Olbermann And Huffington Discuss Cheney's Backtracking

Arianna joins Keith as they talk about Cheney's latest statements concerning torture and interrogations. Cheney has been busy talking quite a lot and the commentators believe, as I do, that the ex-V.P.'s remarks are a sign of revisionist history and possibly even a way to justify his actions before a war crimes tribunal. Of course that tribunal is a ways off, but the court of world public opinion is now open.

Cheney Admits No Iraq-Al Qaeda Link, Sorta

Dick Cheney has been a busy talker these past few weeks, and to continue the trend, he had no short supply of comments yesterday. Apart from the pro-gay marriage statement, there was also a mention of the supposed link between Iraq and al-Qaeda. Back before the war the Bush Administration and Cheney specifically made heavy use of a purported connection between Hussein and the terrorists that attacked us as a rationale to go to war with Iraq. Several years later, he has finally begun to acquiesce on that point, just a little bit.

From Bloomberg:

June 1 (Bloomberg) -- Former Vice President Dick Cheney disavowed intelligence he once cited to suggest that then-Iraq dictator Saddam Hussein collaborated with al-Qaeda to stage the Sept. 11 attacks.

Cheney said today that information by the Central Intelligence Agency of collaboration between Iraq and al-Qaeda on Sept. 11 “turned out not to be true.” Still, Cheney said a longstanding relationship existed between Hussein and terrorist groups, including al-Qaeda, that justified the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.

“I thought it was strong at the time and I still feel so today,” Cheney said at a National Press Club lunch in Washington. “There was a relationship between al-Qaeda and Iraq that stretched back 10 years. That’s not something I made up.” Citing 2002 Senate testimony by George Tenet, then the CIA director, he said, “We know for a fact that Saddam Hussein was a state sponsor of terrorism."

We also know for a fact, that Dick was using false intelligence to make claims that were simply not true. We knew it then, he knew it then, but only now is he beginning to admit that there was no smoking gun, even if he still tries to push that there was a valid reason to invade and occupy Iraq.

Cheney Goes Left...On Same-Sex Marriage

When one utters the name "Dick Cheney," progressive values is not something that enters the mind. Secrecy, ignoring the rule of law, torturing people, are all connected to the former V.P. Yet on the issue of same-sex marriage he is very much in favor of allowing gays and lesbians to get married, as long as it is approved on a state-by-state basis.

Repeat As Needed: "Torture Doesn't Work"

Despite the onslaught of Cheney interviews where he says that we needed to torture use enhanced interrogation to get information out of terrorists, the facts are simply not on the ex-VP's side. All Cheney is trying to do is to cover his ass, and so is every single Bushie coming out of the woodwork now that pushes the false idea that torturing terror suspects gets good information out of them. The reality is, in words a three-year-old can understand is, "nuh-uh."

From McClatchy:

WASHINGTON — The CIA inspector general in 2004 found that there was no conclusive proof that waterboarding or other harsh interrogation techniques helped the Bush administration thwart any "specific imminent attacks," according to recently declassified Justice Department memos.

That undercuts assertions by former vice president Dick Cheney and other former Bush administration officials that the use of harsh interrogation tactics including waterboarding, which is widely considered torture, was justified because it headed off terrorist attacks.[...]

The IG's report is among several indications that the Bush administration's use of abusive interrogation methods was less productive than some former administration officials have claimed.

Even some of those in the military who developed the techniques warned that the information they produced was "less reliable" than that gained by traditional psychological measures, and that using them would produce an "intolerable public and political backlash when discovered," according to a Senate Armed Services Committee report released on Tuesday.

