Hutchison Chases Texas Right

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, above, in August announcing her candidacy to unseat Gov. Rick Perry, who is seen below with Texas Rangers in October.
















Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison may have won the backing of former Vice President Dick Cheney in her race for Texas governor, a key endorsement for a candidate seeking conservative support. But her drive to unseat Republican Gov. Rick Perry remains an uphill battle.

Ms. Hutchison, one of the Lone Star State's most popular politicians, was expected to mount a formidable challenge to Mr. Perry in one of the long-anticipated GOP primary battles of next year's elections. The GOP winner is an overwhelming favorite to be the next governor in this Republican state.

"We Westerners know the difference between a real talker and the real deal," Mr. Cheney said before a small crowd of about 100 Hutchison supporters and journalists Tuesday evening. "Kay Bailey Hutchison is the real deal."

Perry is more conservative than Hutchison; he even alluded to Texas seceding from the Union. But the Senator is an old Washington pal of Cheney.

But Mr. Perry has built a large lead in polls with less than four months to go to the March 2 primary. In part, he has scored points using what's shaping up as a popular strategy for many candidates during this election cycle, with rhetoric portraying Ms. Hutchison as a Washington insider out of touch with down-home Texans. He also has accused her of waffling on a pledge to resign from her Senate seat, which she had initially said she would do in October or November.

"It really does appear that it is slipping away for her," said Calvin Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.

The Hutchison campaign hopes the backing of Mr. Cheney, who before being elected vice president was chief executive of Halliburton Co., then based in Dallas, will deepen the shallow conservative backing that has been long viewed as her principal weakness. But supporters of Mr. Perry, who has the backing of conservative groups and such governors as Haley Barbour of Mississippi, have tried to use the Cheney endorsement as evidence Ms. Hutchison is out of touch with Texas voters. "The Washington establishment usually sticks together," Perry campaign spokesman Mark Miner said.

That is almost an insult to Cheney, the right's darling.

Bush memoirs to haunt GOP

For Republicans looking forward to the first Bush-free election in a decade, the book publishing schedule is the bearer of bad news: Between New Year’s Day and next November, as many as five Bush administration officials — including the former president himself — will rehash history in hardback.

First Hank Paulson, that lovable Treasury Secretary, then Laura, then W himself. Should be neat.

The Bush montage plays right into the hands of Democrats, says Democratic strategist Douglas Schoen, who predicts that the midterm elections will be a battle between those who will try to make it a belated referendum on the Bush administration and those who will try to make it a premature referendum on the Obama administration.

Well, jobs will play a significant role, and the Republicans will try to emphasize that, whilst trying to dodge all those books.

In this corner ...

Spoiling for a Bush-Cheney Fight Atlantic Online - Benjamin F. Carlson -The former vice-president plans to slam Bush in his memoir, and pundits are oddly eager. Dick Cheney, the most powerful American vice-president in history, thinks his considered opinion was ignored under Bush's second term.

And not even the former President is beyond the Dick's ire.

Video

Cheney, preparing his memoirs, unloads on Bush for bowing to ... Los Angeles Times

O, I can't wait for this one! And, who leaked this? As if we don't know.

Dick and Trent

Reading Angler, an utterly fascinating book by Barton Gellman, whom I first heard of and saw two nights ago on the Rachel Maddow Show; ran into my old Mississippi buddy, loosely speaking, of course, Trent Lott, who in between being conservative and right wing, took tome out to write (ahem!) a book: Herding Cats. Surprisingly, Hewlett does not own it. Ommission.

Lott, Trent. (2005). Herding cats: a life in politics. New York: Regan Books.

Gellman, Barton. (2008). Angler: the Cheney vice presidency. New York: Penguin Press.

Bush-Era Debate: Using G.I.’s in U.S.

Top Bush administration officials in 2002 debated testing the Constitution by sending American troops into the suburbs of Buffalo to arrest a group of men suspected of plotting with Al Qaeda, according to former administration officials.

Testing the Constitution?

Some of the advisers to President George W. Bush, including Vice President Dick Cheney, argued that a president had the power to use the military on domestic soil to sweep up the terrorism suspects, who came to be known as the Lackawanna Six, and declare them enemy combatants.

Cheney, of course; he seems to have believed anything he decided to do would be legal. Surely John Yoo could have written him a memo declaring the actions constitutional.

Mr. Bush ultimately decided against the proposal to use military force.

For whatever reason, he made the right decision.

