[Mb-civic] From hunter to hunted - Joan Vennochi - Boston Globe Op-Ed

[William Swiggard]

   From hunter to hunted

By Joan Vennochi  |  February 16, 2006  |  The Boston Globe

FORGET ABOUT quail. If you're Dick Cheney, your eye should be on Scooter.

While quail-hunting last weekend, the vice president accidentally shot a 
friend and fellow hunter, 78-year-old Harry M. Whittington. This 
unfortunate event came a few days after a piece of Cheney-related news 
that might rattle any marksman's aim.

According to a Feb. 9 report posted by the National Journal, the vice 
president's former chief of staff, I. Lewis ''Scooter" Libby, told a 
federal grand jury he was ''authorized" by Cheney and by ''superiors" to 
disclose classified information about Iraq's nuclear weapons capability. 
A president can declassify information and a vice president has some 
legal leeway to do so as well. No one is suggesting any crime was 
committed. The implication is that information was declassified for 
political gain, so Libby could defend the Bush administration's use of 
prewar intelligence.

Last October, Libby was indicted on criminal charges involving the 
outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson. Libby was basically accused of 
lying about how and when he learned that Wilson was a CIA agent. The 
indictment specifically states that Libby ''was advised by the vice 
president of the United States" that Wilson worked at the Central 
Intelligence Agency and that ''the vice president had learned this 
information from the CIA."

At the time, Libby's indictment raised questions about what he would 
give up about Cheney and others, including Bush senior adviser Karl 
Rove. Would he make it easier for special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald 
to charge someone in the Bush administration with the specific crime of 
leaking the identity of a covert CIA agent? Those questions remain 
relevant and potentially troubling for the Bush White House.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan easily dodged an inquiry 
about the National Journal report, saying, ''I heard about this story . 
. . but I think you know our policy when it comes to this ongoing legal 
proceeding and it hasn't changed."

It has been much harder to dodge questions about Cheney's hunting 
accident. Long after the hunting jokes grew stale, the vice president 
left it to the White House to handle the increasingly hostile media barrage.

Cheney gave his first interview on the hunting mishap four days after it 
took place, and after Whittington suffered a minor heart attack. Cheney 
told Fox News Channel yesterday: ''You can't blame anybody else. I'm the 
guy who pulled the trigger and shot my friend."

 From the start, the White House press corps focused on the usual: 
itself. Why, White House reporters wanted to know, did the vice 
president, through an intermediary, put out belated word about the 
shooting, first to the Corpus Christi Caller-Times, instead of to the 
White House press corps? The question should have been: Why did it take 
so long for Cheney to inform the public?

But whatever the level of media haughtiness, the level of Cheney's 
haughtiness is hard to beat. In this case, Cheney's legendary arrogance 
turned into an easy metaphor for the generic arrogance of the Bush 
administration. Never explain, never apologize, until you are forced to, 
whether the matter at hand is a war gone wrong or a shot gone wrong.

In this case, Cheney also displayed contempt for President Bush, along 
with his well-documented contempt for the press. By stonewalling, the 
vice president turned a bird hunting mishap into a political albatross 
for the White House. That, in turn, reinforced the recurring theme of a 
president who is not in control of his own administration or its 
policies. Who's the boss? Cheney, not Bush. It gave Democrats a new line 
of attack, linking Cheney's penchant for secrecy to an overall pattern 
of secrecy in the Bush administration.

Cheney, the hunter, is now Cheney, the hunted. The media have him in 
their sights, with fresh ammunition thanks to the shots he accidentally 
fired at Whittington. As a political lame duck, he can dodge the press 
as he sees fit. But what about the special prosecutor? Fitzgerald's 
investigation is not as easily sidestepped.

When Libby was indicted, the Washington media predicted he would be too 
loyal to turn on his former boss. But an ex-chief of staff facing jail 
time and disgrace can redirect loyalty from an ex-boss to his family and 
himself. Libby's case is not scheduled to go to trial until January 
2007. Cheney has plenty of time to find out whether Libby's loyalties 
run as deep as he believed or hoped.

For Cheney, ducking questions about a hunting accident could be 
preferable to ducking questions about Scooter Libby.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/02/16/from_hunter_to_hunted/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.islandlists.com/pipermail/mb-civic/attachments/20060216/810dbf86/attachment.htm