Cheney keeps secrets from the secret keepers.

by Kagro X

That the Bush "administration," and in particular the Office of the Vice President, have been extraordinarily secretive is, ironically, no secret. But in a story first reported by Mark Silva of the Chicago Tribune back in April 2006, details of the extent of the secrecy practices -- if they can be called that -- emerged to reveal something even darker and more disturbing than previously imagined:

As the Bush administration has dramatically accelerated the classification of information as "top secret" or "confidential," one office is refusing to report on its annual activity in classifying documents: the office of Vice President Dick Cheney. A standing executive order, strengthened by President Bush in 2003, requires all agencies and "any other entity within the executive branch" to provide an annual accounting of their classification of documents. More than 80 agencies have collectively reported to the National Archives that they made 15.6 million decisions in 2004 to classify information, nearly double the number in 2001, but Cheney insists he is exempt. Explaining why the vice president has withheld even a tally of his office's secrecy when offices such as the National Security Council routinely report theirs, a spokeswoman said Cheney is "not under any duty" to provide it.

That Executive Order is #13292, which:

prescribes a uniform system for classifying, safeguarding, and declassifying national security information, including information relating to defense against transnational terrorism.

And how is the order to be implemented? Section 5.1(a):

The Director of the Information Security Oversight Office, under the direction of the Archivist and in consultation with the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, shall issue such directives as are necessary to implement this order. These directives shall be binding upon the agencies.

And who are "the agencies?" Section 6.1(b):

"Agency" means any "Executive agency," as defined in 5 U.S.C. 105; any "Military department" as defined in 5 U.S.C. 102; and any other entity within the executive branch that comes into the possession of classified information.

So what's the problem? Well, perhaps you recall the story reported by TPM Muckracker a few weeks ago, in which Justin Rood revealed that Cheney purports to have exempted his office from the requirement of disclosing the number of political appointees in the OVP, for a directory of all executive branch positions known as the "Plum Book." Instead, what appears in place of that required disclosure is a three paragraph statement, beginning thus (PDF):

The Vice Presidency is a unique office that is neither a part of the executive branch nor a part of the legislative branch, but is attached by the Constitution to the latter. The Vice Presidency performs functions in both the legislative branch (see Article I, section 3 of the Constitution) and in the executive branch (see Article II, and amendments XII and XXV, of the Constitution, and section 106 of title 3 of the United States Code).

You read that right. The Vice Presidency is now "a unique office," a fourth branch, if you will. If you will. But you shouldn't. And in fact, ISOO won't:

In an extraordinary internal challenge to the unruly Office of the Vice President (OVP), the Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO) has formally petitioned the Attorney General to direct the OVP to comply with a requirement that executive branch organizations disclose statistics on their classification and declassification activity to ISOO.

But what, specifically, moved ISOO to call for this ruling? The OVP's bizarre conception of itself as somehow exempt? Well, yeah. That, and this:

For the last three years, Vice President Cheney's office has refused to divulge its classification statistics to ISOO, despite a seemingly explicit requirement that it do so. Prior to 2002, such information had routinely been transmitted and reported in ISOO's annual reports to the President.

Wacky, eh? I wonder what's been going on in the OVP that would give them reason to stop complying with the presidential Executive Order? Oh! Here's something weird:

Libby Live: David Addington Four By: emptywheel 1:45 F returns to the Libby sonnet/Cheney meat grinder document. Asking A how it would look when he found it. There's a stamp at the top, that says, "treated as Top Secret/SCI, then crossed out, with declassified." F walks him through how it looked when Addington got it. Has Addington talk though what Top Secret and SCI mean. Can documents be properly classified as "treated as Top Secret SCI" Is that a proper classification? A President's EO doesn't use that phrase. F Do you recall seeing any other document that were "treated as Top Secret/SCI" F Did you put that marking there. A No F Do you know how it got there? A On this particular page, no, but in the course of production, there were situations in which I received handwritten notes saying "treated as" some particular classification, when the govt came back later and asked for originals, from that I take it that when they made copies, they stamped that on there, but this one it seems like they stamped that on the original.

