Quotes for the Week (Lest We Forget)

Dick Cheney
Dick Cheney is trying to polish his image as he gets oh-so-gently interviewed on television about his new book. Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell's former chief of staff, has this to say about Dick Cheney:

• "He wanted desperately to be president of the United States... he knew the Texas governor was not steeped in anything but baseball, so he knew he was going to be president and I think he got his dream. He was president for all practical purposes for the first term of the Bush administration."
  
  
• "He's developed an angst and almost a protective cover, and now he fears being tried as a war criminal so he uses such terminology as 'exploding heads all over Washington' because that's the way someone who's decided he's not going to be prosecuted acts: boldly, let's get out in front of everybody, let's act like we are not concerned and so forth when in fact they are covering up their own fear that somebody will Pinochet him." Both quotes quoted by Elspeth Reeve for The Atlantic Wire, Powell Aide: Cheney was President 'For All Practical Purposes'," posted 30 Aug. 2011.

Dahlia Lithwick reminds us that "until there are legal consequences for those who order or engage in torture, we will only be pretending. Cheney is the beneficiary of that artifice." And that's the tragedy:

Most of us do not want warrantless surveillance, secret prisons, or war against every dictator who looks at us funny. We may be bloodthirsty, but we aren't morons. On his most combative and truly lawless positions, Cheney still stands largely alone.

The tragedy is that it doesn't matter if we are all Cheneyites now. That there is even one Cheney is enough. He understands and benefits from the fact that the law is still all on his side; that there is only heated rhetoric on ours. As John Adams famously put it, the United States was intended to be a government of laws, not of men. Dick Cheney is living proof that if we are not brave enough to enforce our laws, we will forever be at the mercy of a handful of men.

And Conor Friedersdorf reminds us why Americans loathe Cheney (except those, perhaps, who frequented the cocktail circuit with him in Washington, D.C.; amazing how close proximity to power blunts the moral nerve endings--my observation, not Friedersdorf's). Friedersdorf's blog post titled "Remembering Why Americans Loathe Dick Cheney" is based on the investigative reporting and writing of several people, including Wil S. Hylton, Barton Gellman, Jane Mayer, Charlie Savage, and Jack Balkin. Friedersdorf ends his numerical march down memory lane with this gem:

Dick Cheney was a self-aggrandizing criminal who used his knowledge as a Washington insider to subvert both informed public debate about matters of war and peace and to manipulate presidential decisionmaking, sometimes in ways that angered even George W. Bush.

After his early years of public service, he capitalized on connections he made while being paid by taxpayers to earn tens of millions of dollars presiding over Halliburton. While there, he did business with corrupt Arab autocrats, including some in countries that were enemies of the United States. Upon returning to government, he advanced a theory of the executive that is at odds with the intentions of the founders, successfully encouraged the federal government to illegally spy on innocent Americans, passed on to the public false information about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and became directly complicit in a regime of torture for which he should be in jail. Thus his unpopularity circa 2008, when he left office.

Good riddance.

[my emphasis]

"Contrived Indignation"

Watching back-to-back segments from Dick Cheney's speech and President Obama's speech on The Newshour with Jim Lehrer, I was struck by the different tones of the speeches. Cheney speaks with his characteristic sneer, like a grumpy and angry uncle, condescending to anyone who disagrees with him. Obama speaks as if we're all grown-ups; maybe we don't all agree, but we can treat one another with respect. Cheney seems to be addressing his words to the already-persuaded or those who don't keep up with the news and thus won't recognize statements that have been thoroughly discounted. Obama is still trying to speak to those who might not agree with him and to those who need to be more educated on whatever subject he is addressing. Cheney has to label all those who disagree with him as "other," as "enemies." Obama does not. I don't agree with all of Obama's decisions, but I'm willing to listen even to those views of his with which I disagree.

