Cheney’s seamless interweaving of fact and fiction

March 30, 2006

[tag]Dick Cheney[/tag] sat down with [tag]Fox News[/tag]’ Tony Snow yesterday, as part of the conservative pushback against the Dems’ new national security strategy. I realize there’s no real point anymore to fact-checking the Vice President’s remarks — he’s dishonest, we get it — but I was nevertheless struck by how well Cheney can interweave fact and fiction.

Snow, in a question that was embarrassing even by Fox News standards, asked Cheney whether the United States “underestimated Saddam’s involvement in the international terror network.” Cheney responded:

“Well, some of us didn’t. I think there are — there’s been a debate, obviously, and we’ve got a lot of folks who don’t believe that there was any kind of a relationship there between [tag]al Qaeda and Saddam[/tag] Hussein. I think the record is abundantly clear that Saddam Hussein was, in fact, a prime sponsor of terror. This is the guy who was making $25,000 payments to the families of suicide bombers. This is the guy who provided a safe haven for Abu Nidal. The track record there is very clear.

“George Tenet, Director of the CIA, went before the Senate Intel Committee at one point and said there was a relationship between Iraq and the al Qaeda that went back to the early ’90s. So I think what we’ll find as we get a chance to go through and analyze these documents — there’s some 50,000 boxes of them that are now being made available here over the next few months — that we’ll see a pretty complete picture that Saddam Hussein did, in fact, deal with some pretty nefarious characters out there. And he was legitimately labeled by our State Department as a state sponsor of terror.”

As mendacity goes, this is practically award-winning. Notice the effortless juxtaposition between Saddam-al Queda sentences, and broader sentences about Iraq and terrorism in general. Why do too many Americans still believe Iraq had something to do with 9/11? Because their elected leaders are willing to mislead them like this.

The implicit inference is that pre-war Iraq had a serious connection to al Queda. For the umpteenth time, all available evidence suggests, at the most, there may have been low-level, episodic contact between Iraq and al Qaeda. The 9/11 Commission concluded that Saddam and Al Qaeda did not have a “collaborative operational relationship.” Saddam Hussein didn’t try and establish a connection to al Qaeda; he did the opposite, warning his Iraqi supporters to be wary of the network. Cheney clearly tried to give the Fox News audience a different impression.

I genuinely believe the guy just can’t help himself.

OK, Republicans insist that Saddam was a prime sponsor of terror and that there was a substantial relationship between him and Al Qaeda, but then they say there is no evidence Saddam had anything to do with 9/11.

Why didn’t he?

If he is such a global nexus of terror, someone who had intended to use WMDs at a moment’s notice and just all around evil guy, then how come he didn’t have a hand in the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil? After all, the USA – and particularly George H.W. Bush – is a sworn enemy of Saddam. It would make sense that he be part of 9/11. Maybe a reporter should press this a little bit more.

  • “Maybe a reporter should press this a little bit more.” – DKS

    But, but, Cheney gets so mad (shudder)!

    Really the Dickster and the Republicanite party do have such an addiction to spin like this, I doubt they would recognize the truth if it came up and kicked them in the balls.

    Which is pretty much what happened on 9/11, and still Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld wanted to attack Iraq rather than Al Qaeda.

    Mentally sick, that is what they are.

  • Cheney’s picture should be in the dictionary next to the definition of pathological.

    from the OED:

    Pathological:
    4. colloq. (Of a person) exhibiting a quality or trait to a degree considered extreme or psychologically unhealthy; (of a quality) possessed or manifested to such a degree.

    B. n. U.S. A person with a mental disorder or a pathological compulsion.

  • There’s another nation that has provided payments to the families of suicide bombers. The nation also provided a safe haven for Africa’s most brutal dictator, and turned a blind eye to its citizens providing financial support and joining al Qaeda.

    Any guesses to which country this is?

  • “I genuinely believe the guy just can’t help himself.”

    Well, as long as he limits his contacts with the “media” to Fox News and similar propoganda outfits, he has no need to change as there is no fear of being called on the truth by the “reporters”, and the viewers clearly are too ignorant/stupid/lazy/afraid/clueless (take your pick) to check alternative sources for information.

  • There’s still another nation that has – without provocation – spent more money, sent more troops, and rained more bombs on innocent people … oh, what’s the point?

  • “Any guesses to which country this is?” – 2Manchu

    That, I believe, would be Saudi Arabia.

    But Bush can’t critize the Saudis. He is a member of the family 😉

  • In the two hotels that I’ve worked in, I have had guests complain about the lack of Fox News. Educated, business types. I’ve laughed a couple of times, especially at the real pissed off ones.
    I couldn’t imagine staying at a hotel and going downstairs to yell at the DESK CLERK, about the TV lineup.
    The hotel that I’m staying at this weekend better have TV Land or that desk clerk is going to catch hell.

  • Cheney is a prevaricator, an obfuscator, and a liar. And Republicans are supposed to the stewards of morality. As long as the Republican base consists of immoral or amoral capitalists and neckless, credulous rubes from around the country, snakes like Cheney will persist, thrive, and lie with impunity. Throw in mainstream media types that refuse to honor their responsibilities under the Constitution and you’ve got the times we live in.

  • If – just suppose – you accept the alternate reality provided by Cheney that interweaves Iraq, Saddam, and al Qaeda, the capture of bin Laden would be the defining event that allows the US to withdraw from Iraq.

    Or if you have your tinfoil hat on and you believe the US is deliberately allowing bin Laden to remain free (which I do not discount), then bin Laden as the symbol of al Quaeda provides the justification for continuing to occupy Iraq. Because once bin Laden is killed or captured, 9/11 is avenged and Cheney’s illogic evaporates, and there is no longer any basis for extended military operations in the name of 9/11.

  • Because once bin Laden is killed or captured, 9/11 is avenged and Cheney’s illogic evaporates, and there is no longer any basis for extended military operations in the name of 9/11.

    -dander

    Dick Cheney is a liar

    -anyone paying attention

    The key to understanding BushCo’s brand of neoconservativism is not that they lie, it’s that the ends always, always justify the means.

    SO. . .

    Ends: destroy “entitlement” programs. Means: Spend all the money and create a fiscal emergency, then lower taxes.

    Ends: funnel money to friends in military-industrial complex and oil/gas. Means: Invade Iraq.

    Ends: Keep sycophantic Repubs in power. Means: Pander to religio-social conservatives just enough to keep votes coming. Lie constantly. Break laws.

    Etc. etc. We can argue about the specific ends and means (for example, Iraq could also have been about long-term involvement with the middle east, etc.), but the point is the same and until Dems begin to see the why and how, they will never understands what to do to defeat this. They’re arguing over issues specifically created to distract from the core motivations.

    And, for my two cents, Bush actually believes this is about the freedom of the world, which is a noble goal.

    • Comments are closed.