COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Et tu Dickie?



Cheney Uncloaks His Frustration With Bush
'Statute of Limitations Has Expired' on Many Secrets, Former Vice President Says

By Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 13, 2009

In his first few months after leaving office, former vice president Richard B. Cheney threw himself into public combat against the "far left" agenda of the new commander in chief. More private reflections, as his memoir takes shape in slashing longhand on legal pads, have opened a second front against Cheney's White House partner of eight years, George W. Bush.

Cheney's disappointment with the former president surfaced recently in one of the informal conversations he is holding to discuss the book with authors, diplomats, policy experts and past colleagues. By habit, he listens more than he talks, but Cheney broke form when asked about his regrets.

"In the second term, he felt Bush was moving away from him," said a participant in the recent gathering, describing Cheney's reply. "He said Bush was shackled by the public reaction and the criticism he took. Bush was more malleable to that. The implication was that Bush had gone soft on him, or rather Bush had hardened against Cheney's advice. He'd showed an independence that Cheney didn't see coming. It was clear that Cheney's doctrine was cast-iron strength at all times -- never apologize, never explain -- and Bush moved toward the conciliatory."

The two men maintain respectful ties, speaking on the telephone now and then, though aides to both said they were never quite friends. But there is a sting in Cheney's critique, because he views concessions to public sentiment as moral weakness. After years of praising Bush as a man of resolve, Cheney now intimates that the former president turned out to be more like an ordinary politician in the end.

Cheney's post-White House career is as singular as his vice presidency, a position he transformed into the hub of power. Drained of direct authority and cast aside by much of the public, he is no less urgently focused, friends and family members said, on shaping events.

The former vice president remains convinced of mortal dangers that few other leaders, in his view, face squarely. That fixed belief does much to explain the conduct that so many critics find baffling. He gives no weight, close associates said, to his low approval ratings, to the tradition of statesmanlike White House exits or to the grumbling of Republicans about his effect on the party brand.

John P. Hannah, Cheney's second-term national security adviser, said the former vice president is driven, now as before, by the nightmare of a hostile state acquiring nuclear weapons and passing them to terrorists. Aaron Friedberg, another of Cheney's foreign policy advisers, said Cheney believes "that many people find it very difficult to hold that idea in their head, really, and conjure with it, and see what it implies."

What is new, Hannah said, is Cheney's readiness to acknowledge "doubts about the main channels of American policy during the last few years," a period encompassing most of Bush's second term. "These are not small issues," Hannah said. "They cut to the very core of who Cheney is," and "he really feels he has an obligation" to save the country from danger.

Cheney's imprint on law and policy, achieved during the first term at the peak of his influence, had faded considerably by the time he and Bush left office. Bush halted the waterboarding of accused terrorists, closed secret CIA prisons, sought congressional blessing for domestic surveillance, and reached out diplomatically to Iran and North Korea, which Cheney believed to be ripe for "regime change."

Some of the disputes between the president and his Number Two were more personal. Shortly after Bush fired Donald H. Rumsfeld, Cheney called his old mentor history's "finest secretary of defense" and invited direct comparison to Bush by saying he had "never learned more" from a boss than he had as Rumsfeld's deputy in the Ford administration.

The depths of Cheney's distress about another close friend, his former chief of staff and alter ego I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, have only recently become clear. Bush refused a pardon after Libby's felony convictions in 2007 for perjury and obstruction of an investigation of the leak of a clandestine CIA officer's identity. Cheney tried mightily to prevent Libby's fall, scrawling in a note made public at trial that he would not let anyone "sacrifice the guy that was asked to stick his neck in the meat grinder." Cheney never explained the allusion, but grand jury transcripts -- and independent counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald -- suggested that Libby's false statements aimed above all to protect the vice president.

Last month, an account in Time magazine, based on close access to Bush's personal lawyer and White House counsel, described Cheney's desperate end-of-term efforts to change Bush's mind about a pardon. Cheney, who has spent a professional lifetime ignoring unflattering stories, issued a quietly furious reply. In the most explicit terms, he accused Bush of abandoning "an innocent man" who had served the president with honor and then become the "victim of a severe miscarriage of justice." Cheney now says privately that his memoir, expected to be published in spring 2011, will describe their heated arguments in full.