Even with everything that we've learned to date, there is still more classified material out there that government has not released. It has been hinted at that the documents and videos the CIA had destroyed were more horrific than anyone in the outside world has seen to date. With all of this evidence, it leads us back to two simple points, that torture does not work and that those that engage and/or order it should be held accountable for their actions. The United States knew it didn't work back in World War II and we even executed Japanese soldiers at that time who practiced techniques such as waterboarding on our very own troops. There is no reason that our standards should change as a nation that respects the rule of law, whether we are fighting Hitler, Mussolini and Hirohito or Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

A Dream Come True: The "Bush Six"

I always love hearing a good story about how seemingly crazy, wishful thinking slowly but surely becomes certifiable fact. Case in point is British lawyer Phillippe Sands who wrote a book claiming that several of the top men in the Bush Administration would be tried in court for their crimes against humanity. The subjects of the book responded harshly and most of the traditional media in the U.S. ignored it. Now however, Sands' prediction is starting to stand on more solid ground and the story caught the eye of the New Yorker this week:

Last week, Sands’s accusations suddenly did not seem so outlandish. A Spanish court took the first steps toward starting a criminal investigation of the same six former Bush Administration officials he had named, weighing charges that they had enabled and abetted torture by justifying the abuse of terrorism suspects. Among those whom the court singled out was Feith, the former Under-Secretary of Defense for Policy, along with former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales; John Yoo, a former Justice Department lawyer; and David Addington, the chief of staff and the principal legal adviser to Vice-President Dick Cheney.

In Washington the other night, over a cup of camomile tea, Sands described the behind-the-scenes role he played in spurring the Spanish court to action. He paced his hotel room, seeming by turns proud and stunned at what he had done. “This is the end of these people’s professional reputations!” he said. “This is no joke. We’re talking about the serious potential deprivation of liberty.”

A deprivation of liberty is exactly what those men need, and you can add Dick Cheney and George Bush to that list as well. Yet one has to wonder, how did this Brit get so involved in the illegalities of American politicos?

The current torture case began in the spring of 2004, when photographs of abused prisoners at Abu Ghraib surfaced. Sands said that he read the protestations of innocence from Bush Administration officials, who blamed a few “bad apples” for the incidents, with the eye of a barrister. He recalled, “I could spot right away that they were speaking as advocates of a cause. So I decided to find out what really happened.” While keeping up his busy law practice, he travelled to America to interview the key players in what he described as “a writing project I am engaged in on international law and the war on terror.” Many Bush officials, including Feith and William J. Haynes II, the former Pentagon general counsel, who was also named in the Spanish lawsuit, agreed to meet with Sands, perhaps expecting a friendly chat. “I spent two years trekking around the country, finding out that they were manifestly untruthful,” Sands said. “I’ve got a particular bugbear about lawyers,” he added. “If not for lawyers, none of these abuses would have ever occurred.”

Like Sands, I've got a serious bugbear with all of the White House goons that were involved with the condoning of torture. There were some serious crimes committed under Bush's watch and hardly anyone tried to stop the perpetrators. Without much scrutiny, the masterminds were able to blame the little people and expected to get away with their terrible deeds. Now that we have at least one court in trying them, hopefully justice will prevail as Sands predicts.

Hagel Calls Cheney's Fearmongering Against Obama Ridiculous

Rachel Maddow had Chuck Hagel on last night to talk about Cheney's interview this past weekend. Hagel soundly rejects Cheney's assertions that Obama is making us less safe and calls it "folly" and is sorry the ex-V.P. even opened his mouth.

Center For Constitutional Rights Blasts Leahy's "Whitewash" Commission

Senator Patrick Leahy got a stinging rebuke from Michael Ratner at the Center for Constitutional Rights yesterday. Ratner's fear, which is shared by many, is that the Truth Commission that the Senator wants to go through is nothing a "whitewash" and will only provide an easy way for criminals within the Bush Administration, including Bush himself. Ratner is pissed and you know what, so am I.

From RawStory:

"We’re talking about a whitewash with Leahy. Are we some Latin American country where we don’t have a democracy robust enough to try people?" Ratner said. “[Leahy’s] essentially diffusing the issue so there’s not as much pressure on prosecution. It’s not really going to go far. [The commission is] going to divert us for a few years and we’re never going to see something come out of it.”

Ratner said he and the Center for Constitutional Rights want to see criminal prosecutions of officials at the highest level of the Bush administration, the so-called “principals” who were the architects of controversial polices and signed off on them.

“Cheney has openly said that he approved the water boarding memo and that he would do it again,” Ratner said, adding, “My view is you absolutely have to have prosecutions to have deterrents [for future executive power abuses].”

