Columbus, Ohio, Cheney’s Law, FRONTLINE Documentary, FREE FILM NIGHT!
JUNE 24, 2008 – 7:30pm
Sponsored by the Drexel East Theater, the Free Press, and the Central Ohio Green Education Fund
Drexel East Theater, 2254 Main St., Bexley
Discussion to follow screening in the Drexel Radio Cafe next door
253-2571, truth@freepress.org
For three decades Vice President Dick Cheney conducted a secretive, behind-closed-doors campaign to give the president virtually unlimited wartime power. Finally, in the aftermath of 9/11, the Justice Department and the White House made a number of controversial legal decisions. Orchestrated by Cheney and his lawyer David Addington, the department interpreted executive power in an expansive and extraordinary way, granting President George W. Bush the power to detain, interrogate, torture, wiretap and spy — without congressional approval or judicial review.
Now, as the White House appears ready to ignore subpoenas in the investigations over wiretapping and U.S. attorney firings, FRONTLINE examines the battle over the power of the presidency and Cheney’s way of looking at the Constitution.
“The vice president believes that Congress has very few powers to actually constrain the president and the executive branch,” former Justice Department attorney Marty Lederman tells FRONTLINE. “He believes the president should have the final word — indeed the only word — on all matters within the executive branch.”