The official excuse for the secrecy surrounding Dick Cheney's upcoming visit to Penn is that he is coming not in his public capacity as vice president, but in his private capacity as a rich white male.
However, these two roles are inseparable: Cheney certainly wouldn't be the vice president if he were not already wealthy, and his political positions have undoubtedly made him wealthier still.
Cheney accumulated his wealth as CEO of Halliburton, a corporation mainly involved in the oil business. Its subsidiary, Brown and Root, does construction through contracting for the military and other government agencies.
As secretary of defense under George Bush I, Cheney made a number of friends in the military. As CEO of Halliburton, Cheney cashed in on those friends, nearly doubling the company's income from government contracts. His claim during the 2000 vice presidential debate that "the government had absolutely nothing to do with" the company's success was patently false. In fact, as defense secretary, Cheney had pushed for the privatization of military contracts, hiring Halliburton to do it, according to Robert Bryce of Mother Jones.
Cheney's other activities at Halliburton included supplying Iraq with parts in the late 1990s, despite claiming to Sam Donaldson in August 2000, "I had a firm policy that I wouldn't do anything in Iraq -- even arrangements that were supposedly legal." The explanation for the discrepancy? It was actually Halliburton subsidiaries in Europe, which do not really count.
In 1996, when Cheney was still with Halliburton, he explained why the first Bush Administration did not attempt to overthrow Saddam Hussein; his arguments, quoted by Timothy Noah on Slate.com, are similar to those of today's "doves." His views have obviously changed since he stopped making money from Iraq.
As vice president, Cheney has been notable for only two things: his pandering to corporations and his secrecy. His biggest achievement was gathering executives from Enron and other energy companies to craft the Bush Administration's energy policy. The General Accounting Office, the investigation arm of the U.S. Congress, never known for its belligerence, has sued Cheney to obtain records of these meetings, in which Cheney proposed the country do exactly what the energy companies wanted.
A judge ruled last Thursday that the administration could not keep them secret any longer. Cheney's office is appealing the decision.
In light of Cheney's record, the fact that he is coming to praise Jon Huntsman, the largest single donor toward what is now Huntsman Hall, makes one reflect on Huntsman himself. Isn't asking Dick Cheney to attest to your character a bit like asking Bill Clinton to praise your marital fidelity?
As Matthew Mugmon suggested last week, this visit is about politics. Cheney has been set loose from his "undisclosed location" for one reason: campaign visits for Republicans. Cheney and Huntsman may fish together, but the ties that really bind are Huntsman's hefty campaign contributions to Republicans. In 2000, Huntsman personally gave $50,000 to the various Republican electoral committees and many more thousands to individual Republican candidates, according to data from opensecrets.org.
Huntsman Chemical, run by Jon Huntsman and his family, gained notoriety in 2000 when Gail Sheehy of Vanity Fair exposed its record of pollution in Odessa, Texas. Then-Governor Bush's appointees to the environmental regulatory agency ignored complaints about the Huntsman plastics factory, even after clouds of toxic black smoke repeatedly engulfed the mostly minority town.
Critics called it a classic case of environmental racism. Eventually Huntsman was fined $140,000 for its pollution, but not until after the 2000 presidential election.
Huntsman closed the plant in 2001, claiming that it could not compete with products being "dumped" from Indonesia and South Korea. Bush's departments of Commerce and Labor agreed, according to the Odessa American. The less partisan International Trade Commission disagreed, saying the Asian plastics outsold Huntsman's because they were demonstrably better.
Ironically, Huntsman's son, Jon Huntsman Jr., who sits on Penn's Board of Trustees, was appointed by Bush to be the deputy U.S. trade representative. Now he negotiates with other countries to lower their trade barriers, even as his father's company seeks to benefit from trade restrictions.
And so when Penn students protest outside Huntsman Hall on Friday morning, they will not only be voicing opposition to the war in Iraq, or to Cheney's role in Bush's reactionary administration. They will also be protesting Cheney's corporate cronyism and his use of the government to enrich himself and his friends.
And though I know Penn for Peace, the College Democrats and other "liberal" organizations will be there, I'm wondering where the conservatives are. After all, real conservatives don't support corporate welfare or secretive government bureaucracies. The Cato Institute, Judicial Watch and other conservative organizations have been highly critical of Cheney's activities.
So while I know some opportunistic College Republicans will eagerly anticipate Cheney's visit, I hope that intellectually honest people of all political backgrounds realize that Cheney is not welcome here and join us on College Green on Friday at 8:00 a.m. to protest.
Stephen Preston is a lecturer in Mathematics.
