Dick Cheney: "We must restore some balance" between Congress and the White House

this man is clueless...



the above surely must be one of jonah goldberg's favorite quotes... he's writing in today's la times, parroting once again the incredibly juvenile theme of, "Well, THEY did it too"...

My president's better than yours
Liberals who deride Bush's actions as extreme sang a different tune when their party's presidents used similar tactics.

At a candidate forum for trial lawyers in Chicago on Sunday, Hillary Clinton proclaimed that the Bush administration is "the most radical presidency we have ever had."

This is, quite simply, absurd. But such boob-bait for the Bush bashers is common today in Democratic circles, just as similar right-wing rhetoric about Bill Clinton was par for the course a decade ago.

[...]

For eight years, the right screamed bloody murder about Clinton's overreaching. He minted new executive privileges, "accidentally" rummaged through the FBI files of political opponents and sought electronic wiretapping powers — during peacetime — that today are denounced during the war on terror. Some on the right feared we were on a slippery slope to tyranny. Liberals often chortled about such right-wing paranoia.

Today, the dynamic is reversed. Liberals fret over creeping fascism while conservatives give Bush the benefit of the doubt. Both sides are open to charges of hypocrisy, and neither is immune to partisan amnesia. The only consistent crowd are the Libertarians, who distrust all government power.

here's what i wrote to the la times as an open letter to mr. goldberg...

Sir,

I don't disagree with your thesis. Presidents seem to have a propensity for seizing as much power as they can, a tendency foreseen by the founders and doubtlessly the reason they formulated such clear language about the separate but equal balance of powers.

I don't support any president of any party accruing unfettered power, and to claim that concerns about the constitution-trampling Bush administration are "absurd" only tells me that, one, you either haven't been paying attention or, two, you choose to ignore reality. The steps taken by George Bush and Dick Cheney to wield absolute executive power are among the single most disturbing developments I have seen take place in my country over a 60-year lifetime, a lifetime that's included 37 years of senior level management and university professorships around the globe. I am in daily touch with a number of friends both in the U.S. and abroad, a mix of lifelong Republicans, Democrats and independents, all of whom agree that the United States is facing the most critical constitutional crisis of its history, and that, if it's allowed to continue, we are in serious danger not only because of the time left to the current White House occupants, but, down the road, from ANY future president.

Rather than perpetuating the, in my opinion, patently ridiculous theme of "Well, THEY did it too," I would think you would be speaking out FOR the restoration of our precious Constitution to its rightful place as the fundamental underpinning of our nation. I never let my children (or, now, my grandchildren) get away with the "They did it too" excuse and I certainly expect better from someone who writes from the platform of the Los Angeles Times.

Sincerely,

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