Ratner is right. Our democratic (notice the small d) soundness is at stake here and Leahy is about to show that we don't have much of those principles behind what we claim to be. Now Leahy has been talking tough and that "nothing should be swept under the rug" but this Commission is exactly what that will do. If we want to get to the bottom of what happened, then what we need is a Judge and Jury.

Olbermann Tells Cheney To Leave America

Dick Cheney has done enough damage to our country, so his latest interview was highly unwelcome. Cheney's priority, as Olbermann said was to serve Cheney and not our country, so scram, you deluded war-mongering crook.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Finally, A Vice-President That Cares

For eight long years not only did we have a terrible President in George Bush, we had a sinister Vice-President that went along with him. Cheney's abysmal poll numbers only told part of the story. The man was pre-occupied with expanding secrecy in the Executive branch, torture, corporate power and war. When asked about how people felt about him, he could care less. Our new VP however, well, it's like night and day.

From USA Today Op-Ed by Vice-President Biden):

For years, we had a White House that failed to put the middle class front and center in its economic policies.

President Obama has made it clear that is going to change. And it's why he has asked me to lead a task force on the middle class.[...]

One of the things that makes this task force distinctive is it brings together — in one place — those agencies that have the most impact on the well-being of the middle class in our country. We'll be looking at everything from access to college and training with the Department of Education, to business development with the Department of Commerce, to child care reform with Health and Human Services, to labor law with the Department of Labor. With this task force, we'll have a single, high-visibility group with one goal: to raise the living standards of middle-class families.

Over the upcoming months, we will focus on answering those concerns that matter most to families. What can we do to make retirement more secure? How can we make child and elder care more affordable? How do we improve workplace safety? How are we going to get the cost of college within reach? What can we do to help weary parents juggle work and family? And, above all else, what are the jobs of the future? Here, we'll be looking at green jobs, better-paying jobs, better-quality jobs.

The only jobs Dick Cheney cared about were those of private contractors, especially those that worked for Halliburton. Everything was done in secret and strictly for the sake of a profit...at the expense of the country. Now our Vice-President is willing and wanting to listen to us, to hear our ideas and implement the best plan to move the middle class forward and expand it once again. Too many people have suffered under Bush and Cheney. The time to reverse that is now.

U.N. Investigator: We Must Prosecute Bush And Cheney

Just adding a little more pressure so that ex-President Bush and ex-V.P. Cheney be brought to justice for their (alleged) war crimes:

President Obama, You Must Do This For The Sake Of Our Democracy

There are so many problems to deal with, solutions to find....but, we cannot just leave the past as it is. The torture condoned and promoted by the Bush Administration may not be allowed to just become a part of history, there must be consequences as well.

The End Of The Last Day Of The Last Eight Years

January 19th is drawing to a close here on the East Coast and tomorrow brings a new day and quite possibly a new era for this nation. Barack Obama will become our 44th President and embark on a different course for the America that elected him...and even those that cast their vote for McCain or none of the above. It is going to be quite an adventure in the ensuing months and years, one that will not be easy, but that should be marked with progress.

That stands in complete contrast with the last eight years. Every single day was a fight to keep the country from regressing into the Gilded Age. Liberals won some of those battles, but ended up losing many more. Sure, we have the numbers in Congress now, but at one time we were destined for nothing more than obscurity.

Of course, the nation wised up to what George Bush and the Republican elite were up to. Many had been shocked and horrified by the response to Katrina, the war, the attempt on Social Security and just the President's lackadaisical smirkish behavior in general. A man that had ninety percent approval seven years ago has been reduced to a target for shoe-throwers.

By and large though, he was more of a puppet than anything. The man with at least a few of his strings continues to be disregarded, disliked and despised by even many in his own party. Cheney took executive power to the extreme and enriched himself and his brothers in the military industrial complex multiple times over with the blood of Iraqis and Americans among others. At the end of his reign as Vice-President, he has given the figurative finger to a limp-wristed Congress that refuses to try him for the many crimes he's committed. In fact, Dick is going to write a book to "settle scores" once this is all said and done just to prove that no one is willing to mess with him. What a sad, miserable excuse for a human being that he is.

