The Washington Post on Cheney, Part 3

Here is the third part of that profile on Cheney:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/cheney/chapters/leaving_no_tracks/index.html


Finally, here is some of the muckraking that ought to have been the standard for this entire run of articles. This section focuses on Cheney's continued and viscous attempts to undercut environmental regulations for the benefit of industry, particularly the energy industry.

Like yesterday's article, there isn't a broad theme that I didn't already know existed. If you had asked me whether Cheney was Pro-Environment or Pro-business, I would have guessed the right side of the coin. But still, the details are enough to chill the blood.

Now, this is an issue that is near and dear to my heart. I'm a hugely Pro-Environment person, to give full disclosure. I believe that the degradation of the environment is the number one issue facing humanity today, and that a solution (or rather a comprehensive solution, involving countless small changes and fixes, in both regulation and personal behavior) is in the interests of EVERYONE. And if you're a farmer, or a fisherman, or a logger, who thinks your industry will suffer from increased regulation, too bad. You shouldn't have over-fished, clear-cut logged, or over-irrigated in the first place. You've been doing whatever you want for a hundred years, now it's time for Mother Nature to get some back.

To return to Cheney, I'd like to point out something about his tendency to "reach down" and talk directly to the people involved in the issues of interest. It's something for which he has been universally praised, and that's just ridiculous. Cheney called the 19th ranked person at the EPA, and left a message on her voice mail instructing her to "call the White House." That's not attention, that's intimidation.

What I mean, of course, is that what has been interpreted as Cheney "sinking his teeth" into an issue or some such bullshit, is Cheney going low enough on the totem pole to find people he can easily intimidate with his office, and people he can fire easily if they fail to respond to his intimidation.

And fire them he has. Over and over in the article, we see evidence of the Vice demanding his way, and demanding (and getting) resignations from people that disagreed with him. He abused his position by using it as a bully pulpit against people flustered and surprised at even receiving a call from the second most powerful man in the country.

To conclude, I place a ton of blame at the feet of the people who resigned instead of fought, and on the whole did so without a lot of clarity (or outright lies) about why they were resigning. One example is the head of the EPA, who said she was resigning for "Personal Reasons". Now she comes out for this article and says that it was actually because of the White House's behavior over environmental regulation.

Coming forward now, after it's too late to do anything except place blame on top of a large heap, is a cowardly, expedient thing to do. Where was her anger and her whistle-blowing when it would have made a difference? Then she just didn't want to be bothered with the heat that would have come down for her position. Now that the popular kids are saying what a bad guy Cheney is, she figures she'll jump on the pile.

It is this kind of cowardice that facilitates the kind of abuses described in this article. See lady, when you leave, they just put someone in your place who agrees with them. That's how we got in this shitty mess. All the people of principle (I'm talking to you Colin Powell) leave, and Bush/Cheney put talking heads in their place. It's pathetic.

To anyone left in the government with some principle: Ask yourselves why you got into government in the first place. Was it to protect the things you care about? This woman was the head of the EPA. Her career had nowhere else to go. Yet she saved face and, I assume, saved her "career" by resigning for "Personal Reasons" instead of stopping play and calling foul. That is a failure of the system, it is a failure of policy, and it is a failure of personal courage.

The Washington Post on Cheney, Part 2

Here is the second part of the WaPost Article on Cheney:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/cheney/chapters/a_strong_push_from_back_stage/index.html

I know I said I wasn't going to be updating as regularly, but I don't want to lose any regular readers I might have gained, and I have a few minutes, so...

I found this article deficient in the ways that the first installment was, but not nearly as bad. I think the basic problem the Post has is that they want to be perceived as objective, but if they wrote an objective piece on Cheney it would come off as a hack-job because the guy is so fucking evil.

Or maybe I'm just reading the article as a free pass because the things they are saying aren't a surprise to me. Looking at their narrative, it is actually a rather stark description of a Vice-President seeking to expand his power by deceiving anyone he has to, including the President. It's just that I already knew that was Cheney's MO. It's like a guy in prison for murder, and then somebody tries to shock me by telling me that he shot a guy. It's like, yeah, I get it, the guy's a killer. Tell me something I don't know.

Also, the article really hasn't dealt with a lot of the newer stuff about Cheney, and that's the stuff that I find the most problematic and absurd. I mean, compared with the transparently, flagrantly dishonest shit he's trying to pull now, the "I'm not part of the Executive Branch thing, all the stuff he's done as a run-up to that seems tame.

As a side note, I heard something really insightful on Hardball last night about that whole affair. I think it was David Gregory who said "Cheney is just trying to run a delay right now. He knows how much longer he has in office, and if he can stall with these ridiculous tactics for that long, he can do whatever he wants until he leave office." Great point. Cheney may indeed be the Anti-Christ.

Back to the article: One thing I did find really interesting was their blow-by-blow description of how Cheney got his way on the specifics of Bush's 2003 Tax Cuts. First, he screwed Greenspan (Chairman of the fed and most respected economist in the country) out of getting his say by placating him and then discrediting his evidence. Then, when Bush didn't want to include the capitol gains break that Cheney wanted, Cheney pitched the idea directly to members of the relevant House committee, had them put it in the bill, then went back and told the President that he had to give in to get the bill passed. Asshole.

So overall this profile has been a disappointment so far. Hopefully they'll get more into the meat tomorrow. I'll make sure to blog again at that point.

