A few days ago, there were two party crashers at a special White House dinner. Fortunately, they were just publicity-seeking jerks and did not pose a danger. But they still should not have been able to get through two separate Secret Service checkpoints since they were not on the approved guest list.To his credit, Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan assumed full responsibility for the screw-up saying, "This is our fault and our fault alone." He has suspended three agents with pay. Hopefully, that is just until a decision can be made about discipline. I think more needs to be done than just a paid vacation for the agents. They didn't just screw-up, but that screw-up could have cost the president his life.
But there is something else that worries me almost as much -- the misuse of the presidential "executive privilege". The House of Representative's Homeland Security Committee is investigating the screw-up. They have already spoken to Secret Service Director Sullivan and are expected to call the party crashers themselves. They also asked for White House Social Secretary Desiree Rogers (pictured) to testify.
That's where the problem arises. The White House has refused to let Ms. Rogers testify, claiming executive privilege. White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said "...there's a pretty long history of ensuring White House staff can provide advice to the president and do so confidentially." That's pretty weak.
This is not about confidential advice or the history of misusing executive privilege by previous presidents. This is about what plans were made, why they didn't work and what can be done to prevent this from happening in the future. There is nothing so secretive about the job of the White House Social Secretary that would damage the country if she testified.
During last year's campaign, Barack Obama promised to have an open and transparent presidency. It's time he started living up to that promise. If Congress cannot even hear from the WH Social Secretary, is there anyone in the White House not covered by executive privilege?
I hate to say it, but this ridiculous and unnecessary action reminds me of the super-secret White House of George Bush.
The Administration tried to sugar-coat it by calling it "separation of powers" instead of the tainted "executive privilege," but a rose by any other name smells ... hmm, bad metaphor!
ReplyDeleteThere are legitimate reasons to invoke executive privilege, but all too often it's been used as a ruse to cover up bad (or at least embarrassing) behavior. The Nixon Administration was probably the most notorious for that.