The single most frightening, glaring headline to come out of last night’s vice presidential debate is that Sarah Palin still doesn’t know what the vice president does and she wants the extra power that Dick Cheney has bestowed on himself, if not more power.
She still does not know what the Constitution dictates the vice president’s powers, and apparently, her handlers have been taking their talking points from Cheney the Dick and not from Constitutional scholars.
Joe Biden explained it in a way that even she and they should be able to understand.
Biden: … the primary role of the vice president of the United States of America is to support the president of the United States of America, give that president his or her best judgment when sought, and as vice president, to preside over the Senate, only in a time when in fact there's a tie vote. The Constitution is explicit. It will always be a mystery how Cheney has inserted himself into the Legislative Branch, while clinging to the protections of the Executive Branch and Congress has allowed him to get away with it.Now Palin wants the same thing -- if not more -- for herself.
Her words are frightening and should be read carefully and taken extremely seriously.
Palin: Of course, we know what a vice president does…I'm thankful the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the vice president if that vice president so chose to exert it in working with the Senate and making sure that we are supportive of the president's policies … our founding fathers were very wise there in allowing through the Constitution much flexibility there in the office of the vice president.
Yeah, so I do agree with him that we have a lot of flexibility in there, and we'll do what we have to do to administer very appropriately the plans that are needed for this nation.
I said you have to listen closely, because it sounds good.
If the schools hadn’t stopped teaching civics years ago, everyone would know she is dead wrong, and the Constitution says nothing about the vice president having anything to do with the Legislative branch of the government, or that any flexibility is allowed.
In her first sentence, note she said “we know what the vice president does.”
Obviously, “they” do not know what the vice president’s duties are, and neither do all the teachers in her family that she boasted so boldly about, because they neglected to pass along the information.
No, it took Joe Biden to make vice president’s responsibilities according to the United States Constitution perfectly clear.
