Cheney Involved in Firing Gov't Lawyers in 1969

[Rose Siding]

This is rich - Rumsfeld hired Cheney in 1969 to work in the Johnson era's Office of Economic Opportunity.

Through laughing? Okay, guess what Cheney did - He wanted government lawyers who weren't political allies to be fired:

From the esteemed, Pulitzer prize winning Charlie Savage.

The antipoverty agency, set up by Congress during the Johnson administration, was unpopular among conservatives, and Rumsfeld's and Cheney's job was to help Nixon impose greater political control over the office.

A chief target was the agency's legal aid program, headed by Terry Lenzner. Now a private investigator, Lenzner said in a recent interview that the White House pressured him to fire lawyers who filed class-action lawsuits on behalf of the poor. But Lenzner said he could not fire them because of the way Congress had written the agency's statute.

"I was being told, 'You have to put a stop to this, you have to control these lawyers,'" Lenzner recalled. "But I said that 'If I do what you want me to do, it will violate the law.'"

The orders to fire lawyers, Lenzner said, came from other White House aides, not Rumsfeld or Cheney personally. Still, in November 1970, Rumsfeld summoned Lenzner to his office, and, with Cheney at his side, fired Lenzner because he was unwilling to follow orders.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/11/26/hail_to_the_chief/?page=2

And the seasons, they go round and round....

[bluestateguy]

1. It's too bad that NIxon killed off the OEO

That agency did a lot of good things.

[myrna minx]

2. Very interesting. n/t

[tanyev]

3. Interesting, and yet not surprising.

The seeds for today's astonishing assaults on democracy were planted in the Nixon administration.

[hootinholler]

4. Thanks for that...

The Globe seems to be on the USA case pretty good.

-Hoot

[intheflow]

5. Apparently Cheney has never had an original thought in his life.

He just keeps subjecting us to the same shit we had to deal with in the late 60's and early 70's, because history shows what a stellar time that was for American politics. :eyes:

[myrna minx]

6. Kick. n/t

[L. Coyote]

7. A detailed history of Cheney's work and role in the Nixon White House needed.

I would sure appreciate such a read. Meanwhile, a nation tolerating and electing Nixonian political hacks and Iran-Contra felonious actors is getting a wake-up call on its own electoral misdeeds. That tolerance is coming to an abrupt end soon, hopefully. And, hisatory's lesson will be imprinted with some permanence, perhaps.