Last night, I complained about the light sentence that was given to Stephen Griles. It was just one more example of the corruption that is so pervasive in Washington, especially in the Department of the Interior. I don't think I had many readers and only one person bothered to comment.
Had I waited until this morning, I could have had a much more complete story and an example of just how high into the Administration this all went. I had surmised that the light sentence and no need to cooperate with the ongoing investigation centered on Jack Abramoff was a way to give cover to either Gale Norton or Alberto Gonzales. But, maybe it was to cover Dick Cheney's derrière.
The blog of the Washington Post today directly connects Cheney to both Stephen Griles and his girlfriend du jour, Sue Ellen Wooldridge. One must ask what Griles and Wooldridge had that Cheney needed? Nothing more than votes in a key Oregon Congressional District.
In Oregon, a battleground state that the Bush-Cheney ticket had lost by less than half of 1 percent, drought-stricken farmers and ranchers were about to be cut off from the irrigation water that kept their cropland and pastures green. Federal biologists said the Endangered Species Act left the government no choice: The survival of two imperiled species of fish was at stake.
This entire scenario has been reviewed time and time again. It formed a major section in Chris Mooney's book, The Republican War on Science.
In this case, WaPo staff writers, Jo Becker and Barton Gellman have laid out the details in a manner that I had not seen before. This was Cheney intervening directly into a political situation, twisting the arms of novice political hacks in jobs that demanded more of their ethical judgment than they apparently were able to provide. At the root of this example is that Wooldridge was probably basking in the importance of getting a direct call from Cheney.
One of my fishing friends put it best when they forwarded the WaPo story with this comment attached.
While an angler will get cited for keeping a coho salmon or using a hook that isn't considered barbless enough, corrupt officials like Cheney and his underlings can kill thousands and thousands of fish with impunity. It is absolutely disgusting - and shows you how horribly corrupt the Bush administration is.
Last night, I was prodding Nick Rahall and the House Committee on Natural Resources to conduct a hearing into why such a light punishment for Griles. I would expand that a bit. They should look at why the Vice President was taking these Rovian actions, actions that ultimately cost the taxpayers of this country $ millions because of the destruction of the Klamath River salmon fisheries.
I would hope that for every farmer vote Cheney won, he lost three votes from those who fish. I would hope that for every potato farmer in the Klamath basin who thanked Cheney or Rove or even the excommunicated Richard Pombo, that there are 100 Native Americans who understand that the livelihood of their Hoopabrothers was only a political calculation. I hope that everyone who reads this will read Mooney's book to understand just why so many good things do not happen. I hope that everyone who reads this diary will get involved in the growing demand to Impeach Cheney. This is one task that can not remain "off the table."