Throughout this national nightmare though, there have been rays of sunshine in our long-running darkness. ThinkProgress notes 43 people or groups that have made a difference, if only in the psyche of society. From musicians to Congressmembers, Gold Star parents to Judges, many Americans have made a difference in the fight against George Bush's assault on our democracy. They should all be proud of their actions as we are grateful to them and all those that helped bring this colossal shame to an end.

Now we need our heroes and everyday folks to stand up just as tall and fight just as hard during the Obama Administration. There are forces against us that still reside in halls of Congress and office buildings of K Street. All of us need to put them in their place....and continually remind President Obama who put him in his spot in the White House.

The World Knows They're War Criminals, Now We Must Do Something About It

And Barack Obama must lead the charge in affirming the rule of law and protecting our Constitution. The ever-amazing Rachel Maddow along with Jonathan Turley get into it:

Cheney Exits, Just As Delusional As He Came In

Dick Cheney's interview with his hometown paper yesterday was a sad testament for those in power who are clearly intoxicated from it. Mr. Cheney has been in Washington and out of Wyoming for many years and has clearly added to the corrosiveness of American politics that we all unfortunately know too well. Cheney is one of the most unpopular elected officials of all time, yet he seems not to care, nor even knows why.

From RawStory:

Vice President Dick Cheney, during an interview with the Casper Star-Tribune in his home state of Wyoming, defended his decisions during his two terms and dismissed the low poll numbers that have followed his administration with the continued occupation of Iraq and the tanking economy. He told his interviewer that a politician can't change his policy every time a new poll comes out.

"My experience has been over the years that if you govern based upon poll numbers, upon trying to improve your overall poll ratings, people I’ve encountered who do that are people who won’t make tough decisions," he said. "And the job the president has and those who advise him is to make those basic fundamental decisions for the nation that nobody else is authorized or able to make."

"My own experience has been," he added, "in the administrations I've served in, for example Gerald Ford, a man who made a very, very tough decision when he decided to pardon Nixon, something that was extremely unpopular, universally condemned, but 30 years later he was praised as having done the right thing. So I think you need to have that kind of approach to it rather than watch the polls on any given day."

"I think the facts are that we were faced with a unique set of circumstances in the aftermath of 9/11," he continued, "and we had to make some very tough decisions that not everybody agreed with. But I think they were the right decisions, especially in terms of defending the homeland.

There is nothing wrong with making decisions that go against the grain, leaders do do that from time to time. Yet they still lead with the consent of the governed and Cheney has made it consistently clear he has no regard for the citizens of this country. He proved it from the start of the Administration when he had secret policy meetings with big corporations and excluded advocacy groups, he proved it when he helped send soldiers to war where he literally profited as a beneficiary of Halliburton activities and he proved it when he promoted and condoned torture.

Cheney's list of impeachable and lesser offenses goes on and on, but one thing that remains the same is the size of the deluded bubble that he rode into the Naval Observatory on.

Sunday Talk Roundup: Biden Vs Cheney

Care of the always amazing TPM. This week's theme was the battle of the incoming versus the outgoing Vice Presidents:

Cheney's High Moment Of The Last Eight Years

It was the death of nearly 3,000 Americans. Truly, utterly, sickening, to the core:

Cafferty Asks Who History Will Be Kinder To, Bush Or Cheney

According to Cafferty and his viewers, Cheney will be looked at far worse, since he is so evil:

Cheney Admits To Approving Torture, Laughs In The Face Of Congress

Not that people didn't assume, highly suspect or know deep down inside already, but Dick Cheney came out yesterday and admitted that he approved of and condoned torture tactics. With just a few short weeks left in the Bush/Cheney Administration, the sinister Vice President brazenly acknowledged that not only does he believe in waterboarding, he supported it.

From RawStory:

When asked by ABC News reporter Jonathan Karl whether he approved of interrogation tactics used against a so-called "high value prisoner" at the controversial Guantanamo Bay prison, Mr. Cheney, in a break from his history of being press-shy, admitted to giving official sanctioning of torture.

