Why Invoke Executive Privilege...

...if there's nothing to hide?

Scooter Libby.

As discussed previously, Libby was not guilty of any real crime (in fact, no crime had been committed by anyone). But, Fitzgerald got him on the stand and was able to twist Libby's testimony into falsehoods, thus getting Libby convicted in a farce trial.

So what is executive privilege? It's basically the freedom for the President to have candid and confidential discussions with his closest advisors without fear that those discussions could be forced into the public.

In addition to the further Libby investigations, Bush has invoked executive privilege for a couple other high-profile issues: the firing of trial attorneys and the terrorist surveillance program. In the case of the terrorist surveillance, the Editors of NRO write that the White House has already provided "stacks of records" on the topic, and there is no real cause to think that Congress will gain any new insights on the legal process involved by hearing testimony.

In the same article, NRO says that for the firing of U.S. attorneys, the White House has already provided 8,500 pages of documents (and, in this case, the testimony of numerous officials and former officials). But, that doesn't appear to be enough for a Congress that seems intent on chasing down every conspiracy theory about firings that were completely within Bush's authority to do.

Why would the White House want to avoid sending people to the stand in these non-scandal 'scandals'? Chances are good that enough grilling and enough testimony could trip up just about anyone, so it's safest not to even allow for the chance of that happening, even if there's nothing to hide. Don't believe me? Look at this story in the New York Times where the Bush administration has offered to have aides meet with committees privately in informal sessions with no transcripts, but Congress declined.

Besides, executive privilege is a completely legal Constitutional action that can be taken by the President.

The real hypocrisy here is that these same Democrat leaders in Congress seem to have conveniently forgotten that Bill Clinton fired all 93 U.S. attorneys when he became President (the rumor was that one of them was investigating a friend of Clinton's, but Clinton didn't want it to look like he was hiding something so he fired all of them). Where was the outrage then? There wasn't any - it was perfectly legal for Clinton to do it. The fact is that U.S. attorneys serve at the pleasure of the President. They can be hired and fired at will, for no reason at all.

Congress needs to stop creating scandals where none exist. They have passed just a single piece of meaningful legislation in its first six months this year -- raising the minimum wage -- while firing off literally hundreds of inconsequential investigations into the Bush administration. When are we going to stand up and call them to account for their (lack of) actions?

There's my two cents.