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Taylor Marsh has been writing on line since 1996, with the archives provided here a representation of that work.

Tag Archives | Dick Cheney

Barack Obama, the Sane Republican

By on 30 December 2011

photo by Pete Souza


The quote to end the year comes from Cenk Uygur in a piece that’s worth a read.

I am “uncommitted” toward Obama. I’m uncommitted from supporting a guy that has walked all over our civil liberties, that thinks tax cuts are the only answer, that gave all of the money to the bankers and asked for nothing in return, that thinks the right-wing establishment has all of the answers. Uncommitted is the kindest word I have.

As Cenk reveals, he didn’t want to come down to “uncommitted,” but Pres. Obama made him do it. At least the door remains open to possibly voting for Obama.

Glenn Greenwald, writing this week in the UK Guardian, basically writes what I’ve been writing for three years: Vote Obama – if you want a centrist Republican for US president.

But how can a GOP candidate invoke this time-tested caricature when Obama has embraced the vast bulk of George Bush’s terrorism policies; waged a war against government whistleblowers as part of a campaign of obsessive secrecy; led efforts to overturn a global ban on cluster bombs; extinguished the lives not only of accused terrorists but of huge numbers of innocent civilians with cluster bombs and drones in Muslim countries; engineered a covert war against Iran; tried to extend the Iraq war; ignored Congress and the constitution to prosecute an unauthorised war in Libya; adopted the defining Bush/Cheney policy of indefinite detention without trial for accused terrorists; and even claimed and exercised the power to assassinate US citizens far from any battlefield and without due process?

Reflecting this difficulty for the GOP field is the fact that former Bush officials, including Dick Cheney, have taken to lavishing Obama with public praise for continuing his predecessor’s once-controversial terrorism polices. …

The best case to make for Pres. Obama in 2012 is that he’s the sane Republican.

Are you in?

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Hillary and Joe, Condi vs. Joe

By on 29 December 2011

The rumors are flying around the internets.

Robert Reich reveals the Democratic panic deep within the insiders by pushing a Hillary – Biden switch. He’s just the latest.

The subject of a Biden – Hillary switch makes my book, but I’ve yet to read anyone address the damage it would do to Pres. Obama, who right now is seeing his approval ratings rise. What would dumping Joe Biden, which isn’t going to happen, say about his candidacy? That he absolutely needs Hillary to win? There’s no proof that this is true.

Would Hillary supporters automatically vote for Pres. Obama if she’s on the ticket? Newsflash: Most Hillary supporters are going to vote for Obama anyway.

This site was a leading anti-Puma venue in the 2008 general election. Would anti-Obama voters who tilt Democratic and to the left automatically vote for Obama if Hillary was his nominee? Could these people be inspired to vote Obama in order to save Hillary from humiliation of the possibility of not delivering for him?

With Robert Reich the latest to hoist the Hillary – Biden swtich, there is obviously real worry by insider Democrats that the base won’t be inspired to turn out for Obama alone.

For me, however, the most interesting rumor hitting my inbox lately is Condi versus Biden. An abundance of popcorn would be required for a Rice debate with Joe Biden.

But as the CBS video above from November 2011 reveals, she says “… I’m a policy person not a politician. …politics doesn’t appeal to me.”

But before anything would happen Pres. Obama would be forced to combat yet another push for the Biden – Clinton tango, something I think is ludicrous to suggest and, for what it’s worth, do not endorse.

Dr. “swatting flies” Rice was arguably the worst national security adviser in U.S. history.

“I don’t think anybody could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center, take another one and slam it into the Pentagon. That they would try to use an airplane as a missile? A hijacked airplane as a missile? All of this reporting about hijacking was about traditional hijacking.” – Condoleezza Rice

Another round of “mushroom clouds,” anyone?

There’s that little item “Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside U.S.” that didn’t get much attention from her. Rice’s reaction to George Tenet telling her the U.S. needed to strike Afghanistan is equally disturbing.

Dr. Rice played third fiddle in the Rummy-Cheney fiefdom, then allowed herself to be humiliated by Pres. Bush, who wouldn’t let her do her job and even hung her out on torture.

Rice also demoted Richard Clarke, the man Pres. Clinton elevated to a cabinet position, because of the terrorism threat, including cyberterrorism. Then there’s the decision not to set up a principle’s meeting with Clarke until after 9/11.

Dr. Rice missed the Hamas moment, when Pres. Bush pushed for elections that landed them in power (from 2006), which rendered her “surprised” at the time. It should be noted that the Palestinians warned Bush they weren’t yet ready.

But no one would likely care.

In a year of the Republican circus primary shuffle, Condoleeza Rice comes off like Margaret Thatcher, only moderate.

Ms. Rice is an abortion rights advocate, so she’ll catch some flak from some. However, among suburban women who vote Republican, as well as the highly educated contingent, and independents, not to mention cafeteria Catholics, that will be a plus.

It’s just another rumor, but if Dr. Rice heard George W. Bush’s voice on the phone saying her country needed her could she resist?

I’m still waiting for Liz Cheney’s move, though she’s got plenty of time to make it.

Assuming Romney prevails, the most dangerous man for team Obama remains Chris Christie, though everyone should remember only the fringe people vote on vice presidential choice alone. That includes Robert Reich’s hail Mary panic pick, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

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What Might Happen Around the World in 2012?

By on 14 December 2011

Global recession with a surprise winner or two – The Eurozombies may avoid catastrophe but instead produce a macroeconomic remake of Night of the Living Dead. Recession in austerity-bound Europe will only be worsened by the sweeping downturn already taking place in the emerging world, and the result could be a deeper slump worldwide. But here’s the twist: the United States will win, as it is a destination for those in the midst of one of the most confusing, frustrating flights to quality in recent history. Japan too. They won’t do very well at all, but in the global ugly contest they may take home least-ugly honors. – David Rothkopf

So, what could happen in 2012?

David Rothkopf over at Foreign Policy has done his next year headlines in review list, many of which don’t take an expert’s mind to name. Stephen Walt has his own that includes Israel accepting the Arab League Peace Plan. Rothkopf thinks the Eurozone will strengthen. More are below.

The end of Ahmadinejad, but it won’t come through Dick Cheney’s fantasies or any neoconservative getting his war wishes in a Christmas stocking. From Erin Burnett’s “Out Front,” when Burnett brought up the RQ-170 sentinel:

CHENEY: I would assume that’s the case. Or they’ll send it back in pieces after they’ve gotten all the intelligence they can out of it.

The right response to that would have been to go in immediately after it had gone down and destroy it. You can do that from the air. You can do that with a quick airstrike, and in effect make it impossible for them to benefit from having captured that drone. I was told that the president had three options on his desk. He rejected all of them.

BURNETT: And they all involved removing the drone immediately?

CHENEY: They all involved sending somebody in to try to recover it, or if you can’t do that, admittedly that would be a difficult operation, you certainly could have gone in and destroyed it on the ground with an airstrike. But he didn’t take any of the options. He asked for them to return it. And they aren’t going to do that.

The world is going to continue to have major shifts in power centers.

The collapse of Assad in Syria, which couldn’t come soon enough as far as I’m concerned.

Political unrest in China? It’s the beginning, Rothkopf predicts.

Power struggle in Pakistan?  Nothing new there.

Say goodbye to Castro and Hugo Chavez?

Incoming “cybershocker” that will take down somebody financially.

Putin’s not going to return to power easily.