A decision to dispatch troops into the streets to make arrests would be nearly unprecedented in American history, as both the Constitution and subsequent laws restrict the military from being used to conduct domestic raids and seize property.

The Fourth Amendment bans “unreasonable” searches and seizures without probable cause. And the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 generally prohibits the military from acting in a law enforcement capacity.

In the discussions, Mr. Cheney and others cited an Oct. 23, 2001, memorandum from the Justice Department that, using a broad interpretation of presidential authority, argued that the domestic use of the military against Al Qaeda would be legal because it served a national security, rather than a law enforcement, purpose.

A broad interpretation? Isn't that akin to judicial activism?

Intellectuals

Watching the PBS News Hour, Hardball and Rachel Maddow on MSNBC last night, and enjoying the entire thing, these people impressed me:

Melissa Harris-Lacewell, a professor at Princeton U., who talked politics and race with Ms. Maddow. His intellect impressed.

Antwi Akom, a professor at San Francisco State U., who talked about racial profiling in connection with the Dr. Henry Louis Gates jr. imbroglio (himself racially profiled and arrested). His intellect impressed. He spoke clearly, factually, reasonably.

Barton Gellman, a Washington Post reporter who wrote the book Angler : the Cheney vice presidency, spoke with Ms. Maddow about the current Cheney imbroglio. His exactness and care in answering questions factually, and making sure whatever matters and details they were considering as they discussed Cheney, Scooter Libby and ther pardon that President Bush did not issue to the latter were correct.

Charles P. Pierce, a Boston Globe journalist who wrote the book Idiot America : how stupidity became a virtue in the Land of the Free, and had a contentious exchange with David Shuster while they talked about Liz Cheney and her father. Shuster was looking for an answer to the question of why Ms. Cheney will not simply say that the right-wing-nut contention that Barack Obama is not a native-born US citizen is a silly conspiracy theory (never mind so much barely disguised racism). Pierce cynically riposted that Ms. Cheney is a leader of the Republican Party, as Shuster contended and wondered about, because media outlets provide her a platform to speak her views.

Cheney to Publish His Memoir

Former Vice President Dick Cheney is working on a book.


The deal was negotiated by Robert Barnett, a Washington lawyer who also represents Mr. Bush, former President Bill Clinton and President Obama.





Is there any better proof of what C. Wright Mills called the Power Elite?



June 24, 2009
Cheney to Publish His Memoir
By MOTOKO RICH

As widely expected, Vice President Dick Cheney has signed a deal with an imprint of Simon & Schuster to write a memoir about his life in politics and his service in four presidential administrations. A spokesman for Simon & Schuster said Mr. Cheney would write a book for Threshold Editions, where Mary Matalin, his close friend and adviser, is editor in chief.

Mr. Cheney, who had been looking for a publisher for about two months, joins a roster of Bush administration figures writing memoirs, including President George W. Bush; his wife, Laura; former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice; former Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr.; former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld; and Karl Rove, the former presidential political adviser. Mr. Rove’s book will also be published by Threshold.

Mr. Cheney’s memoir, which will focus on the past 40 years of his life, mostly in Washington, will be published in the spring of 2011. The deal was negotiated by Robert Barnett, a Washington lawyer who also represents Mr. Bush, former President Bill Clinton and President Obama.

The former vice president is working with his eldest daughter, Liz Cheney, on the memoir. Ms. Cheney is helping with research and “filling in the gaps.”

“He’s a student of history, and I think he never really planned to write a book,” Ms. Cheney said. “But I think because the job he just finished is obviously his last job he’ll ever have in government and because he cares about history and has been part of so many consequential events over the last 40 years, he wants to make sure that his story is told, and told in a way that his grandchildren will be able to understand and appreciate even 20 or 30 years from now.”

She said Mr. Cheney had been writing out his thoughts in longhand but had also begun writing on a laptop, working in homes on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, in Virginia and in Wyoming.

In addition to covering his roles in the administrations of Presidents Richard M. Nixon, Gerald R. Ford, George Bush and George W. Bush, Mr. Cheney will write about his private-sector experience, including his time as chief executive of the Halliburton Company, the oil field services provider.

A person familiar with the negotiations said Mr. Cheney would receive around $2 million for his book. The spokesman for Simon & Schuster declined to comment.

Biden Outlines Plans to Do More With Less Power

Damon Winter/The New York Times -Vice President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr., in his transitional office on Wednesday, had critical words for his predecessor

One thing about Biden: he has a way with words.