Despite an ailing heart and reduced mobility, the former vice president at age 68 retains a prodigious capacity for work. He rises early, reads voraciously about history and current events, and acquired a BlackBerry in modest recompense for the loss of daily intelligence briefings. He allows himself some indulgences, Liz Cheney said in an interview. She said her father relishes his new freedom to take a morning drive to Starbucks in a black SUV, toting home the decaffeinated latte on which his doctor and his wife, Lynne, insist. He attends the soccer and softball games of his oldest grandchildren, Kate and Elizabeth, and spends more time than he could as vice president fly fishing near his vacation homes in Wyoming and on Maryland's Eastern Shore.

But Cheney passes most of his days at the top of the garage at his new house in McLean, where he built an office under the dormered roof and filled it with books and binders of his vice presidential papers. He kept copies of the unclassified ones and consults the rest on visits to the National Archives. He took detailed notes in the White House, head bobbing up and down as he wrote and sometimes disappearing from the screen in videoconferences. Those notes, according to one person who has discussed them with Cheney, will form the core of his account of the Bush years.

"What impressed me was his continuing zeal," said an associate who discussed the book with Cheney. "He hadn't stepped back a bit from the positions he took in office to a more relaxed, Olympian view. He was still very much in the fray. He's not going to soften anything or accommodate shifts of conscience. There was no sense in which he looked back and said, 'I wish I'd done something differently.' Rather, there was a sense that they hadn't gone far enough. If he'd been equipped with a group of people as ideologically rigorous as he was, they'd have been able to push further."

Some old associates see Cheney's newfound openness as a breach of principle. For decades, he expressed contempt for departing officials who wrote insider accounts, arguing that candid internal debate was impossible if the president and his advisers could not count on secrecy. As far back as 1979, one of the heroes in Lynne Cheney's novel "Executive Privilege" resolved never to write a memoir because "a president deserved at least one person around him whose silence he could depend on." Cheney lived that vow for the next 30 years.

As vice president, according to one witness, Cheney "was livid" when the memoir of L. Paul Bremer, who led the occupation of Iraq, made the less-than-stunning disclosure that Cheney shared Bremer's concern about U.S. military strategy. A Cabinet-level Bush appointee recalled that Cheney likewise described revelations by former Treasury secretary Paul H. O'Neill and former White House spokesman Scott McClellan as "beyond the pale."

"If he goes out and writes a memoir that spills beans about what took place behind closed doors, that would be out of character," said Ari Fleischer, who served as White House spokesman during Bush's first term.

Yet that appears to be precisely Cheney's intent. Robert Barnett, who negotiated Cheney's book contract, passed word to potential publishers that the memoir would be packed with news, and Cheney himself has said, without explanation, that "the statute of limitations has expired" on many of his secrets. "When the president made decisions that I didn't agree with, I still supported him and didn't go out and undercut him," Cheney said, according to Stephen Hayes, his authorized biographer. "Now we're talking about after we've left office. I have strong feelings about what happened. . . . And I don't have any reason not to forthrightly express those views."

Liz Cheney, whom friends credit with talking her father into writing the book, described the memoir as a record for posterity. "You have to think about his love of history, and when he thinks about this memoir, he thinks about it as a book his grandchildren will read," she said.

What the former vice president assuredly will not do, according to friends and family, is break a lifetime's reticence about his feelings. Alluding to Bush's forthcoming memoir, Cheney told one small group recently that he had no interest "in sharing personal details," as the former president planned to do.

"He sort of spat the word 'personal,' " said one person in the room.


© 2009 The Washington Post Company


119 comments:

  1. The title of this post implies that Cheney is betraying Bush.

    I don't know what to say except that I am stunned by this implication. I couldn't disagree with you more.

    ReplyDelete
  2. ironic - Both coincidental and contradictory in a humorous or poignant and extremely improbable way...

    I see irony.

    Like you, I'm a Cheney supporter.