…and get ready for extremism in Africa to become an American strategic interest.

Interesting list, as is Stephen Walt’s.

Do you have any thoughts on what might happen in the world next year?

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Not Disappointed in Pres. Obama

By on 21 November 2011

**Postscript added**

President Obama is now neck and neck with a generic Republican challenger in the latest Real Clear Politics 2012 General Election Average (43.8%-43.%). Meanwhile, voters disapprove of the president’s performance 49%-41% in the most recent Gallup survey, and 63% of voters disapprove of his handling of the economy, according to the most recent CNN/ORC poll. – The Hillary Moment

The Obama supporter in the video shown here is “not disappointed by Pres. Obama.”

I’m not either.

The difference is that I’m not as exhausted as this particular Obama supporter seems to be, because I don’t feel the need to defend him or attempt a pitch on his presidency that comes with no enthusiasm and gives lesser of two evils as the foundation. Watching the video is actually depressing instead of convincing.

I’m also not disappointed to say most of the things Pres. Obama has accomplished most any Democratic president would have also done, which may be part of the reason most die hard Obama fans always end up their arguments talking about the appalling choices on the right.

I’m not disappointed that Pres. Obama let too big to fail banks rake in record cash, in fact, more in Pres. Obama’s first term than in all eight of George W. Bush, because Barack Obama was always the corporate guy in a elite political party who is bought off by both banks and big business. He had no intention of reeling in the banks to any degree, which is proven through the appointments of Tim Geithner and Larry Summers.

But I wasn’t disappointed in Tim Geithner or Larry Summers, because it’s not like Barack Obama, who received more money from Wall Street than any other candidate in his time, was going to buck the boys that represent those jackals.

I knew Pres. Obama would not lead the country on issues he believed strongly in, inspiring Congress to find consensus, because what he does is compromise between ideas presented to him.

I wrote over 4 years ago that Pres. Obama would not fight for entitlements.

I also wrote that no one should take his anti-war Iraq speech as any indication of what he’d do as president, because his votes in the United States Senate on these matters were exactly like Hillary Clinton’s. I wrote that if Barack Obama had been in the Senate he would have likely voted for the Iraq war, just as all the Democratic presidential hopefuls did from the Senate, with his presidency proving that possibility very real.

It’s hard to take anyone touting Mr. Obama as the lesser of two evils, as Obama supporters do most often, while as President he’s shown a penchant toward militarism that rivals George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

I wasn’t disappointed when Pres. Obama decided to bomb Libya. See above.

I’m not disappointed that Pres. Obama assassinated an American citizen abroad using executive branch powers, because he’s been following the George W. Bush presidential model all the way.

So, I wasn’t surprised that instead of showing economic muscle, Pres. Obama opted for 2,500 Marines in Australia. See above.

I’m not disappointed that Pres. Obama handed over health care to Sen. Max Baucus and the insurance industry, because I watched him at the very first health care debate, sponsored by CAP/SEIU, in Nevada, long before I back Hillary. He came in and spoke about health care without a plan or a clue on what he would do.

I’m not disappointed in Pres. Obama’s compromise and capitulation, because there was never any evidence that he’d fight for Democratic principles.

I’m not disappointed that before the 2010 midterms Pres. Obama didn’t lead with an economic message to rival the Tea Party, because he’s not made one argument for progressive economics, preferring to tout Ronald Reagan a lot more often than Bill Clinton, the man who made Obama’s neoliberal presidency possible.

I’m not disappointed that Pres. Obama then caved to Republicans and extended the Bush tax cuts in December 2010, because after all, if he’s not going to fight before an election why would he fight afterward when his Democratic majority was in shambles?

I wasn’t even disappointed in the midterm outcomes themselves or that women split their vote with Republicans, with seniors tilting right, because Pres. Obama doesn’t make the Democratic case for why they shouldn’t.

I wasn’t disappointed that across the country state houses turned red, because Pres. Obama set the Republicans up by making things easier for them.

I wasn’t so much disappointed in Pres. Obama’s selling out women to the Bart Stupak crowd as wishing he’d simply voted “present” as he did in Illinois.

I wasn’t even disappointed when Pres. Obama didn’t fight for Elizabeth Warren to head the agency that was her brainchild.

Pres. Obama isn’t a fighter, that is, unless he’s fighting for himself.

I’m not disappointed in Pres. Obama for not being a more progressive leader, because I knew he wasn’t a progressive from the start.

It’s also not disappointing that Pres. Obama has made the Democratic Party more like the Republican Party through his continual leaning to the right, because both parties are basically the same these days, though the Republican right’s crazy is more virulent, while the Democratic left is just feckless.

I’m not disappointed Pres. Obama didn’t get a primary challenger, because you’d have to be nuts to go up against a man so thoroughly bought and paid for by Wall Street and big business.

I’m not disappointed that Republicans are “deranged,” because that’s nothing new and so hearing the Obama supporter in the video make the case that Pres. Obama is better than the alternative isn’t disappointing, because as I’ve proven here, what else do they have?

Pres. Obama is better than the current leading alternative on the Republican side, which today is Newt Gingrich.

I’m just not sure what that says about this country or our chances of getting out of the mess we’re in.

I’m not disappointed that Mitt Romney will still likely be the one to challenge Pres. Obama, because they’re the flip side of each big party, matching each other pretty well on aloofness, elitism, lack of power to relate, cluelessness of the 99% and just how badly most everyone would like to have better choices than either of these two men.

It’s just the latest edition of the Hillary Effect.

POSTSCRIPT: The only relevant aspect to the so-called “Democratic pollsters” writing in the WSJ is the short bit I quote at the top. These very real numbers are indeed the inspiration for yet another chapter in the Hillary Effect. So, not even the opining of Fox News Channel shills can negate that the Hillary Effect has been in sway since 2008, going back to when Sarah Palin was chosen as McCain’s vice president, all of which is detailed in my book. As for those throwing around the false talking point about “Obama hatred,” there is absolutely no evidence of it, except among right wing extremists and wingnut conservatives, with the American people still liking Pres. Obama personally. As for me, I’ve been consistent over a long period of time. I’ve called out Secretary Clinton’s militarism and where we disagree on foreign policy (here, here, here, here, here). The case is made in my book The Hillary Effect, which anyone interested in the history of the last few years should read.

video h/t The Moderate Voice

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A Word About Iraq

By on 23 October 2011

“No one, most particularly Iran, should miscalculate about our continuing commitment to and with the Iraqis going forward,” she told CNN’s “State of the Union” when asked whether Iran’s relationship with Iraq is a concern. – Clinton warns Iran against moving into Iraq

President Barack Obama talks with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki of Iraq during a secure video teleconference in the Situation Room of the White House, Oct. 21, 2011. Seated at the table, from left, are: Tony Blinken, National Security Advisor to the Vice President ; National Security Advisor Tom Donilon; Puneet Talwar, Senior Director for Iraq, Iran and the Gulf States; Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough; and Chief of Staff Bill Daley. Pictured onscreen are: at left, Prime Minister al-Maliki, along with two aides; in center, Vice President Joe Biden; at right, General Lloyd Austin, Commanding General of U.S. Forces - Iraq and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffrey. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

November 17, 2008 – Tina Susman BAGHDAD — Iraq’s Cabinet on Sunday overwhelmingly accepted a plan to end the U.S. military presence in Iraq by the end of 2011 and sent it on to parliament for approval, where it faces a fight from lawmakers who consider it a sellout to the Americans. T[...] The agreement is to replace the United Nations mandate expiring Dec. 31 that gives U.S. forces the legal basis for being in Iraq. [...] The agreement calls for American forces to pull out of Iraqi cities by the end of June and fully withdraw from Iraq by Dec. 31, 2011. – Iraq Cabinet OKs U.S. exit schedule

Before Barack Obama was inaugurated, the Iraq Cabinet voted and affirmed the U.S. military withdrawal of December 31, 2011. That means the timeline was formulated when Pres. George W. Bush was still in office. It seems collective amnesia has set it, with few remembering the facts. If we started talking about the details in Josh Rogin’s piece, “How the Obama administration bungled the Iraq withdrawal negotiations,” the reality beneath what we saw happen on Friday would unravel.

