Continue Pressing for Cheney Leak Hearings

Howard Dean, bless his soul, is calling for Dick Cheney to resign if he instructed Scooter Libby to leak classified intelligence to justify the administration's case for war. And at least one Republican senator is calling it a serious breach. But I expect the Republicans to argue that Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is the best person to conduct the investigation.

That's not good enough. Fitzgerald made it abundantly clear, in the press conference announcing Libby's indictment, that he will not make public any of his findings exept to the extent that they directly result in a criminal indictment. If Cheney gave Libby that instruction but Fitzgerald feels he is not indictable -- due to a technicality, a privilege, or otherwise -- then he will never tell us what evidence he did find.

A criminal investigation is a powerful tool, but it is not a substitute for Congressional oversight. When the Executive oversteps -- and Cheney, of all Vice Presidents in history, IS included in the term "Executive" -- then Congress must rein it in.

So please, keep manning the phones whenever you can, asking for Congressional hearings into the Cheney-Libby leak instruction. At this point, I only want to hit the D.C. offices of the Congressional leadership and the intelligence committee members. Just a few phone calls a day, at this early state, may be enough to get hearings started -- and then, we'll watch the momentum snowball, perhaps into impeachment.