I was particularly annoyed with Cheney's claim that those who are against "enhanced interrogation" or "harsh questioning" (i. e., torture--"harsh questioning" is as sleazy a euphemism as I can think of) are guilty of "contrived indignation and faulty moralizing." Here is an example of that over-weaning condescension in the man. My indignation, I assure bilious Uncle Dick, is not "contrived"--it is strong and true indignation, based on deeply-held morals. Nor am I, and others like me, "blam[ing] America for the evil others do." I am thoroughly capable of recognizing the evil that others do. I want evil-doers held accountable. But I am blaming the American government for the evil it has done in my name: torturing prisoners of war. I want those held accountable who smeared my good name as an American citizen and who trampled on the values of my country. If you're gonna call fighting terror a "war," well, then, the prisoners you capture from that war are "prisoners of war." The United States has traditionally and lawfully denounced the use of torture against prisoners of war. Hence, the use of torture is un-American. Oh, and immoral.

I have loved and cherished the values this country stands for; any person who challenges those values challenges me, as an American citizen. Someone, please send Uncle Dick back to his bunker. Maybe there's room for some of those terrorists from Guantanamo Bay in there, too. Dick Cheney needs to look his real enemy--not the American people who disagree with him--in the eye and argue his values then.

Conspiracy? Could Be. . .

Updates below

When I first heard of the fatal plane crash of Mike Connell, I briefly thought, "Well, that's suspiciously convenient for Karl Rove and the Bush administration," but I shook off the thought. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, and I'm leery of those who are. Yet as I read more and more about the story, I began to get suspicious again. If Dick Cheney can take to the airwaves and openly and confidently announce to the world that he helped instigate torture and that he thinks waterboarding is efficacious and necessary in warfare (when our own government has prosecuted people in the past who waterboarded prisoners), then who knows what these people are capable of doing.

Mike Connell was "a Republican media consultant who was instrumental in the presidential and gubernatorial campaigns of three members of the Bush Family" (CBS News, "Republican IT Guru Dies in Plane Crash," Dec. 23, 2008). He was also the chief IT consultant for Karl Rove. He had a

central role in building the IT infrastructure of the White House and his association with Karl Rove has brought him into the controversy surrounding missing White House e-mails relating to the firing of U.S. Attorneys and other topics, and the fate of e-mail communications sent by Rove and other administration staffers which were sent via a Republican Party Web site, gwb43.com, rather than through a whitehouse.gov address.

Connell had recently been "subpoenaed earlier this year to testify in an Ohio federal court regarding alleged voter fraud in the 2004 election. Despite exit polls showing a lead by Democratic nominee John Kerry of more than 4 percent, Mr. Bush won the state's vote by 2.5 percent, along with its crucial electoral votes" ("Republican IT Guru Dies in Plane Crash").

Evidently, Connell was worried about his safety. One news source reports that

Connell had recently said he was afraid George Bush and Dick Cheney would "throw [him] under the bus." Cliff Arnebeck had also previously alerted Attorney General Michael Mukasey to alleged threats from Karl Rove to Connell if he refused to "take the fall." (Amy Goodman, "Rove's IT Guru Warned of Sabotage before Fatal Plane Crash; Was Set to Testify," posted December 22, 2008).

CBS News reports that "twice in the past two months Connell, who was an experienced pilot, canceled flights because of suspicious problems with his plane" and that Connell "was warned at least twice about flying his plane because his plane might be sabotaged."

While investigators are looking into the causes of the crash, I suspect this story will soon be on the back-burner for lack of media interest. But how convenient for Karl Rove and the Bush administration. The one man who could have spilled all the secrets of those missing e-mails and the internet strategies for the 2000 and 2004 Bush-Cheney campaigns has died in a fire-bomb plane crash, leaving behind a widow and four children.

But some are asking, "Where's the body?"

Updates: Steve Benen weighs in on this subject with some cautionary notes (cautionary about labeling this event as a conspiracy) and more information. He also provides a link to further discussion: "Michael Connell's Death Draws Scrutiny," posted December 26, 2008, on his Political Animal blog at Washington Monthly.