The Reasoning of the Executive Privilege Claim

[cthulu2016]

The president's contention is that Congress can, of course, demand information about departmental activities, but that Congress cannot demand internal documents about how the executive branch talked about how to respond to the initial request.

There are two sides to this.

The most obvious is that if I requested information from the Bush WH and they sent over what appeared to me to be incomplete and said, "that's all we have," then I would start investigating the process by which the WH determined that was all they had. How were people instructed to collect that information? What was the scope they were instructed to limit themselves too? What was there that they decided to not include, and for what reason?

The other side is the heart of executive privilege, which is that it is difficult to make the best decisions if you think every bit of the decision making process will be published. (In this case, the decision making process of how to comply with congress' request.) Internal deliberations are usually subject to executive privilege.


Since this is a political fishing expedition I am personally sympathetic to the specific EP claim, but there is not an obvious or easy right answer in general terms. (The Executive branch and the Legislative branch have both, at various time in the 21st century, been shockingly corrupt institutions so there is no institutional good guy.)

[TBMASE]

1. There should be a special prosecutor appointed. Get a nonpartisan investigation

into the whole thing, hold everyone involved accountable going back to the Bush Administration.

[JDPriestly]

7. There are already ongoing criminal investigations.

The problem is that Congress is trying to either end or interfere in those investigations. The transgressions occurred in offices in Arizona if that is any clue to who may be under investigation.

Listen to the first hour of Randi Rhodes show today. It is apparently available on her website. She goes down the chronology of events, what happened, who did what. The Obama administration is not the culprit here.

[TBMASE]

11. This story broke in 2010

where are the indictments?

[Horse with no Name]

2. IF I am not mistaken

there are still documents that were court ordered from the Bush administration that have not been turned over.

The longevity of the outrage over WAR CRIMES lasted less than a news cycle.

As far as this stuff goes? Sorry...we all need to play by the same rules. If they don't uphold their party to the same standard they uphold ours to...then they do NOT deserve the answers THEY seek.

[TBMASE]

3. Ludicrous.

They did it so it makes it okay for us to do it too?

I thought we were going to be better than them

[Horse with no Name]

5. No...it isn't

when war crimes last less than a news cycle...nothing is ludicrous.

[TBMASE]

9. So we're not expected to be better than the republicans

when it comes to the law and the transparency of the government?

I thought we were getting a change in how things operated in washington, not a repeat of the Bush years and the way they did things

[cthulu2016]

6. You psyched me out.

"As far as this stuff goes? Sorry...we all need to play by the same rules."

That had me expecting an acknowledgment that what is right for Bush (even if was not done) is right for any president.

I don't see any upside to the "We need to be as low as the pukes."

They are better at it. That is home-field advantage for them, and is a fight we ultimately lose.

Plus, not everyone who votes Democratic would continue to do so if the party was like the Republicans.

Some voters are hung up on proper process, decency, rationality, etc..

[badtoworse]

4. Politically, this is a really bad move.

It will become high profile and start to really smell. People died because of this and Obama will be personally wearing the blame if he continues down this path.

[JDPriestly]

8. No. Listen to the first hour of the Randi Rhodes show today.

This is not what Issa claims it is.

Obama is doing the right thing. There are ongoing criminal investigations.

[4th law of robotics]

10. Exactly.

Hard to distance himself from it now. He just owned the entire debacle.

[Lurks Often]

12. I question whether ALL 70,000 documents

that DOJ is claiming executive privilege on, will hold up if it reaches a judge as it surely will if neither side blinks.

I did some research last night and my post on Executive Privilege here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002836000

my research suggests that claiming Executive Privilege on ALL of the 70,000 documents will NOT hold up and that the Executive branch will have narrow the amount they want covered.

and Contempt of Congress cases copied from my response in another thread:

per Wikipedia (Yes, I know Wikipedia, but the link cites the relevant US law)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contempt_of_Congress

Since 1975 there have been 12 cases, 7 involving Republicans, 5 involving Democrats.

Two are listed as ongoing: Holder and Miers & Bolten

One involved an impeachment of a Republican who was "Indicted for lying to Congress; convicted; sentenced to 6 months in prison, 5 years probation thereafter, and a fine of $10,000"

In the 8 of the other 9 cases, the person risking impeachment either released all of the required documents or "substantially" complied with the subpoena

The other case was resolved "After legal cases and a court dismissal of the executive Branch's suit, the parties reached an agreement to provide documents."