posted
Not really...energy is a touchy subject. If he wanted honest opinions, he had to gaurentee anonymity.
Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
The argument is this: As VP Dick Cheney wants ideas given to him that are not spun or politically correct in case those are the ideas that the country needs. Handing over the minutes of these meetings to the press means his next meeting, people will not give him many ideas, fearing that the press will learn of them.
Of course, why just a list of the attendees is being kept secret is not clear.
The only two possible reasons are, A)He is afraid of a slippery slope--give them the names this time and next time they will want the agenda. B)He met with a bunch of oil buddies and that looks bad when they were planning the entire energy policy of the country.
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
No it's not. It's part of the White House's priviledge to have close door meetings like that, the theory being that they want to get advice unfettered by people being concerned that whatever they tell the White House would be fair game to, for example, be plastered on the front page of a newspaper. This can be a valuable asset, but it can also be very easily abused. Just like any other secret aspect of the government, it bypasses the accountability built into the system. When the government is doing something in secret, they are relying on trust.
The simple fact is that there are many aspects of governing that work better when they can be kept secret. The problem that we run into is that our leaders aren't willing to accept that, because of this, they need to work to earn our trust. Instead, they seem to think that it's ok to hide behind laws and priviledges and just assume that we have to trust them. The only real recourse the public has then to at least try to keep our politicians accountable is to make their lives much more difficult anytime they try and pull secret crap.
The furor over Vice-President Cheney's secret meetings with energy advisors isn't necessarily because they were secret. It's more that as this administration has not tried to earn our trust and actively abused the public's trust on some occasions, there are reasons to doubt that these meetings were directed towards what was best for the country.
If I considered Dick Cheney a trust-worthy person, if he and President Bush had made it a habit of disclosing all information but the kind that actually needed to be kept secret without reference to whether or not it furthered their agenda, I'd have no problem with them meeting with pretty much anyone they wanted for advice in making sustantive policy decisions and keeping what happened in those meetings secret. As I said, this lack of disclosure can actually help the government run better.
However, because they have not shown themselves to be trustworthy, this is not a priviledge (of having secret meetings without being grilled about them) that they should be extended. Since they are unwilling to fulfill their responsibilities, the best that we the public can hope for is to hassle the heck out of them about the situations where there is a chance of impropriety.
Of course, other people may disagree with me about how trustworthy the Bush administration has shown themselves to be. In which case, they'd see this as people unjustifiably causing a hard time for an administration that doesn't deserve it.
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