Spencer Ackerman joins Josh Rogin in reporting the outside elements swirling upon Pres. Obama’s announcement. Both reports come under damning headlines, with Rogin getting an adamant response from the White House after his went up. Rogin’s piece didn’t make anyone at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue very happy. Ackerman’s post likely pissed off the State Department too. Here’s an excerpt:

But the fact is America’s military efforts in Iraq aren’t coming to an end. They are instead entering a new phase. On January 1, 2012, the State Department will command a hired army of about 5,500 security contractors, all to protect the largest U.S. diplomatic presence anywhere overseas.

The State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security does not have a promising record when it comes to managing its mercenaries. The 2007 Nisour Square shootings by State’s security contractors, in which 17 Iraqi civilians were killed, marked one of the low points of the war. Now, State will be commanding a much larger security presence, the equivalent of a heavy combat brigade. In July, Danger Room exclusively reported that the Department blocked the Congressionally-appointed watchdog for Iraq from acquiring basic information about contractor security operations, such as the contractors’ rules of engagement.

That means no one outside the State Department knows how its contractors will behave as they ferry over 10,000 U.S. State Department employees throughout Iraq — which, in case anyone has forgotten, is still a war zone. Since Iraq wouldn’t grant legal immunity to U.S. troops, it is unlikely to grant it to U.S. contractors, particularly in the heat and anger of an accident resulting in the loss of Iraqi life.

It’s a situation with the potential for diplomatic disaster. And it’s being managed by an organization with no experience running the tight command structure that makes armies cohesive and effective.

You can also expect that there will be a shadow presence by the CIA, and possibly the Joint Special Operations Command, to hunt persons affiliated with al-Qaida. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has conspicuously stated that al-Qaida still has 1,000 Iraqi adherents, which would make it the largest al-Qaida affiliate in the world.

So far, there are three big security firms with lucrative contracts to protect U.S. diplomats. Triple Canopy, a longtime State guard company, has a contract worth up to $1.53 billion to keep diplos safe as they travel throughout Iraq. Global Strategies Group will guard the consulate at Basra for up to $401 million. SOC Incorporated will protect the mega-embassy in Baghdad for up to $974 million. State has yet to award contracts to guard consulates in multiethnic flashpoint cities Mosul and Kirkuk, as well as the outpost in placid Irbil.

These reports are both important, because they give atmospherics.

It’s Ackerman’s “entering a new phase” analysis that I think is worth emphasizing.

I disagree with people who are not acknowledging the importance of what Pres. Obama announced, as well as the risks involved, which both reports I mention above reveal. Obama’s announcement is no small matter.

The bookend, however, is that we are entering a new phase of our relationship with Iraq’s government and people. Do people actually expect for the U.S. to go from preemption to no involvement at all? Certainly people’s intelligence for foreign policy isn’t that low.

Given that I’ve written about the mega-embassy in Baghdad, I’m not surprised at all there will be a multi-billion dollar expenditure to protect it after U.S. military forces withdraw. This was telegraphed long ago.

I’m wary of what awaits after we withdraw from Iraq, which is one reason I was against going in and said so at the time.

Both Ackerman’s and Rogin’s reports should be read as they are offered. Reporters doing their job informing people, at least those who are willing to listen to facts and realities on the ground in Iraq as the U.S. military prepares to leave.

What matters in the discussion is that our involvement in Iraq is not over. That’s the sobering and salient point that everyone needs to swallow.

Anyone focused on declaring any kind of “victory” or fixated on trying to claim credit for the current Administration doesn’t understand the collective breath-holding a lot of people will be doing once our troops begin withdrawing. This includes Pres. Obama, whose job it is as commander in chief to oversee the withdrawal that’s about to begin and the aftermath it leaves behind.

Meanwhile, the Republican snarls will rise to a crescendo as the 2012 smackdown gets closer.

President Obama’s astonishing failure to secure an orderly transition in Iraq has unnecessarily put at risk the victories that were won through the blood and sacrifice of thousands of American men and women. The unavoidable question is whether this decision is the result of a naked political calculation or simply sheer ineptitude in negotiations with the Iraqi government. The American people deserve to hear the recommendations that were made by our military commanders in Iraq. – Mitt Romney (via Ben Smith)

There is real risk to what Pres. Obama is doing on Iraq by following Bush’s timetable, though I’m certainly not suggesting we stay, because we must not. But if Obama’s poll numbers were better among his own base it’s my belief he would not be following it. The forces from the State Dept. Spencer Ackerman reports about points to a reality that leads to this possibility.

The final outcome of what Republicans and Democrats concocted through allowing Pres. Bush to choose preemption is something we may not know for many years.

As for the short-term, I’ve got my fingers crossed that Pres. Obama made the wise decision, which brings with it a shift to the State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security, something that doesn’t fill me with confidence. Secy. Clinton will have her hands full managing this feat, with the track record of State’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security nothing to laud. If you’re not worried about this development you don’t understand the magnitude of how badly things could go wrong and how very quickly, too.

What Bush wrought in Iraq is not Pres. Obama’s fault, the timeline Bush’s as well. However, once Pres. Obama makes the turn he’s planned, he’ll own what happens next in Iraq. Digest that.

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The Cost of Fear: Osama Won

By on 11 September 2011

by NOLA LOPEZ

“The dangerous trend in Pakistan,” he said, “is that there is far more hate for America now than there was ever love of Osama.” – Mission Unfinished, BY JILL ABRAMSON – In the twilight of America’s decade-long, multibillion-dollar intervention, Afghanistan remains highly unstable, the Pakistanis trust us less than ever, and it is not at all clear how “the big things are going to turn out.”

As the man who gave the order to kill Osama bin Laden fights for his reelection amidst horrific economic times, there can be only one conclusion. We blew it.

Osama bin Laden’s purpose in targeting the financial heart of the United States was to bring the body of our economic engine to its knees.

Mission accomplished.

There’s little doubt, as Pres. Obama’s new SecDef decides troops should stay in Iraq, while Mr. Obama continues to make the case for endless engagement in Afghanistan, while our economic health is on life support, we’ve lost sight of creating our own destiny by looking forward instead of back.

Once the airlines opened after 9/11, I took a very long flight to a family wedding. We hopscotched across the country, we lonely 8 in the plane, after we each were searched within an inch of our lives, which began the unraveling of what America means, because fear had gripped our soul.

Then we did the unthinkable, the most un-American of acts: we tortured.

In “The Making of a Man,” which I wrote 11 years ago after Pres. Bush’s eloquent speech at the National Cathedral, I never suspected what his Administration would plot next.

Former Pres. George W. Bush and V.P. Dick Cheney have a lot for which they should be made to answer, however, instead they’ve both enjoyed a rehabilitation.

