The Thing That Wouldn't Leave

If Warner Brothers is ever interested in a remake of "The Man Who Came to Dinner," the Monty Wooley role of the irascible, housebound, curmudgeonly critic could be perfectly filled by Dick Cheney. His continuing media appearances have become an irritant like a rash that just won't heal. As badly as I'd like to forget these guys, the former Vice President, sometimes known by his regal name, "Richard the Chickenhearted," refuses to go away. Every day there's another Cheney sighting and another microphone to assist Dirty Dick in sewing his discord. And now that he's linked arms with Rush Limbaugh, his white noise concerning "enhanced interrogation techniques" will always have an outlet.

It has to be a tough gig defending torture under any circumstances, but Cheney tries to justify his special methods because, "They worked." So does armed robbery, but the criminals are usually brought to justice after they confess. Now, separate reports have surfaced saying the Office of the Vice President personally suggested "harsh techniques" to be used on certain captives in Iraq, and not because of some Keifer Sutherland, ticking dirty bomb fantasy. Col. Lawrence B. Wilkerson, Colin Powell's former chief of staff, recently wrote in the Washington Note that Cheney's suggested "enhanced" methods used in April of 2002, before the President's legal council had spoken on the matter, were entirely for the purpose of "discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and Al Qaeda." Wilkerson continues to state that the reason the country has been free of a terrorist attack since 9/11, "is due almost entirely to the nation's having deployed over 200,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan," and not as the result of Cheney's interrogation methods. So why does Cheney continue to parrot that the country is more vulnerable under Obama's non-torturing directives?

There is certainly no downside to Cheney predicting another terrorist attack on American soil. Most Middle East analysts agree with him, so if or when an attack is attempted, Cheney can say "I told you so," and be seen as a visionary. If another sneak attack should never come, he can say that he erred on the side of national security. Either way, Cheney can't lose and he believes history will absolve him of his crimes in the name of "vigilance." Of course, if you go above or around the law and, say, attack a sovereign nation without provocation, then you're merely a "vigilante." The fog of talk-show war that Cheney is churning out is for one purpose only; if he can get everyone to focus on the use of harsh questioning of perceived terrorists in defense of the country, attention is diverted from the larger issue of the initial decision to invade Iraq and the consequent sales pitch that preceded the bombing of Baghdad. Interrogating bad guys is an argument that Cheney can win, but busting him for torture is like arresting a man for speeding when he's been caught in a stolen car. Sending the armed forces into combat under false pretences is the real crime. The torture of prisoners was used to justify it.

There's a fierce storm a'comin. It's going to be more furious than Katrina, worse than the Clinton impeachment, and uglier than Watergate. In fact, you'll have to go back to the Grant administration and the trials of Jefferson Davis and the hierarchy of the Confederacy to find a parallel. But it is as inevitable as justice itself and the people will demand it. We've always known there would be a reckoning someday for all the destruction and death resulting from this misbegotten war; a war spawned by a political philosophy encapsulated in the "Statement of Principles" of the Project For the New American Century. (Click on title). Among the signers of that document, three years before Bush was appointed president by the Supreme Court, were Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Scooter Libby, and Dick Cheney. Their imperialist desires were pretty much spelled out in advance, and Cheney, by necessity, had to emerge from his undisclosed location to defend what has become the indefensible; starting a war. And to think that if Karl Rove had achieved his goal of a "permanent Republican majority," through voter fraud and gerrymandering, this gang would have gotten away clean. All this clamor over harsh interrogations being spewed by Dick Cheney is the sound of a drowning man who realizes he's going under, but is treading water just as fast as he can to delay the inevitable; sort of like someone being waterboarded.