    ReplyDelete
  3. ... then you need to revisit Julius Caesar.

    ReplyDelete
  4. "If he goes out and writes a memoir that spills beans about what took place behind closed doors, that would be out of character," said Ari Fleischer, who served as White House spokesman during Bush's first term.

    Yet that appears to be precisely Cheney's intent. Robert Barnett, who negotiated Cheney's book contract, passed word to potential publishers that the memoir would be packed with news, and Cheney himself has said, without explanation, that "the statute of limitations has expired" on many of his secrets. "When the president made decisions that I didn't agree with, I still supported him and didn't go out and undercut him," Cheney said, according to Stephen Hayes, his authorized biographer. "Now we're talking about after we've left office. I have strong feelings about what happened. . . . And I don't have any reason not to forthrightly express those views."

    ReplyDelete
  5. The assassination of Julius Caesar was by men who believed they had to kill Caesar to save the Roman Republic. In fact they set the stage to undo it.

    Unintended consequences.

    Bush and Cheney represented far different kind of Republicans. There is a wing in the Republican Party that believes it needs to purify itself. Maybe it does.

    How will that be done?

    For better or worse, should that happen the Republican Party may or may not survive, but to true believers The McCains, Bush's, Spector's, Snow's must go.

    According to the article, Cheney..." remains convinced of mortal dangers that few other leaders, in his view, face squarely. That fixed belief does much to explain the conduct that so many critics find baffling. He gives no weight, close associates said, to his low approval ratings, to the tradition of statesmanlike White House exits or to the grumbling of Republicans about his effect on the party brand."

    {...}

    ..."What is new, Hannah said, is Cheney's readiness to acknowledge "doubts about the main channels of American policy during the last few years," a period encompassing most of Bush's second term. "These are not small issues," Hannah said. "They cut to the very core of who Cheney is," and "he really feels he has an obligation" to save the country from danger."

    ReplyDelete
  6. W's Presidency went to Hell when he switched from Cheney to Condi as chief advisor.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Figures... Dems Are Now Planting Fake Doctors at Town Hall Meetings

    Roxana Mayer said she was a pediatric primary care physician at Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee's town hall meeting and that she was a huge supporter of Obamacare.

    One problem.She's not a doctor.

    ...But, she was an Obama state delegate!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Duke University Professor analyzes HR 3200 (from flopping aces)http://www.classicalideals.com/H....com/ HR3200.htm

    John David Lewis, asks a series of questions about the House approved version of health care “reform.” He then analyzes the relevant sections and makes his conclusion.

    I’m posting his questions and yes or no answers but recommend you read his full analysis for the bill language and additional analsysis.

    1. Will the plan ration health care? – Yes.

    2. Will the plan punish Americans who try to opt out? – Yes.

    3. Will the plan destroy private health insurance? – Yes.

    4. Does the plan allow the government to set fees for services? – Yes.

    5. Will the plan increase the power of government officials to scrutinize our private affairs? – Yes.

    6. Does the plan automatically enroll Americans in the government plan? – Yes.

    7. Does the plan exempt federal officials from court review? – Yes.

    - Jenny

    ReplyDelete
  9. Only the most "Crazed" partisan could ever give a flip what an "Ex-Vice President" says.

    Cheney got his Chief of Staff thrown in prison, and, given free rein, would have surely gotten the entire Administrative Branch of the Government thrown in jail.

    Unlike Cheney, Bush had the responsibility to try and keep his Party in Power (And the Democrats "Out of Power.")

    A Party of Cheney Partisans would surely give us a "Permanent" Government by the Democratic Party. Obama I, Obama II, Pelosi I, etc., etc.

    Fuck Cheney.

    ReplyDelete
  10. This is just the next flip-flop by Cheney.

    In 1991 he was all for having an "Exit Stategy" before any US military force could be employeed.

    In 2001 an "Exit Stategy" for military operations was out of the question.

    Before 2008, tell all tales from the White House were "beyond the pale", now Mr Cheney is penning his own.

    He is driven by situational ethics, is a drunk and an unsafe hunter/shooter.