“The proof of the pudding is in the eating,” Mr. Biden said in an interview Wednesday. “The Bush-Cheney relationship hasn’t tasted very good. Not a single person you can name for me” — at this point, he leaned forward in his chair, jabbed his finger in the air and punctuated his words sharply. “Look at me, now — a single one can tell you that the pudding has tasted good. Not one. Name me one serious person, liberal, conservative, Democrat, Republican.”

He said he would bring more to the job than any of his predecessors, except possibly Lyndon B. Johnson. “I know as much or more than Cheney,” Mr. Biden said. “I’m the most experienced vice president since anybody.”

But he is a savvy politician.

“The only value of power is the effect, the efficacy of its use,” Mr. Biden said. “And all the power Cheney had did not result in effective outcomes.”

An interesting assessment:

“Cheney essentially served the president as chief of staff,” said David Axelrod, Mr. Obama’s senior adviser. “That’s not the function that Barack Obama was looking to fill in his vice president.”

Great timing

Vice President Dick Cheney today endorsed John McCain's candidacy for President. E=lection day is in three days. Great timing, no?

Trick or Treat

Top 10 Ways the G.O.P. Plans to Celebrate Halloween
Frank Santopadre - October 30, 2008

10. Assure President Bush that the shamrock and leprechaun decorations look great

9. Add fun “apple bobbing feature” to water-boarding procedures

8. Claim Obama supporter attacked trick-or-treater and carved letter “B” in her pumpkin

7. Arrange photo-op of McCain giving out candy at each of his 9 houses

6. Prank call Barney Frank's house; ask if he has “some guy named Albert in his can”

5. Take Cindy McCain trick-or-treating at Merck and Pfizer factories

4. Dress unqualified Alaska governor in funny Vice President costume

3. Set fire to Bill of Rights, leave on Pelosi's doorstep, ring bell, run

2. Station Klan members in black voting districts; insist they're just trick-or-treaters dressed as ghosts

1. Wait until dark, watch Cheney turn into a bat

Photo illustration by Hamish Robertson.

The ones that didn't make the list: Make Sarah Palin wear a Dan Quayle costume in hopes of creating a more intelligent image. All trick or treaters visiting the Vice-Presidential residence get a list of the names of CIA operatives dropped in their goody bags.

Brace yourselves – George Bush will soon be free to do just what he wants

We are about to enter the twilight zone, that strange black hole in political time and space that appears no more than once every four years. It is known as the period of transition, and it starts a week from today, the time when the United States has not one president but two. One will be the president-elect, the other George Bush, in power for 12 more weeks in which he can do pretty much whatever he likes. Not only will he never again have to face voters, he won't even have to worry about damaging the prospects of his own party and its standard bearer (as if he has not damaged those enough already). From November 5 to January 20, he will exercise the freest, most unaccountable form of power the democratic world has to offer.

A scary thought. And, why did they do it?

A former official in the Bush administration confirmed to me yesterday that the US has lunged into Syrian territory several times before: it's just that Damascus chose to keep quiet. In which case, the interesting question is why the Syrians went public this time.

This was a deliberate act, calculated to send a series of messages. First, to the Syrians, reminding them who's boss in the region and strong-arming them to do more to crack down on al-Qaida.

Second, to the Europeans who have been moving towards a rapprochement with Damascus. Nicolas Sarkozy may have invited President Assad to Paris and David Miliband may have been hosting the Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Muallem, in London this very Monday, 24 hours after the raid - but no matter. Bush gets to remind both these uppity Europeans who's in charge.

Third, the president could have been sending a message to his own administration.

However we are meant to read it, the attack on Syria looks a lot like a parting shot from Bush, an end-of-the-movie reminder of what this long and bloody saga has been about. A small operation, causing eight deaths, it nevertheless captures much of the Bush ethos that has ruled the globe these past eight years. It was unilateral; it trampled on state sovereignty; and it relied on force as a first, not last, resort. As a souvenir of the Bush era, it would be hard to top.

Bush may be thinking of a parting gift more in keeping with the record of the last eight years. He and Cheney might decide, what the hell, we have one last chance to whack Iran - and let the new guy clear up the mess. Not likely, but possible. For in the twilight zone, anything can happen.

The Heartbeat Job

Three decades after Mr. Rockefeller departed the office, Dick Cheney has transformed it into a veritable fourth branch of government.

Cheney seems to have claimed that the VP is both in the executive and the legislative branches. Who bought that argument?

His authority at times seemed to eclipse that of President Bush.

Well, besides Georgie W?