Preemptive war in Iraq on the wings of the new U.S. policy of regime change, while keeping the costs off the books, was one of the single worst economic wounds to be dealt to this country.

The drum beat to war singled the death of American journalism, with uncritical thinking, access and cowardice the media’s chosen path.

It allowed Afghanistan to weaken, with candidate Obama inspired to label Afghanistan the “good war” from which it seems we shall never be freed.

Today our economy is hobbled, with the response from Wall Street to 9/11 being greed and recklessness, while our politicians, no matter the party, looked the other way for fear their campaign coffers wouldn’t be filled.

All of this was laid on the ground of fear. The fear that terrorists would hit us again. That sacrificing civil liberties was the cost. That solidifying our future in the global, 21st century economy wasn’t the priority.

A grateful China kept busy.

Our leaders believed that keeping us safe had everything to do with militarism, but forgot the most important part of our national security strength is our economic prowess and the ability to build, compete and challenge nations whose armies are secondary, because the U.S. is the global policeman on which they can rely.

This is no longer F.D.R.’s America. It’s not even John F. Kennedy’s anymore.

Our economic weaknesses today were laid on the foundation from Pres. Bush, who said to go shopping, while he plotted to attack Iraq, a country that had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11. It came after a decade of peace and prosperity that handed him a surplus which he blew through with the reckless abandon of a drunken teenager with an unlimited credit line.

…and Pres. Obama and the Democrats simply shrugged and said we need to move on, while ignoring the legacy of Bush-Cheney, which was an economy on its knees.

You can call this politics.

I call it truth.

He may be dead, but he drove our leaders to distraction that led to the collapse of our economy, which was his main goal 10 years ago today.

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9/11 Commemoration: Three Presidents, Different Perspectives

By on 10 September 2011

“There has always been a special place in the common memory for people who deliberately, knowingly, certainly lay down their lives for other people to live. …” – Pres. Bill Clinton

Every time I hear the word “anniversary” invoked for 9/11 I cringe. There is nothing celebratory about the date, with it a commemoration of a horrific tragedy that now with the 9/11 memorials in place should take a new spot in our national dialogue. Revisiting the history of it that has an end, which came with Pres. Obama’s call to send Seal Team Six into Pakistan to risk it all to kill Osama bin Laden.

The politics of 9/11, however, will go on, as we saw last Sunday on Fox News with Chris Wallace, when the anchor decided not ask former V.P. Dick Cheney about the killing of Osama bin Laden, because the thought of crediting Pres. Obama with an extraordinary point of leadership, which didn’t require torturing anyone, would be just too much for FNC viewers to take.

From Politico, the politics of 9/11.

A decade later, 9/11 has finally brought the political parties together in this respect: They’ve both mastered the art of politicizing the terrorist attacks.

[...] But the presence of 9/11 in politics is as profuse as ever. Most recently – days ahead of the tenth anniversary of the attacks – candidates in a New York congressional election have traded sharp accusations over who’s more committed to protecting the country from terrorism and supporting first responders.

Continue Reading →

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Chris Wallace Proves (again) Why He’s the Worst Anchor on TV

By on 04 September 2011

… But both parties are not rotten in quite the same way. The Democrats have their share of machine politicians, careerists, corporate bagmen, egomaniacs and kooks. Nothing, however, quite matches the modern GOP. [...] – Goodbye to All That: Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left the Cult

Fox News Channel and Chris Wallace won’t be leaving the “cult” anytime soon. In fact, today is representative of how they keep the cult alive, along with the mythology that helps promote, but also hide, the rancid reality of Republicanism today, not only where the economy is concerned, but also on matters of national security.

If you want to get an idea of how awful Chris Wallace is as a news man, today was another example. While discussing Cheney’s book, Mr. Wallace danced around 9/11 without ever once mentioning the killing of Osama bin Laden and the mission Pres. Obama approved to get that job done. It’s the exact opposite approach he took with former Pres. Clinton one day in 2006, with the entire spectacle today on Fox representative of the worst of today’s national security media mendacity.

What’s even worse is that Chris Wallace allowed former V.P. Dick Cheney to once again embellish, some would say continue to perpetuate a historical lie when compared to the facts, his role on 9/11. I’ve written about it before, in 2007 and in 2006, with the second link to 2006 giving you an example of the types of questions Wallace asked former Pres. Bill Clinton compared to how Wallace tip toes around Dick Cheney.

So, take yourself back…

It’s 9/11.

All hell has broken loose, with hijacked planes bearing down on the nation’s capitol, Washington, D.C. and outlying areas and and the financial center of the United States, New York City.

V.P. Dick Cheney has been whisked to the bunker for safety, but according to Mr. Cheney, he’s also in charge of events.

What kind of man lies about his role on 9/11?

Unfortunately, it’s now becoming legend, as Mr. Cheney once again regurgitated his story to Chris Wallace, who did nothing to challenge his version of events.

From a very important Vanity Fair article back in 2006, “9/11 Live: The NORAD Tapes” (the salient section about Cheney being proved a liar on page 18).

Nasypany starts walking up and down the floor, asking all his section heads and weapons techs if they are prepared to shoot down a civilian airliner if need be, but he’s jumping the gun: he doesn’t have the authority to order a shootdown, nor does Marr or Arnold, or Vice President Cheney, for that matter. The order will need to come from President Bush, who has only just learned of the attack at a photo op in Florida.

[...] A former senior executive at the F.A.A., speaking to me on the condition that I not identify him by name, tried to explain. “Our whole procedures prior to 9/11 were that you turned everything [regarding a hijacking] over to the F.B.I.,” he said, reiterating that hijackers had never actually flown airplanes; it was expected that they’d land and make demands. “There were absolutely no shootdown protocols at all. The F.A.A. had nothing to do with whether they were going to shoot anybody down. We had no protocols or rules of engagement.”

In his bunker under the White House, Vice President Cheney was not notified about United 93 until 10:02—only one minute before the airliner impacted the ground. Yet it was with dark bravado that the vice president and others in the Bush administration would later recount sober deliberations about the prospect of shooting down United 93. “Very, very tough decision, and the president understood the magnitude of that decision,” Bush’s then chief of staff, Andrew Card, told ABC News.

Cheney echoed, “The significance of saying to a pilot that you are authorized to shoot down a plane full of Americans is, a, you know, it’s an order that had never been given before.” And it wasn’t on 9/11, either.

President Bush would finally grant commanders the authority to give that order at 10:18, which—though no one knew it at the time—was 15 minutes after the attack was over.

Rewriting Bush-Cheney history has been happening a lot in the Obama era.

Now segue to Wallace interviewing former Pres. Bill Clinton in 2006. While Wallace today didn’t bother to ask Cheney why former Pres. George W. Bush said he was “truly not that concerned” about bin Laden. As you can witness by former Pres. Bill Clinton’s response to Wallace’s blatant bias, love him or hate him, the Big Dawg didn’t take Chris’ crap when Wallace tried to sandbag him on 9/11. Here’s the excerpt, since minds have gone soft as we approach the commemoration of the horrific tragedy next week.

WALLACE: When we announced that you were going to be on Fox News Sunday, I got a lot of email from viewers, and I got to say I was surprised most of them wanted me to ask you this question. Why didn’t you do more to put Bin Laden and al Qaeda out of business when you were President? There’s a new book out which I suspect you’ve read called the Looming Tower. And it talks about how the fact that when you pulled troops out of Somalia in 1993, Bin Laden said “I have seen the frailty and the weakness and the cowardice of US troops.” Then there was the bombing of the embassies in Africa and the attack on the USS Cole.

