Justices Hear Arguments in Energy Task Force Case: "The Supreme Court argument about Vice President Dick Cheney's energy policy task force on Tuesday finally came down to this question: Is the presidency entitled to special treatment?
Underlying the case, although barely mentioned in the courtroom, is a politically charged election-year dispute over the Bush administration's efforts to avoid making public the names of energy industry officials whom it consulted when developing its energy policy in early 2001.
... The federal district court here said the groups were entitled to try to prove that the industry executives were so intimately involved in the process as to have become de facto panel members, thus requiring it to conduct business in public under a 1972 law, the Federal Advisory Committee Act. The federal appeals court ruled that it lacked jurisdiction to hear the administration's appeal."
- posted by geoff @ #