Mr. Goldstein said the ascendancy of the office began with Walter Mondale, who secured a central role as adviser. Jimmy Carter gave him a West Wing office, an autonomous staff and access to all key meetings, perks that have gone to succeeding vice presidents.

[Joel K. Goldstein, a law professor at St. Louis University and author of “The Modern American Vice Presidency: The Transformation of a Political Institution.”]

Vice presidents after Mr. Mondale were given wider scope than those who came before. President Clinton entrusted Al Gore with the chore of streamlining government and overseeing global warming policy. He also carried a substantial foreign affairs portfolio.

Dan Quayle had a lesser role but kept the West Wing office and met regularly with the first President Bush. He spent much of his time on goodwill missions, raising money and chairing panels on the economy and space.

Meaning that Al Gore was given responsibilities outside of the mainstream responsibilities of the President, but important ones, while Dan Quayle went to teas.

Mr. Cheney has taken the office to a new level. He honed his bureaucratic skills as White House chief of staff under Gerald Ford, and during 10 years in Congress and 4 as defense secretary under the first President Bush. When he returned to the White House in 2001, he negotiated a broad brief from President George W. Bush.

Cheney goes back to Ford, a point not often mentioned. That amounts to more than 30 years of being in the loop.

In 1989, George H. W. Bush was flying to Malta for a meeting with Soviet leaders when Philippine military officers attempted a coup. Mr. Quayle assembled the National Security Council to consider a response. Mr. Cheney, then secretary of defense, refused to attend because the vice president has no place in the military chain of command, according to an account in “Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency,” by Barton Gellman of The Washington Post.

That is very telling: the VP, when it was Quayle, was not in the military chain of command (and didn't Bush 41 consider delegating authority to his VP?), but when it is Cheney, the VP is in the chain of command.



This picture tells all.

Cheney's best and worst

Asked during the debate last night what Dick Cheney's best and worst acts in office, Governor Palin said: his worst: accidentally shooting his hapless hunting companion; his best: supporting W's support of the troops.

This is an answer worthy of a vice-presidential candidate? Oy.

From a blog posting in the NY Times: Viewers who went into the debate liking her or disliking her probably saw more evidence to confirm their views. She reinforced her down-home, folksy “hockey mom” image with phrases such as “darn right,” “doggone it,” “you betcha” and “God bless her.” At one point, she delivered an obviously scripted riposte. “Say it ain’t so, Joe. There you go again.” A little hokey, but playing to the strategy of appealing to her demographic. Her fans probably loved it. Her detractors probably rolled their eyes.

Another entry quotes her: “Honestly, the Sarah Palin in those interviews is a little bit annoyed,” Ms. Palin said, smiling broadly, “Because it’s like, man, you know, no matter what you say, you’re gonna get clobbered.”

Well, that's politics.

Cheney Sought to Alter Climate Discussion

These guys have always tried to make their own rules.

A disclosure Tuesday that Vice President Dick Cheney's office sought to alter a federal official's prepared testimony about the health consequences of global warming intensified an increasingly open conflict between the Environmental Protection Agency and the White House over how to respond to climate change.

The disclosure about Vice President Cheney's role came from Jason Burnett, who until last month was the EPA's associate deputy administrator. Mr. Burnett, whose duties included advising EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson on a range of issues involving climate change, is a supporter of the presidential campaign of Sen. Barack Obama (D., Ill.) and has contributed extensively to the campaigns of other Democrats – giving more than $100,000 since 2000, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based government watchdog.

And why?

The issue of whether greenhouse gases endanger public health or welfare is significant because a finding by the EPA that they do would require the agency to regulate them under the terms of the federal Clean Air Act, spurring new rules across a range of industries.

Who benefits? Corporate supporters of Cheney-Bush.

The GOP's Lame-Duck Push

The Journal's Op-Ed page's liberal. Hooray.

In his landmark 1938 study of political corruption, "The Politicos," Matthew Josephson recalled for his readers the final moments of the Republican 43rd Congress, meeting in a lame-duck session in early 1875.

Matthew Josephson? He was a liberal journalist, among whose other books was The robber barons: the great American capitalists 1861-1901. Yup. That Joshepson, whose name does not at all often appear in the Wall Street Journal.

It is in moments of defeat rather than those of triumph that politicians "show their real hand," Josephson observed. Masks are dropped in the stampede; brutal essence shoves aside compassionate appearance.

Though Cheney has never bothered about appearance.

A similar mood of desperation hangs over Washington in this last year of the Bush administration. Hence the panic: Whatever items remain on the business wish list must get done immediately, consequences be damned.