CLINTON: OK..

WALLACE: Let me — let me — may I just finish the question, sir?

And after the attack, the book says that bin Laden separated his leaders, spread them around, because he expected an attack, and there was no response.

I understand that hindsight is always 20/20…

CLINTON: No let’s talk about–

WALLACE: …but the question is why didn’t you do more, connect the dots and put them out of business?

CLINTON: OK, let’s talk about it. I will answer all of those things on the merits but I want to talk about the context of which this arises. I’m being asked this on the FOX network. ABC just had a right wing conservative on the Path to 9/11 falsely claim that it was based on the 9/11 Commission report with three things asserted against me that are directly contradicted by the 9/11 Commission report. I think it’s very interesting that all the conservative Republicans who now say that I didn’t do enough, claimed that I was obsessed with Bin Laden. All of President Bush’s neocons claimed that I was too obsessed with finding Bin Laden when they didn’t have a single meeting about Bin Laden for the nine months after I left office. All the right wingers who now say that I didn’t do enough said that I did too much. Same people.

Clinton takes on Fox News bias:

WALLACE: Do you think you did enough sir?

CLINTON: No, because I didn’t get him.

WALLACE: Right

CLINTON: But at least I tried. That’s the difference in me and some, including all the right wingers who are attacking me now. They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try and they didn’t. I tried. So I tried and failed. When I failed I left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy and the best guy in the country, Dick Clarke. So you did FOX’s bidding on this show. You did you nice little conservative hit job on me. But what I want to know..

WALLACE: Well, wait a minute, sir.

CLINTON: No, wait. No, no…

WALLACE: I want to ask a question. You don’t think that’s a legitimate question?

CLINTON: It was a perfectly legitimate question, but I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked this question of.

I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked, Why didn’t you do anything about the Cole?

I want to know how many you asked, Why did you fire Dick Clarke?

I want to know how many people you asked…

WALLACE: We asked — we asked…

CLINTON: I don’t…

WALLACE: Do you ever watch Fox News Sunday, sir?

CLINTON: I don’t believe you asked them that.

WALLACE: We ask plenty of questions of…

CLINTON: You didn’t ask that, did you? Tell the truth, Chris.

WALLACE: About the USS Cole?

CLINTON: Tell the truth, Chris.

WALLACE: With Iraq and Afghanistan, there’s plenty of stuff to ask.

CLINTON: Did you ever ask that?

You set this meeting up because you were going to get a lot of criticism from your viewers because Rupert Murdoch’s supporting my work on climate change.

And you came here under false pretenses and said that you’d spend half the time talking about — you said you’d spend half the time talking about what we did out there to raise $7-billion-plus in three days from 215 different commitments. And you don’t care.

WALLACE: But, President Clinton, if you look at the questions here, you’ll see half the questions are about that. I didn’t think this was going to set you off on such a tear.

CLINTON: You launched it — it set me off on a tear because you didn’t formulate it in an honest way and because you people ask me questions you don’t ask the other side.

WALLACE: That’s not true. Sir, that is not true.

CLINTON: And Richard Clarke made it clear in his testimony…

WALLACE: Would you like to talk about the Clinton Global Initiative?

CLINTON: No, I want to finish this now.

WALLACE: All right. Well, after you.

CLINTON: All I’m saying is, you falsely accused me of giving aid and comfort to bin Laden because of what happened in Somalia. No one knew Al Qaida existed then. And…

WALLACE: But did they know in 1996 when he declared war on the U.S.? Did they know in 1998…

CLINTON: Absolutely, they did.

WALLACE: … when he bombed the two embassies?

CLINTON: And who talked about…

WALLACE: Did they know in 2000 when he hit the Cole?

CLINTON: What did I do? What did I do? I worked hard to try to kill him. I authorized a finding for the CIA to kill him. We contracted with people to kill him. I got closer to killing him than anybody has gotten since. And if I were still president, we’d have more than 20,000 troops there trying to kill him.

Now, I’ve never criticized President Bush, and I don’t think this is useful. But you know we do have a government that thinks Afghanistan is only one-seventh as important as Iraq.

And you ask me about terror and Al Qaida with that sort of dismissive thing? When all you have to do is read Richard Clarke’s book to look at what we did in a comprehensive, systematic way to try to protect the country against terror.

And you’ve got that little smirk on your face and you think you’re so clever. But I had responsibility for trying to protect this country. I tried and I failed to get bin Laden. I regret it. But I did try. And I did everything I thought I responsibly could.

The entire military was against sending Special Forces in to Afghanistan and refueling by helicopter. And no one thought we could do it otherwise, because we could not get the CIA and the FBI to certify that Al Qaida was responsible while I was president.

And so, I left office. And yet, I get asked about this all the time. They had three times as much time to deal with it, and nobody ever asks them about it. I think that’s strange.

The entire interview from 2006 is instructive. Because whatever you think of Clinton, and his third way-ism, NAFTA and other policies that were destructive to progressive economics, while paving the way for Obama’s Republicanism, at least the man didn’t use kumbaya bipartisan excuses to keep from fighting battles that need to be fought. Bipartisanship for Clinton didn’t require caving to wingnuts out of fear of partisanship or because he might scare off Independents.

As for Dick Cheney’s other claim today on Fox News Sunday that Obama’s made the economy worse, said with a straight face and without a hint of irony, Chris Wallace didn’t challenge him on that either. The fact that Bush-Cheney kept the wars off the budget, gave massive tax cuts that produced no jobs, while blowing the surplus Clinton left them, with the list a lot longer than this, none of this was on Chris Wallace’s mind either.

That’s because Mr. Wallace feels more comfortable catering to the Fox News audience, so presenting facts over ideological fluffery isn’t his top priority. He does prove why they’re the least informed, because he and others on the network make sure of it.

Simply, do you think there was a liberal bias in the mainstream media? – Chris Wallace to former V.P. Dick Cheney

Maybe Mr. Wallace should try his luck at comedy, because as a journalist, “fair and balanced” or otherwise, he continues to fail.

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’1776′ John Adams: One Useless Man is Called a Disgrace; Two are Called a Law Firm; Three or More Become a Congress

By on 04 July 2011


… Lincoln saw an unresolvable tension between the Constitution of a democratic republic and the policies of aggrandizement and intemperate self-interest that lead from the manners of freedom to the slavish love of power. He spoke of the difference between the work of establishing a constitutional republic and the longer task of maintaining it. But maintaining it against what? Lincoln’s answer was always the same: against the internal pressure of greed, and the external pressure of war. The predicament of the country in 1861, he said, “forces us to ask: ‘Is there, in all republics, this inherent, and fatal weakness? Must a government, of necessity, be too strong for the liberties of its own people, or too weak to maintain its own existence?’”

We are now ten years into a policy shared by two successive administrations to plant a new understanding of the spirit of the laws in America. That policy has pretended there is a “trade-off” between liberty and security, and that in a time of crisis, security ought to have the upper hand. The Cheney-Bush and Obama administrations have accustomed us to laws and language concerned above all with the “protection” of citizens — as if there were something higher or more worth protecting than the liberty that is guaranteed by our laws and the framework of laws, the Constitution. [...]

