JOHN DEAN: Cheney's Incredible and Deadly Lie:

Vice President Dick Cheney's Incredible and Deadly Lie:

By Deceiving a Congressional Leader, Cheney Sent Us to War on False Pretenses And Violated the Separation of Powers - as Well as the Criminal Law
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20080919.html

By JOHN W. DEAN

This week, I agreed to deliver a "Constitution Day" talk on a college campus. My talk was not partisan. Yet the subject matter I selected was prompted by the most incredible - not to mention the most deadly - lie Dick Cheney has yet told, which was reported earlier this week.

Last year, Washington Post reporter Barton Gellman and Jo Baker, now of the New York Times, did an extensive series for the Post on Cheney. Now, Gellman has done some more digging, and published the result in a book he released this week: Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency. The book reveals a lie told to a high-ranking fellow Republican, and the difference that lie made. In this column, I'll explain how Cheney defied the separation of powers, and go back to the founding history to show why actions like his matter so profoundly.

Cheney's Bold Face Lie To Congress

According to Gellman (and to paraphrase from the Post story on his finding), in the run-up to the war in Iraq, the White House was worried about the stance of Republican Majority Leader Richard Armey of Texas, who had deep concerns about going to war with Saddam Hussein. According to the Post, Armey met with Cheney for a highly classified, one-on-on briefing, in Room H-208, Cheney's luxurious hideaway office on the House side of the Capitol.

and it's astonishing, reading how these bastards lied to get their plan to invade Iraq legitimatized, even as the White House absurdly sent Dick Cheney to arm-twist on the Hill the other day on behalf of Bernanke's three-page plan.

The arrogance and contempt for the rule of law is breathtaking.

Everyone should read "Angler." It's a dry read, lots of details, but a vital one.

NOT A PAIR OF BALLS BETWEEN THEM

but, honestly, I had some great expectations of Pelosi.

I simply do not understand THAT meltdown. They should be ashamed of themselves.

Why is it that on DU, whenever a really good post is made
about Republican crimes, Reid and Pelosi get bashed instead of the perps?

She has allowed and even supported the Reich-wing agenda on her watch.

Pelosi needs to be impeached before we can get anywhere

Plus, such a sweeping negative declarative is what I'm pointing out, just total bullshit.
You are just spouting Dem-bashing bullshit instead of facts.

We KNOW what the Republicans are, we don't expect anything out of them but self aggrandizement and brutal control. But when the people who are supposed to be the good guys act like inept cowards, the rage becomes directed at the ones who could have prevented and punished the instigators.

If someone places an infant on the path of an oncoming train, and someone else is standing there watching it where they could pick the child up to safety, does that observer not deserve some of the blame for the child's death?

Get used to it. That's politics.
And this bullshit is totally ineffectual and essentially self-destructive.

Don't blow a hole in the ship, or spew bullshit at the sails, because you think it is off-course.

Purely as a tactical, not philosophical, move, do you think it was smart to tell Chimpenator that impeachment was off the table. Even if she had no intention of going through with impeachment, that's essentially letting the enemy know your battleplans. At the least, she could have kept him guessing.

And if you think this administration is just another administration with mere differences in policy, well, I just don't know what to say.

they elected a Dem majority, then the Dems would spend their time going after Bush and Cheney. I think she probably underestimated the voters' anger at Bush and Cheney, but I do believe her intention was to reassure skittish voters that it was safe to vote in a Dem majority.

I'm not saying they deserve all the hard times they get, but they don;t get a pass just for being democrats. We want action.

was an excellent analogy, especially considering all the mothers and fathers of our service members who have had to bury their babies or help them deal with wounds and trauma that will keep them from ever leading a normal life.

This is not just a question of policy. It is about real human beings. It is about the Constitution of the United States being spit upon and used for toilet paper. It is about our freedom and our future as Americans being sold to the highest corporate bidder.

Any Democrat who thinks Pelosi deserves anything but scorn for her collaboration with the Reich is not paying attention. Quisling. Traitor. Pelosi. Reid.

Unless you're planning to raise your own army and depose the Bushies, you have to rely on your elected representatives to do their jobs.

When they not only shirk their responsibilities but go so far as to praise the criminals ("the Bushes are a lovely, patriotic family," she said) then these non-representatives must shoulder the blame.

How can you not see that at this late stage?

so dickhead armey is the good guy now. let me make it simple: if you believe anything dick cheney says, you're an idiot or a fascist.

would give them to Al Qaeda. Armey now says he may well have stopped the war on Iraq, but for this lie. I haven't read the book that reveals this story, so I don't know how well sourced this story is (is it based solely on Armey's word?) or what other evidence there is to support it, but I find it highly suspicious. Dean is certainly right that Cheney is a liar and has nothing but contempt for the Constitutional balance of powers, but I'm surprised that he doesn't raise the issue of how self-serving this story is (on Armey's part), and also how it attempts to shift the blame for the war off the Congressional Republicans and onto Cheney. And one wonders what ELSE took place in the Cheney-Armey meeting (bribes, threats, kneecapping, collusion?) that was actually the real convincer of Armey. We've heard before that the "mushroom cloud" lies by the Bushwhacks were the reason that Congress turned war decisions over to Bush (in violation of their oaths of office), but I have never believed that. And I am not at all inclined to believe this Cheney-Armey tale either, for the simple reason that war is so very, very profitable--and Bushwhack war the more so, for its off-the-books budgets, no-bid, cost-plus contracts and utter lack of accountabiltiy.

I'm more inclined to believe that these two Dicks met and cooked up plausible deniability stories for the Pukes in Congress, should it all go wrong.