Eric Alterman: Cheney's Shadow Government

[babylonsister]

Cheney's Shadow Government

by Eric Alterman

For centuries, the vice president had no official role, says Eric Alterman, and this weekend's revelations make it clear that Dick Cheney took advantage of that to launch a personal, unaccountable branch of government.


John Adams once called the vice presidency, “the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived.” FDR’s VP, John Nance Garner, said the job wasn’t “worth a pitcher of warm piss."

It’s quotes like these that make Dick Cheney—who pretty much ran his own separate government from the VP’s office—all the more impressive, not to mention terrifying. For not only was Cheney out of control, he was out of control in a job that had no controls attached to it. No one had ever thought them necessary before.

Give the man credit for creativity. Cheney found even more ways to overturn the Constitution, undermine the separation of powers, and possibly make the U.S. government an accessory to murder many times over.

The New York Times broke half the story in Sunday’s paper as Scott Shane explained that “the Central Intelligence Agency withheld information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress for eight years on direct orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney.” Congress finally found out eight years after Cheney gave the order, when CIA Director Leon E. Panetta informed the House and Senate intelligence committees upon learning of the program himself.

What was it? The Times—and its copycats—didn’t appear to know; but in a Wall Street Journal followup, Siobhan Gorman informs us “one former senior intelligence official” said the program was an attempt to carry out assassinations against top al Qaeda agents. Another former agent said the situation “was straight out of the movies...It was like: Let's kill them all."

more...

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-07-13/inside-dick-cheneys-secret-war/full/

[eleny]

1. Have you read Barton Gelman's book, Angler, about Cheney?

It's a page turner. I hope some tv and radio hosts have Gellman on as a guest this week.

[troubledamerican]

2. Cheney & Rumsfeld & COG & Rex 84

http://www.amazon.com/Road-11-Wealth-Empire-America/dp/0520258711/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1247546956&sr=8-2

From ex-Canadian diplomat/Berkeley professor Peter Dale Scott's "Road To 9/11":

"Cheney and Rumsfeld worked through the 1980s and 1990s on emergency nuclear-response plans which allegedly suspended the American constitution and also Congress.<1> (Through these decades Rumsfeld was CEO of a major pharmaceutical firm, and in the later 1990s Cheney was CEO of Halliburton; but their private status did not deter them from continuing to exercise a supra-constitutional planning power conferred on them by Ronald Reagan.)

Few Americans know that these rules, originally dealing with a nuclear attack on America, were extended by Reagan Executive Order 12656 to cover “any occurrence, including natural disaster, military attack, technological emergency, or other emergency, that seriously degrades or seriously threatens the national security of the United States.”<2> And few Americans realize that at least some of these rules, known technically as Continuity of Government or COG rules, were invoked before 10:00 AM on September 11, 2001.<3>

As he did in 2007, President Bush has again, on August 28, 2008, continued for another year the national emergency first officially proclaimed on September 14, 2001, along with “the powers and authorities adopted to deal with that emergency:”

Notice: Continuation of the National Emergency with Respect to Certain Terrorist Attacks
Consistent with section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)), I am continuing
for 1 year the national emergency I declared on September 14, 2001, in Proclamation 7463,
with respect to the terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center, New York, New York, the Pentagon,
and aboard United Airlines flight 93, and the continuing and immediate threat of further attacks
on the United States.

Because the terrorist threat continues, the national emergency declared on September 14, 2001,
and the powers and authorities adopted to deal with that emergency, must continue in effect
beyond September 14, 2008. Therefore, I am continuing in effect for an additional year the
national emergency I declared on September 14, 2001, with respect to the terrorist threat.

This notice shall be published in the Federal Register and transmitted to the Congress.

GEORGE W. BUSH
THE WHITE HOUSE,
August 28, 2008.



Once again appropriate personnel in Congress should learn and review what those “powers and authorities” are, since almost certainly they include COG (Continuity of Government) rules. In 2007 National Security Presidential Directive 51 (NSPD 51), issued by the White House, also extended for one year the emergency proclaimed in 2001; and it empowered the President to personally ensure "continuity of government."<5>

NSPD 51 also contained "classified Continuity Annexes" to "be protected from unauthorized disclosure." Congressman DeFazio twice requested to see these Annexes, the second time in a letter cosigned by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson and Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Christopher Carney. The White House denied these requests, claiming that the congressmen lacked the requisite clearances."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Program_Office

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Rex-84

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug0IL7k3elQ

[grasswire]

3. this ought to be its own thread

thank you for posting.