To Maintain a Republic, by David Bromwich

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TIME: Grand Jury Investigating CIA Abu Ghraib Torture for War Crimes

By on 14 June 2011

The ghosts of Bush-Cheney-Rummy torture still hangs over the C.I.A., no matter what Leon Panetta has done to infuse the agency with honor. From TIME magazine:

Manadel al-Jamadi

It has been nearly a decade since Manadel al-Jamadi, an Iraqi prisoner known as “the Iceman” — for the bungled attempt to cool his body and make him look less dead — perished in CIA custody at Abu Ghraib. But now there are rumbles in Washington that the notorious case, as well as other alleged CIA abuses, could be returning to haunt the agency. TIME has learned that a prosecutor tasked with probing the CIA — John Durham, a respected, Republican-appointed U.S. Attorney from Connecticut — has begun calling witnesses before a secret federal grand jury in Alexandria, Va., looking into, among other things, the lurid Nov. 4, 2003, homicide, which was documented by TIME in 2005.

TIME has obtained a copy of a subpoena signed by Durham that points to his grand jury’s broader mandate, which could involve charging additional CIA officers and contract employees in other cases. The subpoena says “the grand jury is conducting an investigation of possible violations of federal criminal laws involving War Crimes (18 USC/2441), Torture (18 USC 243OA) and related federal offenses.” [...]

I’ll never understand the sense in allowing former Pres. Bush, V.P. Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld to walk out of Washington without a serious hearing on the malfeasance surrounding their prosecution of the Iraq war. I never wanted impeachment hearings to be the primary goal after he won reelection, but there’s something craven about the Democratic cowardice to hold our own leaders culpable by investigating their actions when in office. It’s one of Speaker Pelosi’s gravest errors in judgment.

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Bush Iraqi Boondoggle: Pentagon’s $6.6 Billion Still Missing

By on 13 June 2011

From the LA Times we find out just what a disaster the team of Bush and Rumsfeld were for the U.S. From tax cuts that exploded the debt and an unjustified preemptive war kept off the books, add in Abu Ghraib and the plummeting of American credibility throughout the Arab and Muslim world, it’s hard to name a worse run operation than Dick Cheney’s Iraqi debacle.

After the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the George W. Bush administration flooded the conquered country with so much cash to pay for reconstruction and other projects in the first year that a new unit of measurement was born.

Pentagon officials determined that one giant C-130 Hercules cargo plane could carry $2.4 billion in shrink-wrapped bricks of $100 bills. They sent an initial full planeload of cash, followed by 20 other flights to Iraq by May 2004 in a $12-billion haul that U.S. officials believe to be the biggest international cash airlift of all time. [...]

There is much more at the link, including that the Iraq government believes it was the job of the U.S. to guard the cash, so they intend to try to recoup it.

On a tangential note, there’s simply no reason to be in Iraq anymore.

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The Finish the Job Quotient

By on 23 March 2011

The fact that a trio of top Senate Democrats — who were highly critical of President George W. Bush’s conduct of the war in Iraq — felt compelled to defend a Democratic president who’s launched a new war front shows just how worried some Democrats are about the Libya military action. In fact, Durbin went as far as comparing Obama’s action in Libya to President George H. W. Bush’s international coalition in the first Persian Gulf War. – Senate Democrats defend Obama on Libya

If you’re on defense you’re losing.

As for Democrats being worried, they should be. Libya will by no means be over when Pres. Obama hands the reins to NATO, and the White House begins to market this mess as an accomplishment.

Pres. Obama’s war of choice in Libya was ill conceived and ill planned. There is no foreign policy strategy to pin it to or anything about going in that reveals consistent U.S. thinking. That’s the foundational problem with the whole misadventure, which you can’t call a mission, because there wasn’t one. But there is something equally troubling awaiting us in the wake of what we’ve done.

The daddy of all finish the job lessons came through George W. Bush’s preemptive action in Iraq, led by Dick Cheney and Donald known and unknown Rumsfeld. Greta Van Susteren sat down with Mr. Rumsfeld last night (h/t Yglesias) and listening to what unfolded reminded me of the whole theory of how we ended up back in Iraq. Dick Cheney eventually regretted not finishing the job during the first Gulf War.

It brought to the forefront just how ludicrously dangerous the thinking has been on Libya. That a no-fly zone would be the end of worries for the Libyan people. That with Gadhafi humiliated around the globe, what a megalomaniac like him would do to retaliate against the nations that brought it to bear. Considering the U.S. was the lead on Operation Odyssey Dawn, it puts us in the position where blowback awaits in time.

From the transcript (video at the link):

VAN SUSTEREN: I guess the reason why I have some element of concern because he’s obviously threatened us. I mean, we’ve got our — we’ve got our flyovers. We’ve got our military action. And he says that, you know, he’s going to fight back. And I never know if it’s just sort of an empty threat of someone who’s pathetic or someone who truly does have nuclear or biological or chemical weapons that we simply don’t know about and that he could fight back.

RUMSFELD: I just don’t know the answer, but there’s no question he’s a person who’s engaged in terrorist acts. He’s sponsored them, dealt with terrorist organizations. And he is — he obviously didn’t stay in power for 40 years by being stupid. He’s intelligent and clever and opportunistic. He would not think of trying to compete against our armies or navies or air forces. He would deal — whatever he did would be asymmetric and it would be something that would be unconventional and very likely — and possibly not even something in Libya, something conceivably elsewhere in the world.

[...] [...] RUMSFELD: Oh, my goodness! He’s been a survivor. He’s been there 40 years. If there continues to be open questions as to whether the coalition’s mission is regime change, I think that there is at least a reasonable possibility that Qaddafi can last it out. And the way he would do that would be to inject fear into anybody who decided to oppose him because the mission of the coalition was not to eliminate his regime. That would be public. That would be known. Once that’s known, people would be quite reluctant to turn against what may very well end up staying in power. …

Hearing Pres. Obama say our engagement isn’t war sounds like something a naive person would proffer from fantasyland, not someone leading the most powerful free nation on the planet that’s just started a war against a Libyan mad man whose history of terrorist ties and carnage is legendary. Though it is welcome news to learn about Treasuring freezing his assets, which is some story, with these efforts deserving applause.

Once you choose to start a war for “humanitarian” reasons, but also have declared “Gadhafi must go,” but then you leave your adversary alive and in power to plot, you’ve opened the door to a whole world of unmentionable horror. Can’t assassinate him, particularly under the terms of what you’ve concocted, but you can’t afford to leave him alive either, though that’s exactly what you’ve done.

This is why the U.S. military hates when politicians who don’t understand war decide to play it like it’s a game. You can’t simply let fly a bunch of words to change the dynamic. Once the bombs start dropping all bets are off.

You’d think we’d have learned this by now.

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Chuck Todd Needs Smelling Salts

By on 17 March 2009
Photobucket

Just think if Josh Marshall had gotten his wish and Chuck Todd had gotten the nod to host “Meet the Press.” We’d be getting Todd’s non-stop drivel like what was offered this morning on “First Read”:

Is Robert Gibbs’ open disdain for Cheney acceptable to a president who promised to move beyond petty political squabbling?

With this type of analysis coming from NBC’s “political director,” you’ve got to wonder how he got the job in the first place.

But like I said last night, the traditionalists were going to hit Gibbs for attacking the office of the vice president, even if that’s not what he did. Instead, Gibbs went right for the man himself.