    He has no Standard and is a moral coward. HE shoud have stood up, for "Scooter", by telling the truth from the get go. Not argued with Bush about a pardon for a convicted cover up artist. A perjurer and liar, while working on the Federal dime.

    In Cheney's view, that was just business as usual. A lot of harm, but no fouls should have been called on his guy.

    Scooter being a loyal liar.

    ReplyDelete
  11. "Not Good" Unemployment Claims number, and Retail Sales this morning.

    Same old story. We were trying to claw our way back in Jan, and Feb; gasoline prices rose, and we "stalled" in March.

    We were trying to "Come Back" in June, and early July, Gas prices rose instead, and we're back to giving up ground.

    This is going to take awhile.

    OPEC has us by the "shorts," and they're not about to let go.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Implications of Continued Job Losses
    The economy has lost over 6.6 million jobs since the recession began, which is way above the job losses that we are used to seeing in recessionary periods when job losses have ranged between 1.5 million and 2.5 million. The large job losses of the past months and longer unemployment duration will continue to weigh on the economy in the coming months. The unemployment duration improved slightly in July from the record high witnessed in June, which is positive news. Unemployed workers are falling behind their debt payments, raising defaults on loans and making government mortgage modification programs ineffective. Default rates on various loans have already surpassed the unemployment rate. According to the Moody's credit card index report, published in May 2009, the credit card charge-off rate crossed 10% in May 2009 and is expected to reach a peak of 12% by the second quarter of 2010
    .


    Nouriel Roubini, in Forbes

    ReplyDelete
  13. NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. on Thursday topped analyst expectations with its fiscal second-quarter results, and offered a slightly more upbeat forecast for the rest of the year.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Cheney took 5 Deferrals, and got drunk, went "hunting," and shot a man.

    That's All I want to know about the man.

    I won't be buying the book.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Wall Street Journal - Karen Talley - ‎38 minutes ago‎
    Kohl's Corp. reported a 3% drop in earnings for its second quarter, surprising Wall Street after the retailer last month posted strong sales.

    ReplyDelete
  16. I see that Karl Rove is still pontificating. The man that promised eternal Republican majorities and deliver US to Barack Obama and a 60 seat Democratic Senate.

    Now there is a fellow we need to listen to, if we're insane.
    Keep listening to the same voices, expecting different outcomes.

    Performance counts.
    Team 43 failed to perform to Standard. They washed out.

    Which is a shame, really, but the fact of the matter.



    We may just have a rain out of gag's golf game at Grayhawk, but chances are it'll burn off by this afternoon.

    ReplyDelete
  17. The author of this next piece blames exSpecialist England for the Abu Ghraib fiasco. He dismisses the basic truth of Ms England's quote, she just happened to be there.
    The basic truth is that the abuse at Abu Ghaib was not dependent upon her presence there. Obviously she was not the one violating posted orders not to have cameras in the area and that no photos of the detainees were permitted to be taken, at all.

    The Officers and NCOs at that installation were responsible for the Unit's behaviour, the death of Nick Berg may be traced to Abu Ghraib, but the responsibility for Abu Ghraib was never Ms England's. She had no authority, she just happened to be there.

    By Morris Davis.

    Lynndie England will discuss her biography "Tortured: Lynndie England, Abu Ghraib and the Photographs That Shocked the World" at the Library of Congress Veterans Forum on Friday August 14 at noon in room 139 on the first floor of the James Madison building.

    She is a convicted criminal who was dishonorably discharged, but she’s out of prison and on stage at the Library of Congress. You may recall many of the memorable pictures of the glowing Private England during her tour in Iraq, including the one of her standing next to an Iraqi prisoner, a cigarette dangling from her lip, as she points at the Iraqi prisoner’s genitals as he stands there naked with a sack over his head as he’s forced to masturbate in the presence of GI England and several other nude men. It sure looked like she was enjoying some good times in the picture, so maybe she’ll give more behind the scenes details during her lecture on Friday as she expounds on how she’s a victim who is deprived of veteran’s benefits because of her dishonorable discharge. As she said in an interview published in the West Virginia Metro News on Monday: “Yeah, I was in some pictures, but that’s all it was … I just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Giving Ted Kennedy the Medal of Freedom insults the other 15 that may have deserved it.

