Dick Cheney, Role Model (NYT Editorial)

[jefferson_dem]

Dick Cheney, Role Model

In all the talk about the vice-presidential debate, there was an issue that did not get much attention but kept nagging at us: Sarah Palin’s description of the role and the responsibilities of the office for which she is running, vice president of the United States.

In Thursday night’s debate, Ms. Palin was asked about the vice president’s role in government. She said she agreed with Dick Cheney that “we have a lot of flexibility in there” under the Constitution. And she declared that she was “thankful that the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the vice president also, if that vice president so chose to exert it.”

It is hard to tell from Ms. Palin’s remarks whether she understands how profoundly Dick Cheney has reshaped the vice presidency — as part of a larger drive to free the executive branch from all checks and balances. Nor did she seem to understand how much damage that has done to American democracy.

Mr. Cheney has shown what can happen when a vice president — a position that is easy to lampoon and overlook — is given free rein by the president and does not care about trampling on the Constitution.

Mr. Cheney has long taken the bizarre view that the lesson of Watergate was that Congress was too powerful and the president not powerful enough. He dedicated himself to expanding President Bush’s authority and arrogating to himself executive, legislative and legal powers that are nowhere in the Constitution.

<SNIP>

Any president deserves a vice president who will be a sound adviser and trustworthy supporter. But the American people also deserve and need a vice president who understands and respects the balance of power — and the limits of his or her own power. That is fundamental to our democracy.

So far, Ms. Palin has it exactly, frighteningly wrong.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/04/opinion/04sat1.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&ref=opinion&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin

[BumRushDaShow]

1. Hopefully this issue will get more play.

But it's sad that the Democratic response to Shrub and Darth's attempt at a coup was to have Pelosi insist that "impeachment is off the table" and have Conyers hold dozens of hearings that have gone nowhere - all to run out a clock. This emboldened Mooselini to happily make her own cynical grab for more power, not only in her own state, but as a prospective VP.

For repukes, crime DOES pay and we're seeing it play out. To have had someone like Don Siegelman sitting in jail while Shrub, Darth, Gonzo, Mooselini, and even Bridge-to-nowhere-Stevens laugh off and dodge such a possibility due to convoluted Democratic party posturing, IS a disgrace.

After this election, it will be up to the people in our party to hold Congress' feet to the fire. They need to quit posturing and running out clocks and start making examples out of those who flaunt the Constitution, because a precedence has now been set, and it's time to swing the pendulum back the other way.

[texpatriot2004]

2. I loved Biden's response to Palin on this issue. nm