Unfortunately, Mr. Todd doesn’t get the distinction and also misses the analysis by a mile. It has nothing to do with “promises to move beyond petty political squabbling,” but does represent a White House that is not beyond taking it to Vice President Cheney personally when he’s so blunt as to say the new President is compromising American safety. At the nut of Cheney’s remark is a treasonous charge, because the commander in chief is obligated by sworn oath to protect this country and the citizenry above all other duties.

Whether it was effective for Gibbs to equate Cheney with Limbaugh and the “Republican cabal” is another point entirely. I would have preferred something to the effect, After we’re done cleaning up after the previous Administration, maybe I’ll have time to comment. Elevate the Obama adminstration’s role and challenges, but also their position, especially as compared to Dick Cheney who’s not only out of office but went out of favor a long time ago. Don’t get down into the Limbaugh mud with Mr. Cheney, even if it’s an easy, quick shot.

But Gibbs’ response does prove that the Rush vein of criticism isn’t going away any time soon.

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Gibbs: ‘I guess Rush Limbaugh was busy…’

By on 16 March 2009

It’s the quote of the day, because it gives you an idea of just how unwound the wingnuts are today, as seen through their spokesmen.

Gibbs continues: “…so they trotted out the next most popular member of the Republican cabal.”

Whatever Mr. Cheney thought he’d accomplish in the John King interview backfired in a big way. Because Cheney is the other bookend to Rush, both of these men gifts that keep on giving to Democrats and President Obama.

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A.Q. Khan: ‘I don’t care about the rest of the world’

By on 07 February 2009

Khan only cares “about his country.” Well, that’s obvious.

A.Q. Khan was released from house arrest on Friday.

A Pakistani court today freed nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan from unofficial house arrest, capping a rehabilitation that began almost from the moment he confessed in 2004 to providing sensitive nuclear technology to rogue regimes around the world. [...]

Clinton voiced “concern,” with the promise that more will be said on the issue at some point. But someone at State who wants to remain anonymous told AFP that there is also belief some of Khan’s network may still be active.

Yet another steaming remnant of the Bush-Cheney Musharaff policy in Pakistan.

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Dick Cheney Steamrolls Politico

By on 04 February 2009

Reading this article today on Politico, I was suddenly thrown back in time when the late Tim Russert interviewed Dick Cheney right after 9/11. It basically turned into an open forum for the vice president to say any unsubstantiated thing he wanted because everyone who wasn’t stunned into submission at this early point was rendered mute by the attack. But today, John F. Harris and Jim Vandehei, who started the site after leaving the Washington Post, along with Mike Allen, who spread enough manure during HRC’s State Department nomination to fertilize a field, all basically play stenographer for Cheney. Oh, and guess the message. I know, too easy, America is going to get attacked because Barack Obama policies, but particularly because he intends to close Gitmo.

“When we get people who are more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States against people who are absolutely committed to do anything they can to kill Americans, then I worry,” Cheney said.

Protecting the country’s security is “a tough, mean, dirty, nasty business,” he said. “These are evil people. And we’re not going to win this fight by turning the other cheek.”

Citing intelligence reports, Cheney said at least 61 of the inmates who were released from Guantanamo during the Bush administration — “that’s about 11 or 12 percent” — have “gone back into the business of being terrorists.” [...]

According to John, Jim and Mike, Mr. Cheney was in “a self-vindicating mood.” Well, I’m shocked. Stating the obvious after the longest legacy rehabilitation tour we’ve seen in recent memory is hardly worthy of writing, but on and on they go. We won’t even get into the fact that Cheney’s “61 of the inmates” parable is false. But it gets worse, as the Politico boys allow Dick Cheney to do what he did on the run up to the Iraq war. Spin nonsense that forgets one salient element, the truth.

“If it hadn’t been for what we did — with respect to the terrorist surveillance program, or enhanced interrogation techniques for high-value detainees, the Patriot Act, and so forth — then we would have been attacked again,” he said. “Those policies we put in place, in my opinion, were absolutely crucial to getting us through the last seven-plus years without a major-casualty attack on the U.S.”

Dick Cheney, like every other Republican, forgets to mention that it was on George W. Bush’s watch that we got hit, even after warnings, signs and a PDB screaming “Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside U.S.”

The deal with Politico must have been with a tape recorder, with the “reporters” present in order to push record.

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Stephen Hayes Fiction Strikes Again

By on 16 August 2007


Ho-boy. This guy just never gives up. Prep for this post begins with the
interview between Jon Stewart and Stephen Hayes. Yeah, yeah, Stephen wrote
a book. Woo-hoo! It’s about Dick. Okay. His promotional tour for it is the stuff
of author’s dreams. “Meet the Press” is rarely offered to progressive authors.
The Hayes propaganda tour continues beyond Fox “News” in The Wall Street Journal. You’ve
got to love his tenacity for ignoring the truth. It’s positively muscular.


Dick Cheney sat transfixed by the images on the small television screen in
the corner of his West Wing office. Smoke poured out of a gaping hole in the
World Trade Center’s North Tower. John McConnell, the vice president’s chief
speechwriter, sat next to him and said nothing.

Then, a second plane appeared on the right-hand side of the screen, banked
slightly to the left, and plunged into the South Tower. “Did you see
that?” Mr. Cheney asked his aide.

A little more than an hour later, Mr. Cheney was seated below the presidential
seal at a long conference table in the Presidential Emergency Operations Center,
better known as the bunker. When an aide told Mr. Cheney that another passenger
airplane was rapidly approaching the White House, the vice president gave
the order to shoot it down. The young man was so surprised at Mr. Cheney’s
immediate response that he asked again. Mr. Cheney reiterated the order. Thinking
that Mr. Cheney must have misunderstood the question, the military aide asked
him a third time.

The vice president responded evenly. “I said yes.” … ..

The
Cheney Imperative
By STEPHEN F. HAYES

Of course, listeners of my radio show (audio – about twenty minutes in) know exactly where I’m going with this
one.

Ah yes, Mr. Hayes paints Cheney as the decisive one on 9/11, commanding that
a plane be shot out of the air. Feel the drama. Sense the… unmitigated
load of crap.

The Norad tapes prove a completely different reality than the yarn Hayes is telling. But wingnuts have been floating this revisionist 9/11 history for a very long time. However, facts are stubborn things, especially when there’s Norad tape to back them up.


In his bunker under the White House, Vice President Cheney was not notified
about United 93 until 10:02—only one minute before the airliner impacted
the ground. Yet it was with dark bravado that the vice president and others
in the Bush administration would later recount sober deliberations about the
prospect of shooting down United 93. “Very, very tough decision, and
the president understood the magnitude of that decision,” Bush’s then
chief of staff, Andrew Card, told ABC News.

Cheney echoed, “The significance of saying to a pilot that you are authorized
to shoot down a plane full of Americans is, a, you know, it’s an order that
had never been given before.” And it wasn’t on 9/11, either.

President Bush would finally grant commanders the authority to give that
order at 10:18, which—though no one knew it at the time—was 15
minutes after the attack was over. … ..

9/11
Live: The NORAD Tapes

Does The Wall Street Journal care about Hayes’s fictional account
of Dick Cheney on 9/11? Absolutely not. They’re part of the wingnut radio theory
of Republican truth, terror and propaganda: grab the reader or listener by their
emotions and never let go. Craft the image and build the facade big enough and
the public will not only never doubt you, but follow you anywhere. It’s been
effective, because the myth is always more satisfying than the truth, especially during the Bush-Cheney era.