Well, well, well. The OVP has been out of compliance with executive orders on the classification of sensitive national security information for several years. During that time, they've been inventing their own classification system (and spending taxpayer money for official-looking stamps bearing this fake classification). And now the Vice President's former top aide is on trial in federal court, offering as a defense for his role in the burning of a critical nuclear nonproliferation asset the excuse that the Vice President personally authorized the declassification of sensitive information. All the while, not reporting it, or complying with any of the presidential mandate covering the secure handling of sensitive national security information. They still arrest people for that, don't they?

Comments

[Jodi]

Kagro X,

I don't see why all the fuss. Do you think they are experimenting on aliens from Area 51 or something? It seems that sort of thing.

[pdaly]

OVP is out of control.

Oh how I miss the days when VP Dan Quayle was in office; when invented spelling (Can you say potatoe?) and attacks on the fictional TV character Murphy Brown were all the rage from OVP. And the media WAS there to put him in his place. Those were the days.

[Kagro X]

Jodi,

You're a joke here for exactly that reason.

[lolo]

jody, it is against the law.

[americanforliberty]

Actually, I'm a little scared. With Cheney, me/myself & I, being the fourth estate of government. Maybe, that is why---when he shot his best friend down in Texas, a while back, he did not report it to the White House. Because, he is the fourth branch of Government no need to report anyone, but himself.

And on a related subject, when are we going to get those 27 pages declassifed. Because if the Saudi's have ties to the 9/11 terrorist, I'm sure they "helping" us with that Iraq problem too.

[LIsa]

Do you think Fitzgerald has everything for an IIPA prosecution against Cheney and Libby once he can secure a conviction of LIbby in the perjury and obstruction trial? It seems like he's got his hands on some documents that reveal a whole lot about the corrosive, undemocratic, and illegal behavior going on in the OVP. Some of it tangential to the outing of Valeria Plame, but other things may be directly related to that particular crime. Such as the Niger forgeries themselves. Imagine if Fitzgerald got the original or a copy of them and they had the "Treat as Top Secret/SCI" stamp on them.

Which reminds me, did I read somewhere (can't remember where) that Fitzgeral submitted several documents just before he rested his case, one of which was something retreived from a safe in the OVP? What is that all about?

[mickey]

You're on fire these days. The entire conduct of the OVP is, of course, what's on trial in Washington this week, disguised as a trial of Scooter Libby. The problem is enforcement. With our current Attorney General enforcement, not so much. He's more of a Defense Attorney for Bush, Cheney, and Rove.

[Kagro X]

I'm no longer able to speculate on the Libby case from a top-of-mind footing, but I always thought that the elements for an IIPA prosecution were there for a prosecutor creative enough to allow himself to see crime as crime, and not attach any assumptions of purity of motive to the trappings of office.

[freepatriot]

hey jodi, don't believe Kagro

you're a joke here for a lot more reasons than that

[Dismayed]

jodi,

When you first appeared here on thn the sharks jumped you, and I was the first to argue that you should be treated with respect as it seemed to me that you were interested in genuine dialog. DemfromCt jumped on in agreement. This is no longer the case, lately you seem to only want to chide and disrupt. You sound a lot like a little kid who has lost an argument and can now only stick out your tongue to irritate the other. I, like many here have no problem with any person who wishes to present an argument in a reasonable and thoughtful manner, even if in a strongly provocitive manner. However, if all you want to do is yank chains then you have now become a waste of all our time, and I for one ask that you either get with the program or go away. You don't have to agree with the majority opinion on here, but you need to quit acting like a punk.

To everyone else: One more little snide assed usless remark from Jodi, and I will forever shun her, neither reading her post, nor in any way responding. I encourage all to take that approach, won't take her long to get bored and go away. Children don't like to be ignored.

[diemayed]

OH, Nice post Kargo. So glad that perhaps the biggest crook ever to enter American politics is finally getting close examination. The man truly should be in jail.