Arctic Wildlife and offshore drilling are the newest conservative rages.

The Home-Front Battle Heats Up

Clearly we are still grappling with the basic constitutional conundrums of the age of global jihad. In "Law and the Long War," Benjamin Wittes, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, sets out to determine just where our crucial post-9/11 policies fit in our constitutional framework and legal traditions. Along the way, he tries to define the proper role of our three branches of government amid the changing circumstances of a war unlike any other we have fought in our past.

An imperial presidency, an ineffective and fearful legislature, and an activist judiciary.

Indefinite and arbitrary-seeming detention has had the effect, Mr. Wittes notes, of provoking powerful fears of the "unchecked inherent powers of the president." Yet the critics who favored supplanting those powers "with the unchecked inherent powers of the judiciary" also have it wrong. Injecting the judicial branch into matters that it is ill-equipped to handle, he argues, can have one of two results: "paralyzing our response to terrorism" or "corrupting the judiciary" as it inevitably bends the law to accommodate the often brutal exigencies of counterterrorism.

Unchecked? No, just appropriate.

The conflict between law and necessity has arisen nowhere more sharply than in the debate over "enhanced interrogation techniques" – or, in noneuphemistic English, torture. Here Mr. Wittes faults the Bush administration more sharply. He acknowledges that very harsh techniques may be necessary – at least in emergency circumstances. But in the matter of high-stakes interrogations – for example, the CIA's interrogations of top al Qaeda planners like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah – the "administration has dug itself the biggest hole."

By its arrogance.

The administration resolved this problem by simply defining torture narrowly enough to permit waterboarding – a mere "dunk in the water" is what Vice President Cheney called it. But stretching language in this way, writes Mr. Wittes, "is a kind of double-talk that denudes law of meaning and renders the presidency morally laughable."

A mere dunk, this from a man who avoided the draft.

On the whole, Mr. Wittes would like to see Congress playing a greater role in the war on terror. Like Jack Goldsmith, a former Justice Department official, he is worried about the legitimacy of policies that are asserted as if by presidential fiat. Conservatives, he says, should have "anticipated to some degree that the courts would respond to muscular presidential actions with assertions of power of their own."

Congress be effective? In renaming french fries freedom fries. Conservatives, or, better put, reactionaries, want to rule by fiat.

As matters now stand, we are needlessly fighting a war on two fronts: against our enemies and against ourselves.

McCain Unlikely To Use Cheney In Campaign

Well, that's no surprise, is it? If he used Cheney, the link to Bush would be very obvious to every one.

Vice President Cheney is a highly effective fundraiser and a hero to the conservative wing of the party, but it's unlikely he'll appear with presumptive Republican nominee John McCain anytime soon.

In part, it’s a reflection of political expediency. Though Cheney is one of the nation’s most influential and talked about vice presidents ever, his favorability ratings are near toxic lows. But Cheney and McCain also have had a rocky relationship.

What is most likely, say friends and observers of Cheney, is for the vice president to reprise his 2006 role as down-ballot fundraiser and server of partisan red meat.

“He is incredibly popular with the Republican base,” noted David Keene, head of the American Conservative Union and a Cheney friend dating back to their days battling one another in the 1976 GOP primary between Ford and Reagan. “I think you’ll see him out there, particularly in conservative areas. Members of Congress want him for fundraising.”

Though it has been little-noticed, Cheney has again taken with gusto to the GOP’s rubber chicken circuit.

So he'll have to be attacked wherever he goes.

In addition, he’ll speak before friendly interest groups to help push the conservative message. He’s scheduled to speak Wednesday to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s board of directors.

Interest groups? As in special interests.

Iraq 5 years after invasion

W carries on with the party line, and refuses to cede an inch. Were he more believable, or the effort an honest one, that would be admirable. He isn't, it isn't, and it isn't.

Bush: U.S. 'Must Win' War

Bush strongly signaled that he won't order troop withdrawals in Iraq beyond those already planned because he refuses to "jeopardize the hard-fought gains" of the past year. Antiwar demonstrations in Washington and San Francisco marked the fifth anniversary of the U.S. invasion. (Bush's remarks)

• War Talk: Analyzing Bush's Iraq Speeches

• Cheney Touts Progress in Stabilizing Iraq

• Five Years Later: U.S. toll in Iraq

• Looking Back: WSJ Iraqi employees' stories

Oy. 5 years. Cheney's expectations that the US would "be greeted with open arms" sure was off the mark.