SF Chronicle: Cheney's grim vision

Dick Cheney continues to do his best to manipulate the public through fear:

Los Angeles -- In a forceful preview of the Bush administration's expansionist military policies in this election year, Vice President Dick Cheney Wednesday painted a grim picture of what he said was the growing threat of a catastrophic terrorist attack in the United States and warned that the battle, like the Cold War, could last generations.
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Cheney devoted the half-hour speech to a frightening characterization of the war on terrorism and the new kind of mobilization he said it demanded. He sounded the alarm about the increasing prospects of a major new terrorist attack and the extraordinary responses that are required. While many of his remarks echoed past comments by the president and senior officials, Cheney struck a surprisingly dour note and suggested only an administration of proven ability could manage the dramatic overhaul necessary for the nation's security apparatus.

"One of the legacies of this administration will be some of the most sweeping changes in our military, and our national security strategy as it relates to the military and force structure, and how we're based, and how we used it in the last 50 or 60 years, probably since World War II," Cheney said. "I think the changes are that dramatic."

He also said the administration was planning to expand the military into even more overseas bases so the United States could wage war quickly around the globe.

"Scattered in more than 50 nations, the al Qaeda network and other terrorist groups constitute an enemy unlike any other that we have ever faced, " he said. "And as our intelligence shows, the terrorists continue plotting to kill on an ever-larger scale, including here in the United States."

read more:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/01/15/MNGK14AC301.DTL

E-mail James Sterngold at jsterngold@sfchronicle.com.

I emailed the author; this is what I wrote:

The terrible picture that Cheney painted in his January 15 speech to the Los Angeles Affairs Council -- more horrendous attacks on American soil and a "war" lasting generations -- is another example of this administration's strategy of manipulating the public through fear. They warned of a "mushroom cloud" from Iraqi WMD, and stampeded the public into buying duct tape and plastic to protect their homes from Saddam's chemical weapons.

The real cloud turned out to be the smokescreen of lies generated to implement the neocon vision of U.S. military domination of the Middle East, and they intend to dominate American politics by positioning themselves as hard-headed realists that will do whatever it takes to protect our homes and families.

They may be hard-headed, but this is a characteristic of their ideological certitude and their refusal to entertain any real debate or let facts and logic get in the way of their agenda. All of their claims about Iraqi nukes, ties to al Qaeda, and stockpiles of WMD have proven as false as their prediction that our troops would be welcomed with flowers in Baghdad and that this operation would be paid for with Iraqi oil.

These people are not realists -- they're radicals with dangerous delusions.

They claim to be spreading democracy in the Middle East, but they are endangering our democracy right here at home by eroding the Bill of Rights, stifling dissent, and waging war under false pretenses.

Howard Dean was derided for saying the capture of Saddam hasn't made us safer, but he was absolutely correct. Nothing happens in a vacuum. Vital resources were diverted from Afghanistan, and now al Qaeda and the Taliban are regrouping there. Our "preemptive" war has opened the doors to terrorism in Iraq, and our occupation of a Muslim country is the best recruiting tool the jihadists could have hoped for. Our military is stretched precariously thin, our treasury is being drained, we've damaged our relations with much of the world, and our nation is deeply divided.

The foreign policies of the Bush administration have made us less safe, and the "grim vision" articulated by Cheney is a self-fulfilling prophecy. The Middle East terrorism that visited us on Sept. 11 was the product of our own actions in that region, and now we are taking military intervention to a new level. Hate cannot be extinguished with violence, and "evil" cannot be eradicated by force. The moral certitude and Manichaean world view of our president is a blindness that's being exploited by a neocon cabal that is deaf to any argument that challenges their preordained conclusions.

(I began writing that last sentence before I realized I was paraphrasing Paul O'Neil's observation of this administration. If you've read this far, you are to be commended for enduring this rant of mine)

Terrorism is definitely a threat to our country, but the radicals who run our government and command our military are by far the greater threat, for their actions are perpetuating a war on terrorism that can never be won. Their delusional ambitions are a threat to our democracy. Fortunately, we can do something about it on the second day of November, 2004.

Your statement that "The Middle East terrorism that visited us on Sept. 11 was the product of our own actions in that region" is certain to raise some debate.

I don't see where that is such a difficult issue to understand.

Not only are the Taliban gaining more ground but the opium production has gained much momentum. The situation is Afghanistan is far from a success.

Iraq will be a failure that will be called a success, as the US draws down the Occupation. There will be a civil war there as soon as the US pulls down troop strength to 50K.

Another real threat which hardly anyone talks about is from Asia and the rise of anti-American venom and supporters of Al Q. in that region,especialy in Indonesia.

Only one massive attack in the US from Al Q. will bring Maritial Law. If that strie occurs anytime within the next ten months there will probably not be an election, as the Constitution and the Bill of Rights will be put on indefinite hold.

The statement you quoted from my letter -- "The Middle East terrorism that visited us on Sept. 11 was the product of our own actions in that region" -- probably won't be very controversial in this forum. The 1953 coup we engineered to overthrow Iran's democracy and install the repressive regime of the Shah, our support for other repressive regimes in the region (including Saddam Hussein), and our entangling alliance with the Saudi monarchy -- which financed the 9/11 terrorists and spreads extremist Wahabbism throughout the region -- is, IMHO, more than enough evidence to support my statement.

After reviewing my letter (which I wrote rather hastily while my disgust with Cheney's speech was in full swing), the statement I find some fault with is the one about not eradicating evil by force. I wrote this in the context of the bogus Manichaean world view, with the thought that the Bush/Cheney policies will spawn more such "evil".

However, as a general statement, it might not hold up. Hitler's Third Reich was definitely evil (if that term can be applied to the workings of man), and it was eradicted by the force of the Allied armies. Perhaps not eradicated forever -- neo-nazis still exist and various forms of fascism continue to crop up -- but the tyranny of Hitler's regime was certainly defeated and Europe was set on a course of freedom and democracy.

Perhaps the most critical debate we need to have with the neocons is their claim that what they're doing in the Middle East is analogous to the defeat of fascism, and the implementation of the Marshall Plan.