[emptywheel]

And Libby won't even say, unequivocally, that ADD is right on his "theories" of absolute power:

Does Scooter Libby recognize that ADD's legal interpretations are full of shit? It sure looks like it. Here's Libby's response to Fitzgerald's question whether or not he thought Navy v. Egan--which Addington (ADD in Libby's shorthand) cited as justification for the insta-declassification done by Bush and Dick--really said what ADD said it said.

Q. Did it appear to say what you thought Addington said that it meant?

A. Within reason, yes, sir. But Addington is very solid on these things.

Within reason? Even Scooter Libby, who has watched ADD justify the whole unitary executive with this tripe, won't even answer with a straight yes or no when asked if ADD is full of shit?

[plunger]

Clearly there was a conspiracy between Libby and Cheney. Conspiracy is a legal term. Can we all be adults and discuss this and other related conspiracies without being accused of being "Conspiracy Theorists?"

Having a theory about a conspiracy was a prerequisite for Fitzgerald's investigators. It's time to praise those who are able to think outside the box and comprehend the means, motive and opportunity that leads to these types of Conspiracies.

It's time to raise the level of discourse where the term "Conspiracy" is concerned:

http://www.globalsecurity.org/intell/library/reports/2005/franklin_indictment_04aug2005.htm

We've all been conditioned to snicker and ridicule when non-professionals offer theories about conspiracies. It's time to talk about all of these theories and unravel the whole thing.

Conspiracy to Defraud the United States
923 18 U.S.C. § 371

Hass, 216 U.S. at 479-480. In Hammerschmidt, Chief Justice Taft, defined “defraud” as follows:

To conspire to defraud the United States means primarily to cheat the Government out of property or money, but it also means to interfere with or obstruct one of its lawful governmental functions by deceit, craft or trickery, or at least by means that are dishonest. It is not necessary that the Government shall be subjected to property or pecuniary loss by the fraud, but only that its legitimate official action and purpose shall be defeated by misrepresentation, chicane or the overreaching of those charged with carrying out the governmental intention.

http://www.usdoj.gov/ usao/ eousa/ foia_reading_room/ usam/ title9/ crm00923.htm

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/01/cheney.halliburton/

Given what we know about VP Cheney's direct financial ties to Haliburton, isn't it clear that he has committed a fraud against the United States for the purpose of illegal financial gain, in accordance with the following statute? Couldn't the same be said of any US official who knowingly made false statements to advance the cause of war, while owning shares of companies that stood to gain substantially from that war? Cheney was acting specifically on behalf of the Contractor, Haliburton, to ensure no-bid contracts were awarded, based on knowingly fraudulent information generated by his own Office Of Special Plans. It might also be construed that any official who had a relationship to the Carlyle Group was also lying on their behalf - for their own financial benefit.

Section 1031. Major fraud against the United States

(a) Whoever knowingly executes, or attempts to execute, any scheme or artifice with the intent -
(1) to defraud the United States; or
(2) to obtain money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, in any procurement of property or services as a prime contractor with the United States or as a subcontractor or supplier on a contract in which there is a prime contract with the United States, if the value of the contract, subcontract, or any constituent part thereof, for such property or services is $1,000,000 or more shall, subject to the applicability of subsection (c) of this section, be fined not more than $1,000,000, or imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.

(1) the gross loss to the Government or the gross gain to a defendant is $500,000 or greater; or

(2) the offense involves a conscious or reckless risk of serious personal injury.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/casecode/uscodes/18/parts/i/chapters/47/sections/section_1031.html

The financial links between those who lied, and those who benefitted as a direct result of the lies (primarily in the oil and military industries) are clear. The evidence that the President's speech knowingly included a lie about the Niger Yellow Cake is proveable in a court of law under oath.

That the Vice President knew for a fact that the claim was based on a forgery in advance of the President's speech is a given. That he instructed others to ensure that the sentence made it into the speech is also a given. What did the Vice President know, and when did he know it?

Everytime the Vice President knowingly lied to the American People to advance the cause of war, he committed a crime against the United States which both directly harmed other US citizens and directly enriched himself.

Indict Dick Cheney for Fraud.

