posted by TheDon
We’ve all marvelled at the Cheney administration’s dismissive attitude towards the legislative branch. Glenn Greenwald points out that this is just the tip of the unconstitutional iceberg. He has sussed out the strategery being used to run the clock out until January, 2009. It’s two pronged, with the first prong being a delaying tactic – don’t cooperate with investigations, stop the prosecution of your own gang members:
(the Cheney administration) has the power to block the Justice Department, and its U.S. Attorneys, from criminally prosecuting Executive Branch employees who refuse to comply with Congressional subpoenas, notwithstanding a statute enacted by the American people through their Congress requiring such prosecution where Congress issues a contempt citation.
The great unanswered question of the Bush administration has been, and continues to be, whether, upon losing a judicial battle, they would explicitly claim the right to defy the judicial order on the ground that the order exceeds proper judicial authority.
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Always lurking at the core of these radical assertions of executive power is the belief that they can defy court orders due to the claimed “constitutional limitations on the judicial power.”
