Cheney never quits

August 29, 2006

Dick Cheney addressed the Veterans of Foreign Wars National Convention in Nevada yesterday — no, the lengths Cheney went to in order to avoid military service didn’t come up — and explained his administration’s amazing success in defeating enemies around the globe. At least as he sees it.

Because we’re likely to hear most of his rhetoric repeatedly between now and November, it’s probably worth taking a moment to give it a closer look.

“I know some have suggested that by liberating Iraq from Saddam Hussein, we simply stirred up a hornet’s nest. They overlook a fundamental fact: We were not in [tag]Iraq[/tag] on September 11th, 2001, and the terrorists hit us anyway.”

Cheney has been using this one quite a bit, and it’s a fascinating example of multi-layered dishonesty. First, relying on the straw-man tack the White House is so found of, Cheney insists critics of the war in Iraq believe the U.S. “simply stirred up a hornet’s nest.” Has anyone actually made this argument? No matter; Cheney can’t be bothered with details.

Second, you’ll notice, of course, that the VP is once again subtly connecting the war in Iraq and 9/11. He’s quite fond of doing so.

And third, the more I think about Cheney’s argument, the more wanton it appears. To follow the VP’s logic, the Middle East has been a [tag]hornet’s nest[/tag] for a while, long before 9/11. As he sees it, does this mean there was nothing wrong with invading Iraq under false pretenses and hitting the hornet’s nest with a stick for a while?

Cheney also added a new line to his standard stump speech.

“I realize, as well, that some in our own country claim retreat from Iraq would satisfy the appetite of the terrorists and get them to leave us alone. But the exact opposite is true.”

There are those dastardly “some” again, always up to no good.

Look, is there a single example of anyone ever saying that we should get out of Iraq so the terrorists will “leave us alone”? Surely, even Cheney realizes that most critics of the war want a real counter-terrorism campaign, instead of creating a terrorist breeding ground in Iraq, doesn’t he?

I’ve long wondered whether [tag]Cheney[/tag] is hopelessly, almost pathologically, dishonest or whether he’s simply clueless. It’s a tough call, but I’m leaning towards Door #1.

I said it yesterday, I’ll say it again. If the AntiChrist is hre, his name is Dick Cheney.

Most. Evil. Fuckhead. Ever.

  • “Most. Evil. Fuckhead. Ever.”

    Now that is an insult to the most evil fuckhead ever. Cheney needs an all new word to describe the depth of his deprivation. CB, maybe that could be your Sunday discussion group: “A new word to describe the evil that is Dick Cheney”.

  • We weren’t in, say, Bolivia on Sept. 11, 2001, either. The terrorists hit us anyway. US armed services, to Bolivia!

  • Talking about never quitting…

    Sen. John Kerry didn’t contest the results at the time, but now that he’s considering another run for the White House, he’s alleging election improprieties by the Ohio Republican who oversaw the deciding vote in 2004.

    An e-mail will be sent to 100,000 Democratic donors Tuesday asking them to support U.S. Rep. Ted Strickland for governor of Ohio. The bulk of the e-mail criticizes Strickland’s opponent, GOP Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, for his dual role in 2004 as President Bush’s honorary Ohio campaign co-chairman and the state’s top election official.

    “He used the power of his state office to try to intimidate Ohioans and suppress the Democratic vote,” said Kerry’s e-mail.

    Kerry, D-Mass., conceded the election when he lost Ohio and its 20 electoral votes. A recount requested by minor-party candidates showed Bush won by about 118,000 votes out of 5.5 million cast. But Kerry’s e-mail says Blackwell “used his office to abuse our democracy and threaten basic voting rights.”

    Multiple lawsuits by outside groups were unsuccessful in challenging Ohio’s 2004 election. One case filed by the League of Women Voters is still in U.S. District Court in Toledo. It claims Ohio’s election system discriminates against minority voters.

    Blackwell, who is black, says the election was run fairly, citing 1 million more votes cast than in 2000 and record turnout among black voters.

    “People will say anything for money,” said Blackwell campaign spokesman Carlo LoParo. “Fortunately, the historical record contradicts Senator Kerry.”

    Strickland spokesman Keith Dailey said the campaign welcomes Kerry’s support.

  • Shouldn’t the link that reads “He’s quite of doing so” read “He’s fond quite of doing so.”

  • LET’S TRY AGAIN.

    Shouldn’t the link that reads “He’s quite of doing so” read “He’s quite fond of doing so.”

  • “We were not in Iraq on September 11th, 2001, and the terrorists hit us anyway.” – Dick Cheney

    Well, we weren’t in Iran in 9/11/2001. When are we going there, Dick-head?

    And you know where we were? Saudi Arabia. Do you know where the terrorists who DID hit us on 9/11/01 say they didn’t like us being? Saudi Arabia.

    Dick-head, do you actually know who our enemies are? Or are you just going out to find new ones.

  • JRS Jr, when votes are suppressed by methods like tossing out registration forms and ensuring many-hour waits in certain precincts because of scarcity of voting machines, the votes are not cast, so they’re not going to show up in a recount. Also, manipulation of elections is a crime against democracy whether it affects the final outcome or not. Your argument that stealing votes is okay as long as you would have won anyway is ludicrous.

    I’m not convinced that Kerry would have won Ohio without Republican interference in the election, but it’s pretty clear that Republican interference occurred.

  • “I realize, as well, that some in our own country claim retreat from Iraq would satisfy the appetite of the terrorists and get them to leave us alone. But the exact opposite is true.”

