Back in Time

I had forgotten this. I should never be permitted to forget this.

June 21, 2007

In a simmering dispute with the National Archives that heated up Thursday, [Vice President dick] Cheney has long maintained that he does not have to comply with an executive order on safeguarding classified information because, in fact, his office is part of the legislature.

[...]

Cheney, whose single constitutional duty is to serve as president of the Senate, holds that the vice president's office is not an "entity within the executive branch" and therefore not subject to annual reporting or periodic on-site inspections under the 1995 executive order, which was updated four years ago by President Bush.

The vice president has been refusing to cooperate with the National Archives office assigned to oversee the handling of classified data since 2003.

[...]

Constitutional experts were startled at the notion that the vice presidency isn't in the executive branch.

"The vice president is saying he doesn't have to follow the orders of the president," said Garrett Epps, a law professor at the University of Oregon. "That's a very interesting proposition."

[...]

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino brushed off questions about what branch of the government the vice president resides in, saying she doesn't know enough about the issue.

  Seattle PI

I'm not sure just what issue Dana-What-Cuban-Missile-Crisis?-Perino did know enough about.

And, just in case you're wondering...The Whitehouse website, in fact, includes the Vice President in the Executive Branch.

But, what I like best about Cheney's attempt to escape archives oversight was a response Harry Reid made at the time:

"I always thought that he was president of this administration."

And this was pretty good, too:

After Congressional Democrats called his bluff by threatening to withhold funding from his office, the White House was forced to roll back their rhetoric, claiming “that the rationale had been the view of the vice president’s lawyers, not Cheney himself.”

  Think Progress

Cheney being more than willing to turn over information to the archives. MORE than willing.

Now that the political tempest over Cheney’s exemption of his office has subsided a bit, the Vice President is back to claiming he is a branch of government all to himself — or as he says it, “a unique creature” in constitutional government.

For a brief period in our history, according to the Man Who Would Be King behind the Man Who Would Be King , our government had four branches. This will be on the quiz, folks.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.