[katie Jensen]

Here's my theory about why Dick Cheney has needed to change his power status as V.P. I believe that daddy Bush knew that his son was impaired. (tears as he talked about Jeb-it looked like shame to me). I think that Cheney (also probably an alcholic but higher functioning that Bush) had to take over at times for Bush (the pretzel incident...bike accident times two...running into the british police officer).

We keep discussing these administrative issues devoid of Bush which is symptomatic in and of itself...it says something without saying anything about the system and the problem. He's not present...get it?? The power grab by Cheney has been an attempt to enable and protect Bush (and Cheney and all his assets-I am not pleading that Cheney is being self sacrificing...trust me).

This is a dynamic of the disease. Those surrounding an alcoholic become very controlling because they try to control the person with the disease and the disease. Alcoholic families are always highly secretive. Everybody works to keep the secret and to keep it unspoken. We cannot leave Bush out of the equation, he's in it...life is full of systems and patterns and this would fit a well known documented pattern.

I think they were "prepared" for Bush in case he would slip. And I think the pretzel incident (how many doctors gave their input that it would be impossible to fall on your face with that impact from choking...you slowly lose consciousness. But if you have ever seen a severe alcoholic hit the floor, they are out when they go down-Bush had two accidents during his presidency in which he had to put on make up to cover the bruises on his face...this is NOT NORMAL) signifies the slip. There's always more to the story and I just hate too much emphasis on Cheney without uncovering the bigger problem. Our president at times has been completely incapacitated by this disease.

And I believe we are as the american public often in denial about the severity of the disease and the fact that it is chronic and fatal without treatment and a program. THe symptoms linger they don't just go away. Living with a dry drunk is the same (if not worse than living with the active disease) and the most likely scenario for someone like Bush is that he would go in and out of relapses because he has not had treatment and is not working a 12 step program. The scenario that he had an alcohol addiction and possibly cocaine (suggest poly substance) and that he just spontaneously quit as he got God is not likely and in fact many people would say not possible. (for me, that's a little black and white but I think it's safe to say that such case would be extremely rare).

Also...someone on fdl suggested that Addy might have aspergers syndrome...at the time I stated that it looked more like OCD to me. Totally agree with that idea...Addy is odd in the OCD way and he would fit in well with a group of alcoholic's whose dx is very similiar to OCD...alcoholism is about obsession and compulsion.

Okay..my little co-dependent therapist self will shut up about this but I think Cheney's behavior is symptomatic of Bush's problem and that the whole system is more like a dysfunctional family protecting secrets, addictions, greed, self centeredness and lies. One of the central symptoms of the disease is that alcoholics are constitutionally unable to be honest with themselves...that is Bush/Cheney/Libby/Rove. And when it says constitutionally unable...it means there is nothing, nothing we can do to make them be honest...they are not capable. We as the american public must hold them accountable and understand that the lies and secrets are symptoms and they will only get worse.

[JC]

First cross-posted in late comments on Dkos last night ~

Kagro - Thank you for writing this excellent diary

I may be about to say something everyone else figured out, or, maybe it's new but it's the top thing on my mind with the Plame trial going on, or, maybe it's ridiculous.

Simply -- Fitz had no choice but to charge Libby with perjury and OOJ, because, Cheney had unilaterally declassified Plame's NOC status. Yes, CIA was right to request Fitz' inquiry, but because Cheney declassified Plame at any convenient time, the legality of the declassification was not a legal fight Fitz could take on -- and it undercut Fitz being able to pursue the obvious conspiracy charge, or, the possible IIPA charge.

Does this make sense, or am I way off?

And EW - simply, thank you for everything you've done these past few years!

[Jodi]

Dismayed,

I appreciate your thoughts, and maybe I was a bit flip. I don't deny that I can do and do "do flip" occasionally. So I apologize if I was "too" flip.

I guess what I am pointing out to you, Kagro X, and others underneath my flippedness is that like JC points out, what everyone screams about as "illegal" is not necessarily so.

Most of our politicians are lawyers, and those that aren't are surrounded by lawyers. The first thing lawyer/politicans do is write laws that are very vague, and then they, as lawyer defense/prosecuteors make a lot of money on these laws. It is a profit churning machine for them.

