The House Oversight Committee is demanding that Vice President Cheney explain himself. Is his office part of the executive branch? Part of the legislative branch? Or is Cheney suggesting that as far as federal rules are concerned, his office essentially doesn't exist?
The issue at hand is Cheney's insistence that his office is exempt from an executive order issued by President Bush in 2003 requiring all federal agencies or "any other entity within the executive branch that comes into the possession of classified information" to report annually on its activities regarding the classification, safeguarding and declassification of national security information.
As Mark Silva reported in the Chicago Tribune in April 2006, Cheney's office maintains that its dual executive and legislative duties (the vice president also serves as president of the Senate) make it uniquely exempt from such rules.
Henry Waxman, the Democratic chairman of the Oversight Committee, begs to differ, and wrote a letter to Cheney this morning saying so.