"I supported it," he said regarding the practice known as "water-boarding," a form of simulated drowning. After World War II, Japanese soldiers were tried and convicted of war crimes in US courts for water-boarding, a practice which the outgoing Bush administration attempted to enshrine in policy.

"I was aware of the program, certainly, and involved in helping get the process cleared, as the agency in effect came in and wanted to know what they could and couldn't do," Cheney said. "And they talked to me, as well as others, to explain what they wanted to do. And I supported it."

He added: "It's been a remarkably successful effort, and I think the results speak for themselves."

ABC asked him if in hindsight he thought the tactics went too far. "I don't," he said.

Cheney obviously could care less that the American people know that he is in favor of remaking America into an evil empire like that that rules his own head. Despite overwhelming evidence that conducting torture has increased the ranks of Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations he approves of torture. Despite more and more Americans losing their lives overseas and the global goodwill towards our country that vanished overnight, he approves of torture. Despite the fact that waterboarding by Americans doesn't even give us good information, he approves of torture.

Dick Cheney is a sick, deluded and evil man. So what does that say for the Congress of the United States that has given him a free pass? Shame on every single one of them that did not sign up to prosecute Cheney. Sure, there were a few that wanted to but not nearly enough. Congress ignored its duty as a check on the Executive branch and now Cheney is ready to get away scot free.

Guantanamo Bay will be closed under Obama (and hopefully all sites where torture exists) which is great but it does not dish out the necessary justice that Cheney deserves. Either Obama, or the judicial system in some form must act to show the world we do not only abhor torture, but prosecute and incarcerate those that do.

Chris Wallace Uses Cheney's Praises To Defend His Conservative Honor

This back and forth between Chris Wallace and Mike Gallagher is hilarious. Gallagher, most likely jealous that Wallace has a larger audience, taunts Wallace for not being Republican enough. Well Wallace wasn't going to take that sitting down, oh no! He can prove he's a far greater Republican hack than Gallagher will ever be.

Cheney And Gonzales Indicted For War Crimes...So What?

Yesterday Vice President Dick Cheney, former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and several other minor officials in Texas were indicted for an assortment of crimes. Cheney and Gonzales take the cake of course, since the charge of war crimes is a serious one. Few people deserve a lifetime in jail than Dick Cheney, who has a reckless disregard for the law and humanity in general. His crimes should land him in jail for several hundred years at a minimum. So am I excited about this development? Nah, not really.

From RawStory:

Cheney's stake in the Vanguard Group, which holds interests in the private prison companies that run the detention centers, was cited in the indictment. Cheney is accused of a conflict of interest and "at least misdemeanor assaults" on detainees through his ownership interest.

Gonzales is accused of using his position during his time as Attorney General to block an investigation into abuses at the detention centers, located in south Texas.

Democratic state Senator Eddie Lucio Jr. is also named in the indictment, Willacy County District Attorney Juan Angel Guerra said. Lucio's attorney, Michael R. Cowen, called Guerra a "one-man circus." "In the March 2008 Democratic Primary," he added, "70 percent of the Willacy County voters elected to remove Juan Guerra...Now, with only a few weeks left in his term, Mr. Guerra has again chosen to misuse his position in an attempt to seek revenge on those who he sees as political enemies."

What a shame that of all the District Attorneys out there, this was the one to have moved ahead on an important case like this. Sure, it is a nice protest but not one with much credibility behind it. Earlier this year a few towns in Vermont indicted him too, but did anything come of that? Of course not. A lawsuit currently filed against Gonzales in another instance of his politicization of the DoJ has resulted in him paying for a private attorney on our dime.

Cheney and Gonzales are career criminals of the worst sort, because they in essence have legalized their crimes. In the case of FISA, they even had Congress retroactively approve their de facto abolishment of the fourth amendment in the Constitution. So, the only way we are going to get justice is from a Congress that is led by the neck by our next President. Though we on the left should know better, and the likelihood of justice for the scum that has worked around the White House in the last eight years is smaller than winning the lottery...three times in a row.