William Rivers Pitt on TruthOut has a theory about why Dick Cheney is all over the TV spouting his version of "keeping us safe" and criticizing Obama for making us less safe.
In short, Pitt says Cheney is scared of even worse revelations coming out that will result in universal damnation of him, even possibly prison time.
Talking about waterboarding is safe; it's the things that were done that haven't come out yet, especially in the "black hole" prisons, the foreign prisons we sent some detainees to, and the contract thugs that took over the interrogations from the FBI and CIA.
Cheney wants us to keep talking about waterboarding and hopes we won't begin to look behind that screen and start hearing about the murders, the rapes, and prisoners so injured by interrogations and left to die in their cells.
That would bring such universal damnation that Obama would be forced to allow full investigation -- and Dick Cheney might very well wind up in prison.
The full story is here. TruthOut is definitely a liberal blog, but it is by no means a wild, conspiracy obsessed rant.
http://www.truthout.org/051509J?n
Ralph
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No, it's not a rant. I almost wish it were. What we already know of them is more than enough, but as Pitt makes clear, we don't know the half of it. It means that Cheney is trying to head off something and, in the scope of time, he can't possibly succeed. The facts will sit there and wait to be unearthed, and there are too many of them to just fall between the cracks.
ReplyDeleteHe has been the master of intimidation. He even has had a dash of Teflon thrown in for good measure. Maybe he'll slide by for a while, but it's beginning to feel like Einstein's notion of the Black Hole. Once you cross a certain point near a Black Hole, your fate is sealed. No matter how you maneuver, the force that keeps even light from escaping will never let you go.
The Black Hole analogy is apt. Every day now there are new YouTube videos of former detainees being interviewed on their treatment. Someone just sent me another one -- the typical story: an innocent man swept up in the bounty hunt (the US paid $5000 to the person who turned him in); they kept him for 3 yrs before even questioning him; then would up torturing him for no good reason. He has a skull fracture and was anally raped with a boomstick. Then he was eventually released without charges.
ReplyDeleteThis stuff is going to accumulate and horrify the majority of people, and we'll demand investigations. Obama will not be able to stop it. It may derail health care reform, but I think we can wait another year for that.
In a Newsweek interview, Obama was asked about Dick Cheney's TV blitz.
ReplyDeleteHe says that Cheney's attempt to vindicate his positions is interesting, because those positions (torture, unilateral foreign policy, military response before diplomacy) were rejected while the Bush administration was still in the White House.
Cheney's views may have won out over Colin Power and Condi Rice as NSA in the first term, but in the last 2 yrs, he lost out.
Now I don't agree that vindication is Cheney's sole reason for his current attempt to control the news; but it is a meme that we haven't been hearing.
Here's how desperate they are. Cheney's daughter Liz has taken up the cause and now she is everywhere on TV defending her father.
ReplyDeleteLiz is the one who had some Asst. Secretary job in the State Department, I think. Was she a spy for daddy in Colin and Clondi's shop?
Meanwhile, daughter Mary, who was his campaign manager and confidante, hasn't been heard from.