    His sister, Eunice, who started the Special Olympics, should have gotten it instead. She did more in that single effort of kindness and compassion, than Teddy has done in his long tenure of worthlessness.

    Ted Kennedy is like the show Seinfeld in that they are both about nothing. What a piece of shit.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Rat

    I grew up in an area that averages 40 inches of rain a year. We will play GrayHawk today!!!

    ReplyDelete
  20. Great day for it, gag.

    A little humid, but not so hot.

    ReplyDelete
  21. EXCLUSIVE: FOX News' Greg Palkot is the only reporter traveling with a combined force of 500 Marines and Afghan soldiers as they carry out day two of air and ground assault Operation Eastern Resolve. The operation is aimed at liberating a key town in Northern Helmand province of Taliban and to secure a strategic pass used by Taliban fighters. What follows is Palkot's latest report.

    August 13: U.S. Marines go door-to-door in Dahaneh, Afghanistan.

    ReplyDelete
  22. RealtyTrac counted 360,149 foreclosure filings nationally, which can range from default notices to bank repossessions. That was up 7 percent from June and 32 percent from July 2008. RealtyTrac, a private firm, says its data include more than 90 percent of U.S. households.

    Half the foreclosure activity was in four states -- California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida -- which have been hardest hit by the housing downturn. But foreclosure activity in the Washington region also grew significantly. Compared with last year, for example, foreclosure filings in July jumped 25 percent in the District
    .

    By Renae Merle
    Washington Post Staff Writer

    ReplyDelete
  23. Guitar, studio wizard Les Paul dies at 94

    ReplyDelete
  24. Drunk? Not a Drunk?

    Liar? Not a Liar?

    Dont care...

    i care that there are terrorist governments looking to nuke us either directly or by proxy...

    ReplyDelete
  25. Nothing new there, wi"o".

    There are lots of folks that'd like to, next to none that can.

    Just go down the list of nations that are nuclear capable that are not part of the civilized whirled.
    Pakistan, India, North Korea and Israel. All stand outside the Nonproliferation norm.

    Which will arm terrorists?

    The NorKs would be the greatest threat. Then the Pakistani. The Indians and Israeli are not any threat to US, at present.

    The Irani may wish to develop a nuclear weapon or a dozen. But to then take one of those untested gems, hand it off to a third party to attack the US with it ...

    Not a viable threat, at present.

    ReplyDelete
  26. There were many good reasons to take down Saddam, but his having a nuclear weapon, that he would hand off to terrorists, that was certainly not one of them.

    ReplyDelete
  27. dr speathith...

    Just go down the list of nations that are nuclear capable that are not part of the civilized whirled.
    Pakistan, India, North Korea and Israel. All stand outside the Nonproliferation norm.

    Israel, as a country and a people that actual GAVE the world the concept of being civilized should not be on your list...

    But you love to include them.

    Israel, Pakistan and India are NOT a part of the treaty and no matter how hard you spin it, this in it's self doesnt make them uncivilized.

    North Korea? signed, lied & withdrew...

    Iran, signed and lied....

    Syria, signed and lied...

    Libya, signed and lied

    To be part of a civilized world, when it comes to this issue alone, would imply that Israel has somehow violated what it means to be civil.

    Pakistan and India BOTH have admitted to having nukes and both have admitted to almost using them on each other...

    Israel has not admitted to have nukes...

    ReplyDelete
  28. desert rat said...
    There were many good reasons to take down Saddam, but his having a nuclear weapon, that he would hand off to terrorists, that was certainly not one of them.


    The world in which I choose to hang my hat says:

    If the big bad bully states that he has a really big weapon and when it's ready he's going to burn half your house down, you dont WAIT until your sure if he's bluffing or not... You kill him like the rabid dog he is... and if in the end, the bully was full of shit?

    to bad...

