William Rivers Pitt argues that what the President, Cheney, and Gonzalez have done is not illegal. Apparently, it is not illegal for the President to declare himself and his administration to be above the law. The idea is so outrageous that it never occurred to anyone to make it illegal.
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I'm sorry: isn't it illegal for anyone to declare themselves above the law and then act on it? Isn't that the point of law? Wouldn't the law have to exempt him?
That's breathtakingly stupid.
The great Kurt Godel, while at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princteon, New Jersey, invented what he called a fatal loophole in the U.S. Constitution. His friends, including Albert Einstein, had to urge him NOT to mention this during the oral interview part of his getting his U.S. Citizenship.
So what Gonzalez, Bush, Cheney et al have done is not, in all likelihood, even an original discovery.
This is a distortion of the actual facts. Executive privilege is not quite a matter of declaring oneself and others in the Executive branch above the law.
The idea is that, in theory, there are things that the Executive branch should not disclose for "national security" interests. It's analogous to saying that the Executive branch should be allowed to have private discussions about all sorts of domestic and international matters -- even now we would have to say there is some merit in this.
The problem is that this seems to be increasingly invoked to avoid embarrassing the President and his staff, thwart investigations about actual illegal activities, and seemingly gets extended in a very broad way to all sorts of individuals.
We have the Republicans to thank for showing us that a sitting President can indeed be pressured into taking depositions and testifying about his own actions.
I think there is a boundary that a President is unwise to cross, however. Let's say President Bush declares that Gonzales, Cheney, and others cannot be tried for illegal activities in connection with whatever. This would first of all be asking for an impeachment, and secondly would really upset any Republican running for office this year or next.
The problem with Executive Privilege in any form is that it violates the concept of checks and balances. If the issues are truly matters of national security, then the other two branches of government have both a right and a duty to be aware of them.
Uggghhh....I'm so sick of hearing about "Executive PRIVILEGE"...
...how about Executive RESPONSIBILITY?
Dear Sir: Excutaive Privalivage under the Bush administration is the elite rubbing their nose in the dirt of the dirty elites out on the ground in a way to publiclly say; if you come to my house we will win no matter what. When your the President; then its only fair to be evil in the eyes of GOD when you are still trying to figure out to let convinvince the nation Where is all the Jgasesed I west hou of ofFriice?"
pPICK OP ,lENNDER