quite understanding what it is that they're echoing.
So changing the function of the DoJ from making sure that civil rights are kept safe to making sure that Christians can advertise their religion in school is standard practice? Using the DoJ to get into lots of happy gerrymandering is standard practice? Drastically reducing the number of attourneys with civil rights background and replacing them with arch-conservative advocates of political Christianity is standard practice?

So *of course* you make sure the VP knows what the President does. That's simple sense. Been that way for a long time. :)
Which begs the question why for 200 years there was a difference in what sort of intelligence both could access or decide to classify. The executive order in question changed that, which seems to me to be a clear change in what they consider to be the function of the office: no longer baby kissing, instead head of the executive on almost the same level as the president, capable of making or influencing all sorts of policy decisions independently.