The Washington Post on Cheney, Part 1

The Post has a four part profile of the Vice Prez coming out this week, and I am going to be tracking it on this blog. I think that this is, while not the most important story in the news right now, certainly the freshest and most interesting. It has the potential to give us a glimpse into the most powerful Vice in the history of this country, at a time when he is kind of on the ropes.

The first part, though, reads like a puff piece. They spend a lot of time talking about his personality, his "kindness to subordinates, etc. Uhh...do they mean kindness to subordinates like taking career revenge on anyone who stands in his way? Or using Alberto Gonzales to deceive the President into taking his advice, as they report him having done in the article? Or do they mean that he remembers people's names? Cause remembering people's names can be interpreted as kindness, or it can be interpreted as setting them up to be used as tools. Most of the sociopaths I know are great with names.

They also talk a lot about how Cheney isn't interested in any verdict but history's, and how he honestly believes that what he is doing is good for the country. You know who else believed in what he was doing, and wasn't interested in the opinions of his contemporaries? Hitler.

Dick Cheney is whatever he says he is

Just saw this article:

http://oversight.house.gov/story.asp?ID=1371

on HuffPost regarding the way in which Dick Cheney claimed his office was not required to follow government-wide procedures for safeguarding national security information, because his office is "not a part of the executive branch."

Okay, first of all, that statement is absurd on a number of levels. First, yes it is. Second, all Dick Cheney talks about is the need for secrecy and the protection of national secrets, so this is coming totally out of left field. It's just a deeply confusing position for the guy to try and take.

Second, there is another cover-up at work here. When Representative Waxman, Chairman of a House Oversight Committee, wrote to, guess who, Alberto Gonzales over at DOJ and requested he force the Vice-President to follow procedure, guess what Cheney did? If you said complained to Gonzo and tried to get the administrative office of the National Archives (the office that oversees the procedures) shut down, paste a gold star next to whatever computer you're sitting at.

As a side note, for a more complete listing of Cheney's unprecedented efforts at secrecy, follow this link:

http://oversight.house.gov/documents/20070621095118.pdf

I've accepted the fact that Cheney is going to do whatever he wants. I'v accepted the fact that he isn't going to tell anyone what he's doing. I've even accepted the fact that the Democrats are too pussy to do anything about it. Fine. That's their fault, not Cheney's. But then an ironic thought occurred to me. It was a memory, something I had once read...let's see, I'm calling up the memory banks...

Oh yeah. Remember this article?

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,198829,00.html

They put the money shot right up front. It reads:

Invoking executive privilege, Vice President Dick Cheney refuses to disclose details of meetings he held last year with Enron officials.

Looks like Cheney had a change of heart sometime since 2002. His status as a member of the executive is about the only area in which he's shown the least bit of flexibility. Sorry Dick, can't have it both ways.

Oh, and also, I put together this post in 30 minutes with nothing more than my memory and Google. How much does anyone want to bet that none of the major news networks run anything like this? You know what show might? The Daily Show. See, cause this sort of calling leaders on their bullshit is only acceptable as a firm of comedy. Otherwise, people might actually start to demand action.

Dick Cheney and the Mona Lisa

Today there were "new revelations" in the NSA wiretapping case that showed that ***pause to register my incredible shock*** Dick Cheney may have been directly involved in the effort to circumvent legal challenges to the warrantless wiretapping program, and that he vindictively blocked the promotion of the career attorney involved in promulgating those challenges.

My question is, was there ever any doubt in anyone's mind that this was the case? Does anyone believe that Alberto Gonzales made a spirited and in all probability illegal effort to legalize a program invented by the white house, without the prodding of Cheney/Bush? Isn't it likely that he had some kind of impetus, from somewhere, and if it is, where else could that impetus have come from than the only masters he serves?

To make my point without rhetorical questions: Alberto Gonzales, whether his efforts were illegal or not, certainly went to extrordinary and extreme lengths to make this program legal. Furthermore, people do not resort to such extreme measures without the instruction of, or at very least the approval of, those above them. Finally, there is nobody above Alberto Gonzales except the President and Vice President. So, one or both of them must have told him to do it, or he wouldn't have.

I don't even have to point out the obvious fact that Cheney is one of the most evil men I have ever been made aware of to make this point, but that don't hurt either, ya dig?

This is all so silly because the fact is we can all see the picture. We can all see the chain of events that obviously happened, and the ricidulousness of the stonewalling currently under way by anyone who might be thought to be responsible. It's just that apparently, unless Cheney or Bush actually says they did this, there's nothing anyone can do. And since it's apparently a given in this country that neither them nor anyone who works for them can be called or compelled to testify about anything, they will never have to face the choice of admitting the obvious or perjuring themselves. Not that they would hesitate to perjure themselves, but it would be some satisfaction to me to know they had done it, instead of having to watch them smugly explain why they don't have to tell anybody shit.

This is a little like if I went to France and put my finger over one of the Mona Lisa's eyes, and then told everyone that the Mona Lisa had been stolen. And then someone told me the Mona Lisa was right there, and would I please stop touching it. And then I said "No, look, the Mona Lisa has two eyes, this painting only has one. And people kept pointing out that I was just, in fact, covering a tiny part of the picture, and that didn't change the fact that the painting was the Mona Lisa. And then I told everyone to stop looking at me and I spit in anyone's face who got too close. That's literally how ridiculous I find this entire situation.