To be truthful I hate lawyers. Not personally, but what they stand for. The murky, mind dulling crap that I personally have to deal with with my own work. "Run it by the lawyers!" "I'm waiting for the lawyers." How many times have the people here heard that?

A very recent example of politicans and laws and such is the new essentially work arounds on the new lobbyist rules as shown in the NYt. It is business as usual fellow taxpayers.

Now I will say this, that after I apologize for my own flippedness, who here is going to apologize for their own climbing out on the tree branch screaming illegality, and treason, etc., when they don't have the foggiest idea what they are talking about, and the tree branch just disappears and leaves them hanging in midair and they still don't realize that they have been had?

Who's first?

[plunger]

To the best of my knowledge, Cheney does not claim - nor does anyone else, that anyone declassified Plame's NOC status. Cheney claims that he declassified a portion of the NIE, but the timing seems suspect (after the Novak article).

As for Cheney's relationship to Bush Senior - he works directly for him. Bush Sr. is the ACTUAL President, and Cheney is his VP. Junior is just that, junior.

He's an alchoholic because he knows his father is the most evil man on earth, and W's only job is to lie to protect his father's crime syndicate. The fact that Jeb is no longer in a position to protect his Dad's operations in Florida is indicative that Charlie Christ is (by necessity) part of the Bush/CIA drug operation.

There are thousands of Secret Service and other agents who know the entre truth. They are mostly alchoholics now too - as they see their silence leading to Fascism and Martial Law. They are frightened for their own lives.

[Kagro X]

Nobody's going to apologize to you for your idiocy, Jodi. Forget about it. The sooner the better.

Even giving you the greatest possible benefit of the doubt, Cheney, Addington, et al. are engaged in the exact inverse of what you accuse us of doing.

But on top of that, you're a fool. Sucks for you.

[Dismayed]

"who here is going to apologize for their own climbing out on the tree branch screaming illegality, and treason, etc."

You see, Jody. The thing is that I don't see examining these things, even yelling from the highest tree as climbing out on a tree branch. It's more like looking for a tree branch, any tree branch, and a heavy one, to hit these guys with.

Do you not see that a great wrong has been done to this country, to the world? Do you not see that people holding positions of the greatest responsibility in the world have severly breached the public trust?

We are supposed to be a nation of laws, not a nation of men. These men knowingly pervert the law at every juncture, to serve their own ends and egos. They lie, they manufacture lies, and they are so damned powerful that it is very hard for truth seeking, honest men to check them in any way.

Are you not an any way angry that these men deliberately misled the congress and the american people into a war that has cost tens of thousands of lives? Can you even see that they did? Do you think they are guilty of no wrong? Of no Crime? Take a deep breath and tell me they acted only in an honest and virtuous manner.

One of my strongest bull headed republican friends is just speechless over this administration and his party. He finally gave up on defending them a year ago. I have another friend in Dallas who continues to support their every position. My problem is, I simply do not understand the mentality of those who won't call a duck a duck. How on earth can they not see? How on earth can they not face the thing that is so plainly obvious to the honest observer?

I though Kargo's post was well laid out and thought provocing, you attack him with 'flip'. He flames back. No fun. I am interested in hearing counterpoints, but I think discussion at some point must at some point lead to revilation by at least one party within the discussion. When you can no longer offer a cogent argument to your position. You must change your position. One huge problem we have in this country is a huge chunk of it will never ever change their minds. And that to me is the height of ignorance.

[Stephen Parrish, CPA]

JC @ 12:11 - here is a link to Executive Order 13292: http://www.fas.org/sgp/bush/eoamend.html

After you and others with an interesting in reading its contents have opportunities to review it, you will see that this executive order did not give the Vice President the authority to unilaterally declassify Valerie Wilson's NOC status. Let us look at Section 3.3(b)(1) in particular:

(b) An agency head may exempt from automatic declassification under paragraph (a) of this section specific information, the release of which could be expected to:

(1) reveal the identity of a confidential human source, or a human intelligence source, or reveal information about the application of an intelligence source or method...