    The newest airline bombing “plot” suggests that the terrorists were and are going to strike the U.S. (and Britain, again) despite our presence in Iraq. A question for Cheney: Short of perpetual war, what is going to make the terrorists “leave us alone”? Everything this administration has tried so far seems to be a complete failure.

  • Shouldn’t the link that reads “He’s quite of doing so” read “He’s quite fond of doing so.”

    Yep. It’s fixed.

  • Door #1, definitely. He’s very calculatingly dishonest. He and Bush both are very careful to not say things that are out-and-out lies, but yet the effect (and intent) of their words is to deceive. He’s most certainly clueless about some things (like, you know, foreign policy), but he is most definitely dishonest.

  • I think Cheney’s evil and AND stupid, a dangerous combination.

    He’s more evil than stupid, but if he wanted to get away with his Iraq adventure, why couldn’t he have one of his spooky friends drop off some WMD to be found by David Kay or whoever? The only excuse I can think of is incompetence, or maybe he’s waiting for the right moment.

    And trusting Chalabi? Only a stupid person would do that.

  • ***They overlook a fundamental fact: We were not in Iraq on September 11th, 2001, and the terrorists hit us anyway.***

    If I apply the same logic, I could say that “George Bush wasn’t in his office on September 11th, 2001, and the terrorists hit us anyway.” Now, I expect the combined might of the US Armed Forces to bring Herr Bush to justice. Let’s call it “Shock-N-Awe: The Sequel.”

    Oh, and Liam…would something like “DickZilla” work for you?

  • If we leave Iraq, the terrorists won’t leave us alone. If we stay in Iraq, the terrorists won’t leave us alone. Conclusion — the terrorists won’t leave us alone. But stimulating the attack pheromones definitely did not help the situation. Bees and hornets are much less of a potential threat when they are busy gathering nectar and pollen. Instead of a war in Iraq, we needed to create about 100 million new jobs in the Middle East. Lets see, 500 billion divided by 100 million equals about $5000 per job, if my math is right. No, that is just too damned capitalistic. Gotta be militaristic.

    The question is — are we safer now that we invaded Iraq than we were before we invaded Iraq?

    Can’t Cheney find another mushroom cloud someplace? Maybe growing under his pile of Bullshit.

    Listen, I don’t mind hearing about real threats to our security, but for President Cheney to continue piling on the shit to cover and justify their lies and screwups just doesn’t work and makes us less safe.

  • Yes, Door #1. Chaney is calculating, and his arrogance sometimes prevents him from making the right calculations, so he appears clueless. But he is definately aware of what he is doing and what other people are doing, and he takes into account the consequences of his actions. In some sense, Chaney’s actions are scruitable.
    Bush too is calculating and arrogant, but he also is willfully ignorant — he commands others to keep him in that bubble, allowing others to manipulate him. He seems less scruitable. I don’t know if that makes him more or less evil than Chaney, but I’ve come to the conclusion that he is just as dangerous, if not more so, than Chaney.

  • OK, I think I can see the “logic” behind Cheney’s gobbledegoop. And he’s not stupid.

    When he says “I know some have suggested that by liberating Iraq from Saddam Hussein, we simply stirred up a hornet’s nest. They overlook a fundamental fact: We were not in Iraq on September 11th, 2001, and the terrorists hit us anyway.”

    The king of deferments is calling us cowards. Why am I not surprised?

    He’s saying we only want out of Iraq because we’re so afraid of being hit by the terrorists. He “answers” that strawman by saying the terrorists would hit us even if we never went into Iraq, so (he’s saying) it’s silly to argue that Iraq is causing more terrorism. As usual, he’s wrong… terrorism has gone way up since we invaded Iraq, and Iraq is now a huge training ground for terrorists who will probably not stay there forever.

    But maybe that’s the plan. What better way to kick off a perpetual war than to do exactly what they’ve done? Now we have billions of people who hate our guts, and a huge training ground for them to learn how to make war on us. I always wondered why they didn’t secure Saddam’s conventional weapons. It even explains why they sent such a small force, those kids were destined to kill more civilians because they weren’t able to control the ground.

    For Cheney and the military industrial complex, those enemy fighters will be the gift that keeps on giving. He thinks the war will allow him to run roughshod over the US treasury and the Constitution, and sadly enough, he’s right. America lets him because they are afraid.

    What we need is the ghost of FDR to sit America down for a fireside chat.

  • And of course he had to go speak to the Professional Morons, er I mean the Professional Drunkards, er, the Professional Veterans (like most veterans, I never joined any of these groups, most of whose members are guys who never got closer to a bullet than loading them in crates at the warehouse). And later this week he goes and speaks to the organization that in its first 20 years was the closest thing we had to Mussolini’s Blackshirts (volunteering as strikebreakers and goon squads to break up union meetings, political meetings, etc.) and during the 50s-60s was further to the right than the John Birch Society – I speak of Das Amerikanisch Legion – if all those lushes ever dried out, AA would double its membership.

  • To those who say that we have simply stirred up a hornets nest, I have this to say:

    We hadn’t stirred up those hornets on 9/11, and that dog bit us anyway!

    Plainly, if we don’t go after the hornets, we may get bitten again!

  • “I realize, as well, that some in our own country claim …. But the exact opposite is true.”

    This is the type of “argument” Bush makes frequently also. Say some people “claim” something that they don’t and then argue against it. It’s called defining your opponents argument if I remember my college reasoning course from many years ago.

    It is a rhetorical trick and should be easily recognized. Unfortunately, I don’t think most people get what he is doing. I think it probably works much more than it should.

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