    ReplyDelete
  29. The greatest nuclear threat right now is North Korea, and not because they can hit the broad side of a barn. They're going to sell it sure as the sun's gonna rise; it's just a question of to whom. While there isn't much incentive for states to sell nuclear and other unconventional material to non-state actors - because once you do you've effectively given up control but not responsibility for its eventual use, which position states do not like to be in - North Korea may be the exception. Most evil regimes are not in fact insane. That one happens sadly to be crazier than a shit-house rat.

    ReplyDelete
  30. If the NorKs represented a viable threat, one that the US should actively respond to, then we'd have to reassess our Treaty Obligations, or at least the current interpretations.

    As our old friend Robert Haddick tells us:

    The June 2009 UN Security Council resolution required that North Korean crews first give their permission to high-seas boardings. U.S. officials deemed this a reason for not ordering USS John S. McCain to board Kang Nam.

    But Team Obamamerica was already playing the end game, while that vessel was at sea, afraid of being compared to Team Bush, more than appearing irresolute.
    Haddick quoting the NYTimes:

    “The whole thing just doesn’t add up,” said one senior administration official who has been tracking the cargo ship’s lazy summer journey. “My worry is that we make a big demand about seeing the cargo, and then there’s a tense standoff, and when it’s all over we discover that old man Kim set us up to look like George Bush searching for nonexistent W.M.D.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Whether the Israeli say they have a nuke or do not, that does not change the reality of perceptions.

    The US government believes the Israeli have nukes, so they do.

    Same Standard that we apply to everyone else.

    wi"o", just one or two posts prior, you said lying did not matter, if in the cause of National Security.

    I'm sure that all those you list as liars, they agree totally.

    ReplyDelete
  32. "the reality of perceptions"


    lol....


    now that is a load of horse shit....

    ReplyDelete
  33. dr:The US government believes the Israeli have nukes, so they do.

    Same Standard that we apply to everyone else.





    No with north korea, we have raised the the bar of WHAT is NUKE...

    Example was defined by Sec of State Clinton who said NKor was not a real nuke power since it's had only public fizzles and still has less than a dozen nukes....

    With Iran? The current POTUS is changing that standard as well....

    so what is reality if you use rose colored glasses when viewing our enemies and you use "xray" glasses on allies....

    ReplyDelete
  34. Not at all, wi"o".
    Not horse shit.
    We've spent days speaking of the President's percieved predispositions.
    How he percieves reality, in regards to race, or more accurately to my view, job description. Frankly, as MS Paglia noted, how he percieves social ranking and class.

    To the exclusion of other interesting topics.

    But in matters of "War and Peace" what Obama percieves as reality is unimportant. If it relates to Israel.

    How bizarre.

    ReplyDelete
  35. India shows the U.S. how to inspect a ship.

    If the Proliferation Security Initiative and UNSCR 1874 are to ever have any meaning, some day there will have to be forced boardings of North Korean cargo ships. With a duplicate of North Korea’s Yongbyon plutonium reactor having appeared in a Syrian desert, North Korea hardly merits the benefit of the doubt. If it is too shy to carry out this sort of work, perhaps the U.S. government should subcontract these duties to the Indian Coast Guard.

    ReplyDelete
  36. Dick Cheney served GHWB extremely well. His success and genuine popularity as SecDef were unquestioned. I remember it very well. That was the National Command Authority dream team.

    Surely Cheney is not unaware of the circumstances that prevailed under the man who a decade later would sit in that office. It's hard to convey just how poisonous, how chaotic, how dark and depressing those years were. Like night and day. The only person whose departure was more eagerly anticipated - nay, celebrated - was Paul Wolfowitz.

    I thought it would be a long time before someone surpassed the disaster that was Albright at State. I was wrong.

    Rumsfeld was not without successes he deeply influenced: For all of its faults (including one major one) the opening campaign in Afghanistan was a marvel. Will be a marvel for a long time. No, it wasn't just the CIA. Though he made it almost infinitely more difficult to pull off, Phase I in Iraq was a model almost any which way you scrutinized it.

