I’ll answer that! He is so clueless, paranoid and psychopathic that he can’t live in the real world. He’s wrong and he wants to rewrite history to exonerate his evil.
His reaction to the Justice Dept. inquiry into the criminal acts that he promoted is that the it raises, “doubts about this administration’s ability to be responsible for our nation’s security.’’
Dick, you limp, evil dick, the inquiry raises doubts into the Bush administration’s ability to be responsible for our nation’s security. Dick, you limp, evil dick, in the future, when a Webster’s illustrated dictionary is published, your picture will accompany the definition of the inner circle of Hell.
Here’s an interesting take on the matter from the Huffington Post.
With this, I do a secondary pit of the media and the way this thing was reported.
There are things like laws, the Constitution and international treaties that govern the actions of a government. They are not up to you, Mr. Cheney, to interpret at your paranoid, twisted whims.
He probably believes it. He’s like Col Jessup in a Few Good Men, he is convinced that hard-headed realistic men like him are necessary to protect us weaklings, who wouldn’t have the stern discipline to do what has to be done.
And the reports themselves seem to be couched in ambiguity. I’m reminded of a phrase John LeCarre used in his novels about the duplicity and beaureacratic cowardice of the British intelligence system. “Yes, repeat, No!” Used to describe the kind of double-talk addressed to difficult situations so that no matter how the situation unfolds, the author can claim to have clearly and unequivocally recommended precisely the right course of action, whichever of two contradictory actions prove to be correct. “Yes, repeat, No!”
I suspect he got “informal” reports that suggested that the techniques he was courageous enough to authorize were effective and fruitful. Who’s gonna piss off Big Dick Cheney?
But the actual reports don’t say any such thing, for fear that some Congressional committeman is going to say “Cite?”. It would be perfectly legit to say that Achmed al Badguy gave up information after being waterboarded. He almost certainly did, for instance, we learned he did not want to be waterboarded. And he told us a whole bunch of stuff, but unfortunately, we cannot divulge what stuff.
National security reasons, you understand.
But even if its utter crap made up in desperation, its still “intelligence”! At least until every last effort has been made to verify it.
Anybody reporting to Cheney would know what he wanted to hear. If they couldn’t tell him that, they would get as close to it as they could. He was told what he wanted to hear, and right now is probably blaming them for telling it to him.
I think it’s because he (and those who agree with him) think it’s treasonous when you’re disagreeing with a President who’s doing all the right things to protect the nation from terrorist attack, and your patriotic duty when you’re disagreeing with a President who’s soft on terror and trying to rip the country apart.
It’s really quite simple to understand once you remember that he thinks no one he worked with while VP did anything wrong, and like elucidator, I do think he believes it.
My problem with Cheney is that he’s too old and infirm for the punishments he deserves. Even if convicted of his crimes, and sent to Scotland to serve time, he would just be furloughed to Libya and receive a hero’s welcome by mercenaries and gun runners.
I think he believes in what he’s done (and what he’s doing now). I don’t think he believes that it’s for the good of the country.
I don’t think it’s a stupid idea. I think it’s a stupid idea to apply it to all situations. If an imminent danger to the United States* exists, then I think we should probably just shut up and let the President do his thing.
If no imminent danger exists- such as when we’re fighting a war of aggression 8,000 miles from our shores- we should tell the President he’s a fucking idiot.
*Actual imminent danger, not Cheney’s “imminent danger”.
I don’t know what he believes about the effectiveness of torture and wouldn’t want to peer too closely into his brain to find out, lest I suffer Saruman’s fate.
But there’s no question in my mind that Cheney is willing to make any bald-faced lie if it suits his purpose, which unfailingly runs counter to American values and common decency. He argued for the overthrow of Hussein in 2002 despite having publicly stated the problems with this in 1994. He claimed to know where WMDs existed when he in fact did not. He claimed to have no hand in outing Valerie Plame when this was demonstrably false. These were not just lies, they were harmful to the best interests of America and the world and served no useful purpose–and Cheney knew it.
Caught in lies on multiple occasions, he simply brushes off accusations as if they don’t exist. He has gotten away with this over the years because 1) he shows no self-doubt, shame or apology whatsoever, which gives many people the idea that he believes his own BS and therefore isn’t exactly lying; and 2) he is a hard-right Republican, the one political persuasion that currently is allowed to make absurdly false statements without being universally denounced.
I don’t really believe in true evil in the Sauron sense of the word–people who do evil things typically have a self-interested albeit twisted motive or a chemical imbalance or something like that–but if I did believe in Satan, his name would be Dick Cheney.
Cheney is a nasty old coward so afraid of anything beyond his control that he whines constantly about his fears about it. We all know that he “authorized” torture and killing despite the fact that they were clearly against the law and common decency and common sense. A look at Cheney’s life demonstrates clearly his cowardice and his bullying, but if anyone wants to summarize it in one incident, it is when he accidentally shot his best friend in the face and made his friend apologize.
He won’t debate any of these things, he will only cast stones from the safety of friendly interviews.
Yes, it makes sense to make it so that everyone who tries to protect the USA goes after a lawyer instead of life saving intelligence.
I hope the next attack is over your house (or hovel). That would be the only justice available to someone who wants to pursue people following the law as expressly stated at the time.
Waiting for Fitzmas? This, like so many other stupid democrat investigations will yeeld nothing except a waste of taxpayer money and time and distract those on the front line against our enemies (you know, those that have ALREADY attacked us).
How can you people sleep at night, knowing you are undermining our country and providing aid and comfort to the enemy? You should re-watch coverage of 9/11 and tell us again how we should coddle these evil enemies.