This isn’t the first outing for Stephen
Hayes’s fiction. With outlets like the WSJ and “Meet the Press,” and let’s not forget Fox “News,”
pimping his fiction, it likely won’t be the last.

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SUNDAY READING EDITION: Condi vs. Deadeye

By on 19 March 2006

For me, Sundays have always been a day of contemplation, rumination,
my usual daily meditations, of course, but most of all for reading. Lately,
the reading has not made it on to these pages, but today I'd like to rectify
that, for Sunday is an opportunity to sit back and do something very important:
THINK.

Condi vs. Deadeye … Hillary vs. McCain
We can't call the whole thing off.

Today I'd like to share what I believe is a very important piece
by Steve Clemons. But first and briefly, Steve is also mentioned today in the
Philadelphia
Inquirer editorial, “The Iraq War: Three Years
Later An incomplete mission, a war-weary nation.” Weary, indeed,
incomplete is it in the nutshell. Instead of reading the rebranding of Rummy,
read the truth from Philly.

… … Still, these last three years
have created new critics of the United States and emboldened old foes. These
last three years have eroded America's prestige.

Before Iraq, said Steven C. Clemons,
a useful mystique surrounded the strength of the United States. Clemons heads
foreign policy studies at the New America Foundation.

Rogue nations such as Iran didn't know
the boundaries of our power. This blundering war of choice in Iraq has revealed
them.

(snip)

In his second term, Bush and Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice have shown a new realization about the importance
of diplomacy. But they are working with far less leverage than before. …
…

Talking about something many find very controversial, the limits
of American power is one way to put it. I prefer the language that makes the
point that there is a limit to our influence through militarism alone. Ever
the hawk, I, this distinction is of critical importance, especially when dealing
with the likes of the non-intellectual anti-diplomacy influence of Deadeye.

Enter Steve Clemons' latest piece, which is posted on the Washington
Note, but also made it on to the pages of Japan's largest English language
daily paper, the Daily
Yomiuri.

A side step… Steve's blog doesn't provide for copying and pasting,
so I got the parts shown below from the Japan site, which I hope Steve will
forgive. I know esteemed writers like Josh Marshall and Steve Clemons don't
like their posts being cut apart, but for discussion purposes it's just tremendously
effective to make my point, rather than me paraphrasing a very complex argument.
I ask you to please take a moment to read
Steve's entire piece, because it can only be appreciated by reading it in
its entirety.

Another point, as all regular readers know, I have a particular disdain for Dr.
Rice, due to what I believe is her abject incompetence. But we'll leave that
out of this debate today. I just didn't want anyone thinking I was ready to
give her a pass because of Steve's a-political persuasions on foreign policy.
He's a bigger person than I.

So, we pick up it up where Condoleezza Rice has decided that America
being absent of diplomatic conversations is getting us in trouble. Well, duh. Oops, I promised, but it's just so hard. … … Ms. Rice
wants to change this reality. We all know what she ran into, none other than
the brick wall of Bush's ball carrier, Vice President Dick Cheney.

… …But where is George W. Bush?

Those who note the third anniversary of the United
States' Iraq war–that began with a stealth bombing effort to decapitate Iraq's
government on March 19, 2003 (U.S. time)–believe that the president fully
subscribed to the neoconservative posture of hard-edged democratization and
abandoned any pretense of realist cost-benefit analysis.

But given the clear quagmire the United States has
fallen into in Iraq–and the puncturing of the mystique of U.S. power in the
world in which enemies are now moving their agendas and allies are counting
on the United States less–Bush's foreign policy soul may be out for bid again.

(snip)

Rice wanted to instill in Bush–using policy intellectuals
like Kaplan–the importance of redesigning U.S. engagement in world affairs
during a time of perceived U.S. ascendancy. Rice knew that an inertia rooted
in Cold War realities rather than contemporary strategy still drove most military
and foreign policy decisions, and she was trying to shake this up. Rice was
also trying–though she failed at that time–to modernize the “realist
church” of foreign policy and make Bush the first major patron of a “neorealist”
movement that used realism as a vehicle for limited democratic transformation
abroad.

(snip)

The bottom line conveyed to Bush was that while the
president had to “talk the talk of democracy,” he had to deal in
the real world with thugs and dictators. Democratizing undemocratic parts
of the world was a time-consuming and long-term process worthy of pursuit–but
more important was that the fundamental U.S. security interests were managed
and shored up as “transformative” efforts were pursued.

(snip)

But Sept. 11 broke the back of Rice's efforts, which
were stymied as well in part because she did little to inculcate these neorealist
views across the broad swath of foreign policy practitioners embedded across
the executive branch.

(read Steve
Clemons' entire article)

Who is Robert Kaplan?
He had enough juice to get a sit down with the boss, according to Clemons. In
Kaplan's next article for Atlantic Monthly, while talking about Iraqi realities, Kaplan heaps praise on the Stryker
brigades, which got the push under a Democratic
president by the name of Bill Clinton. Everyone scoffed at the time, because
of all the effort, time and retooling these monsters took. Well, it's all paid
off.

…The credit for this radically changed emphasis belongs
to successive Army chiefs of staff, particularly Eric Shinseki and Peter Schoomaker.

New hardware, such as the Stryker combat vehicle, also
plays a big role, facilitating a change in the relationships between captains
in the field and majors and lieutenant colonels back at battalion headquarters.
The Stryker—with its added safety features that drastically reduce casualties
from IEDs and suicide bombs, its ability to travel great distances without
refueling, and a computer system that gives captains and noncommissioned officers
situational awareness and the latest intelligence for many miles around—has
helped liberate field units from dependence on headquarters. … …

The
Coming Normalcy?, by Robert Kaplan

Clemons brings together an array of characters fighting for Bush's ear in the
midst of a power lock down orchestrated by Deadeye.

The drama depicted pits a woman against an entrenched, well known man who
has an in with all the boys who play ball on the same team. It's a gender based
struggle in an area of strategic importance that has a woman's ability to engage versus a man's instinct to use any rhetoric to make his point,
which is to hit first and talk after the dust settles, if it ever does.

It's important to note here that when Colin Powell tried to insert his diplomatic prowess, not only was he beaten back by Deadeye, but he bought into the Bush team plan. His lesson, however, seems more to do with how soldiers turn political operatives handle a confrontation with the commander in chief than the importance of pushing your policy beliefs in the face of great odds. Condi doesn't seem to be caught in Colin's trap, though she too has lost the scrimmages so far. That is until Deadeye fired the shot heard round the world, which has done more damage than anyone in the press wants to talk about. Shooting Harry Whittington has no doubt diminished Deadeye with W. Amazing that it took the vice president shooting someone in the face to wake up our ever out of touch prez. But that's the nature of “leadership” in the Republican ranks these days.

The importance of the issues raised lead, I believe, to a fascinating foray into what is
going to happen as women make their way up the political power structure to
seats of influence where bombs and brains, not to mention, boobs and balls, collide. We could be talking about
Condi vs. Deadeye, Rep. Heather Wilson vs. Rummy, or Hillary vs. McCain. This
truly is the opening salvo in the coming of women who will have power, and those women who will be considered strong enough to hold the reigns of ruling normally only held by men. We must
watch it and cull out the lessons. The fate of the future, our nation and the
world lies in our ability to decipher its meaning, as well as shift our sensibilities and prejudices so that women can be considered for a seat where war and peace are not only considered, but actually decided.

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