Political Dick Jokes

I was watching a political commentator discussing the possible decision of the Attorney General, Eric Holder – seemingly defying President Obama’s overall reluctance to prosecute and investigate the any possible sins of the Bush administration as they may relate to “dark ops,” suborning torture or other potentially “illegal” activities associated with “fighting terrorism” – in appointing an independent investigator to ascertain if our intelligence agencies lied to or otherwise misled the Congressional oversight committees and if they were directed to do so by then Vice President Richard Cheney. The commentator remarked that whenever the news of the bad economy escalates – as it did as unemployment numbers, home sales and values and retail sales continue to tank at record levels – a new “horrible” surfaces about the Bush administration.

So is this latest set of “political distractions” meant to pull national attention away from the harsh economy or a legitimate inquiry? Does anyone really think that anything whatsoever would distract the American people from their economic meltdown? Ignore the frozen economy, the vast ranks of the unemployed and the fact that not only is this debacle going to drag on, the notion of a genuine recovery has been replaced with the underlying acceptance that this was a big economic reset to “reality”? And even if somehow we “stupid” Americans are so easily distracted from the most desperate times in their personal lives, is that a reason not to follow an illicit trail?

During his recent speech in Ghana , as the President chastised many African nations where brutality is a way of life, where corruption is a daily necessity and where dictators routinely siphon massive dollars from their people to be placed in numbered Swiss bank accounts, he said: “ Africa doesn’t need strongmen. It needs strong institutions.” But isn’t that exactly what defines the United States ? The institutional separation of the judicial, executive and legislative branches – the brilliant “checks and balances” created by our founders – is at the core of what makes the American form of government great. Any attempt to remove or limit this self-limiting system is a horrific threat to our democratic principles, a challenge to the very survivability of our way of life.

In 1937, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, a Democrat, attempted to dilute the Supreme Court’s power, because they used protection of property rights to reverse many of his programs. Wikipedia: “During Roosevelt's first term in office, the Supreme Court had struck down several prominent New Deal measures designed to bolster economic recovery during the Great Depression, leading to charges that a narrow majority faction of the court was obstructionist and political.”

Shortly after his reelection in 1936, Roosevelt vowed to change the status quo accordingly; he proposed the Judicary Reorganization Bill of 1937: “Although the bill aimed generally to overhaul and modernize all of the federal court system, its most important provision would have granted the President power to appoint an additional Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court for every sitting member over the age of 70½, up to a maximum of six.” Because Roosevelt could add justices to the Supreme Court, diluting the power of the sitting justices accordingly, the move was referred to frequently as his effort to “pack the court.” The move was soundly defeated in the U.S. Senate (70-20), where the system of checks and balances worked quite well obviously.

Vice President Cheney railed at the limitations that Congress has placed on the executive branch of government after the Vietnam War; he believed that in modern times, where threats developed quickly and changed rapidly, Congressional oversight – the system of checks and balances – was ill-suited to deal with extreme crises. He harkened back to ancient Roman times when a single senator was selected by the body politic to lead the country as a virtual dictator during times of dire emergency. More than one such dictator lingered at the top well past the crisis, I might add, and the notion of the Roman Senate seemed to destroy itself accordingly.

This “unitary executive” theory of government, at the heart of Cheney’s passionate belief system, is at profound odds with the system of checks and balances envisioned by our founding fathers. Putting aside the battle of whether or not America defied the Geneva Conventions or the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment with its interrogation methods, there is a huge underlying question that rides to the heart of our form of government: did the office of the President or the Vice President of the United States threaten to undermine or destroy the very system of checks and balances that defines our democracy?

AG Holder has pledged to “follow the facts and the law.” He said in an interview with Newsweek: “I hope that whatever decision I make would not have a negative impact on the president's agenda… But that can't be a part of my decision.” Maybe the line was not crossed, but for America to survive as a nation, we need to preserve the underlying and constitutional fundamentals upon which our government is based. Was the “secret information” simply a nascent CIA plan – never finalized or implemented – to assassinate Al Qaeda leaders, as some have claimed, or something more? Is this much ado about nothing or a challenge to our basic form of government?

We need to find out and make sure that the constitution cannot be rewritten by any individual. This is not about protecting Americans from terrorism; it is about protecting our form of government from those who might choose to ignore those aspects of our democracy that might be inconvenient at any given moment. Who is empowered to make such decisions?

I’m Peter Dekom, and I approve this message.