Vice President Cheney has been in the news a lot lately. One major reason is that he thinks he discovered something about his office that others have failed to see in over 200 years — it is not really part of the executive branch of government. As a result, laws applying to the executive branch don’t apply to him.
Most Americans are not willing to see the error of the past beliefs and the unique exemption of the Office of Vice President from the law, and down the at the Washington Post they are doing an unflattering 4-part series on Cheney. The most recent, part IV, is quite relevant to this blog.
Cheney has been the source of a good deal of the lawlessness of this Administration not just in military policy (e.g., torture, exposing secret agents like Valerie Plame), but in environmental policy too.
Amending environmental laws to help business. Cheney left no tracks as he steered policy moves to ease pollution control. Washington Post as reprinted in MSNBC.
Ralph Maughan
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University with specialties in natural resource politics, public opinion, interest groups, political parties, voting and elections. Aside from academic publications, he is author or co-author of three hiking/backpacking guides, and he is past President of the Western Watersheds Project and the creator of The Wildlife News.