[Mimikatz]

Cheney has been wacko since the Nixon Administration--definitiely since his Ford Admin days--see this item where he suggests an FBI investigation of Seymour Hersh after an article he didn't like. People believed he was smart (and he is in a way, but he has terrible judgment and zero predictive abilities) because he is exceptionally persistent and can deliver outlandish views in a calm, confident way, to the extent that for years people did not quite believe he said what he said.

He is a truly scary person because he is powerful, paranoid, absolutely convinced of the rightness of his views, and yet spectacularly, repeatedly, has been wrong and anti-democratic (that means against our political system, Jodi) about nearly everything he has touched.

Notwithstanding, I believe Fitz thinks that indicting him is too political for him as a presecutor--that removal is essentially a political task for Congress. And Congress just sits there hoping he has another heart attack so they won't have to face such a difficult task. The only question is whether the rest of us can out-survive him.

[John Casper]

Jodi, I would invite you to listen to the eight hours of Scooter's GJ testimony available through a link at CSPAN. I hope as you listen to Scooter stumble, stammer and say that he can't remember, his lack of character along with Cheney's will become more clear to you.

[JC]

Umm jodi, I am simply someone who wanted to pose a thought or a theory of mine to kagro, EW, and this community, who I have total appreciation for.

I did not expect to see you co-opt my comment and twist it to your perspective. I was not engaging you, or whatever issues you are working.

If you have your own blog, then post a link. Otherwise, I have my doubts as to what further attention you can attract here.

[mbbsdphil]

Excellent summary and citations. Mr. Cheney considers himself above the law, or, as another wag put it, that he IS the law. But not really, and he knows it.

Mr. Cheney is very smart. His actions, if emotional, are rational and purposeful, no matter that his politics are to the right of the proverbial Genghis Khan. They are also extremely well-coordinated. (Reputedly, thanks to David Addington and Irving Lewis Libby.) Hence, the response to provide names for the Plum Book - the Who's Who list of federal political appointees - was met with the unprecedented and unsupported assertion that the OVP is not part of the Executive Branch. And, separately, need not comply, eg, with the secrecy practices disclosure order. [The Senate, of course, should demand that its president submit the required information, including his public employee staff, etc., or censure him.]

Mr. Cheney, of course, is the prime mover of his government within the government. His supporters include his ueber-loyal staff, and the army of relatives (his daughter, formerly at State, and her husband, formerly general counsel of OMB and DHS) and acolytes he has disbursed throughout the Washington establishment. These not only give early warning of threats, they enforce discipline among the less devout. They also include ultra-conservative donors and the think tanks they fund, which provide a farm team, pasture, and breeding ground for the faithful.

As it should be, it is Mr. Cheney who is partly on trial in the Libby case. About time. Justice delayed is justice denied.

[mbbsdphil]

Many have pointed out how little George Bush (no pun intended) seems to be involved in these discussions. I credit that partly to his lack of energy, awareness, creativity, curiosity and intelligence. Not merely as a partisan jab, but because those traits force him to adhere to his caricatured notion of how little a CEO has to know or do to run an operation. It's like a plantation owner who hasn't a clue what the estate manager and overseer really do to allow him to live in the house with that columned portico.

That defective, caricatured version of real leadership is dangerous in the private sector, but lethal in the public sector. It has led to the power vaccum that Mr. Cheney has so brilliantly exploited, starting with appointing himself as Vice President. It comes with virtually no down side, but only so long as the president adheres to that caricature.

Consequently, virtually everything that Mr. Cheney does becomes not his but the president's liability. The "I was just following orders" defense turned on its head, since the inferior gave the orders, which the superior accepts as if he had given them. A real life Hogan's Heroes, without the heroes.

To maintain that position requires denying of reality - hence Cheney and Snow's refrains - and obfuscating the object of criticism by declaring it all "just politics". A notion to Mr. Bush that Mr. Cheney manipulates brilliantly. Opinions can be wrong, but rarely can they be illegal. An elegant Stay Out of Jail card that Mr. Libby's trial has just dog-eared.