Vice President Cheney speaking at the Gerald R Ford Museum was quoted as saying "I'm told researchers like to come and dig through my files, to see if anything interesting turns up. I want to wish them luck --but the files are pretty thing. I learned early on that if you don't want your memos to get you in trouble some day, just don't write any." (Washington Post On-line)
Great advise for fledgling politicians on both sides but I can't believe he would say it on the record. After all, saying such in a public forum is allot like writing a memo about not writing memos. If I were a reporter digging through Cheney's files and came upon a memo instructing his staff to avoid writing memos so as to minimize his office's transparency and accountability to the public I would be infuriated, and I hope you and the rest of the public would be as well. The fact that the VP had the audacity to make such a public statement should make it crystal clear to the public just how embedded and accepted these principles of anti-transparency and anti-accountability have become in our political system. Conservatives and liberals alike need to rise up and crush this growing trend and demand transparency and accountability from our politicians. After all, a democracy with out these principles is just wasting its time and money holding elections. And wasting money is something nobody wants.
Quote can be found at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/16/AR2007091601560.html?hpid=sec-politics
1 comment:
Another stab at accountablity by this administration. What is worse is that Cheney tried to claim that his vice-president office is not part of the Executive Branch, so he is immune to the constitutional rules that apply. A Democratic representative quicky said, "Fine, then we can cut off the funds to his offie." They started the ball rolling on cutting of the funds, but could not get enough votes. Cheney retracted his comment.
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