    But the problems started very early, before the war, and only grew to immense proportions. Rumsfeld himself became a severe liability to the institution and its various enterprises. That's no mean feat to pull off as Secretary of Defense.

    I don't know what world Cheney was/is living in.

    ReplyDelete
  37. As always, the various parties will be crying all the way to the bank. Dirt sells. Hype sells. All that seems to be missing is sex.

    ReplyDelete
  38. Former Afghan President Berhanuddin Rabbani has survived a Taliban ambush in northern Afghanistan, an area that has seen a recent rise in militant attacks.

    Afghan police say Taliban fighters attacked Mr. Rabbani's convoy with rocket-propelled grenades and gunfire Thursday in the Ali Abad district of Kunduz province. They say no one in the convoy was hurt, but the attackers suffered casualties in a battle with bodyguards and police.

    Mr. Rabbani is a supporter of Afghan presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah - a main challenger to incumbent President Hamid Karzai in elections on August 20. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack on Mr. Rabbani
    .

    ReplyDelete
  39. trish,

    I don't suppose Rumsfield or Cheney figure large (hmm) in any of that exotic literature you have referenced? My head explodes at the very thought...gag me with a Buick ;-)...And Wolfowitz...OMG!

    ReplyDelete
  40. All that seems to be missing is sex.

    Thu Aug 13, 02:20:00 PM EDT

    I've been doing some literary research. I can help. Little gratuitous nookie - possibly with the mention of nipple clamps - never hurt a book.

    Give me a call, Dick!

    ReplyDelete
  41. trish,

    Next reincarnation...OK? ;-D)

    ReplyDelete
  42. "Whoa. Did she say 'nipple clamps'?"

    "Yessir. Yes, she did."

    "Um."

    "Yeah. She's four months out. Probably best to just let it go."

    ReplyDelete
  43. On the subject of Abu Ghraib:

    My husband was out with a bunch of layabouts (SOF) when that came out. DC knew before the story broke and no effort was spared to contain the damage and preempt further. It was a serious, serious blow in the short, medium, and long runs, because contrary to popular belief most of your actionable intelligence comes from paid sources. And they can withdraw their cooperation any time.

    ReplyDelete
  44. Rat:
    Whether the Israeli say they have a nuke or do not, that does not change the reality of perceptions.

    The US government believes the Israeli have nukes, so they do.

    Same Standard that we apply to everyone else
    .

    Let's paraphrase that, just for the sake of historical argument, c.2003:

    Whether the Iraqi say they have a nuke or do not, that does not change the reality of perceptions.

    The US government believes the Iraqi have nukes, so they do
    .

    ---

    Rat:
    There were many good reasons to take down Saddam, but his having a nuclear weapon, that he would hand off to terrorists, that was certainly not one of them.

    ---

    So, it appears to rat that what the USG "believes" with respect to Israel is one "reality of perceptions" leading to alternative reality 'A'. While what the USG "believed" regarding Saddam's nuclear potential and intentions somehow leads to an alternative reality 'B'.

    Seamlessly two alternate realities are fused within the spin-cycle machinery of rat's commentary. All it takes is inclusion of Israel in the argument.

    -------------

    Rufus, I'll buy two copies to make up for your boycott.

    ReplyDelete
  45. And it can't be said enough: Abu Ghraib was not policy. Abu Ghraib was a zoo. With those in charge waaay over their heads.

    ReplyDelete
  46. Regarding Cheney's role in the miscarriage of justice surrounding Scooter Libby's case, we must not forget that the whole affair was a political circus with a self-possessed prosecutor doing the ring master duty, a rabid media hell-bent on discrediting Bush at any cost, a partisan judge, a partisan jury, and two nefarious bastards hiding out in the administration who could have squelched the whole drama if they'd only told the truth early on.

    ReplyDelete
  47. ...Abu Ghraib was a zoo. With those in charge waaay over their heads.

    Affirmative action and political correctness behind the promotions that led to that situation.

    To say nothing about the overblown press coverage.

    A local radio host summarized it best when he said on-air, "Hell, I've done worse things to people I liked." Unfortunately, he's now broadcasting out of Bakersfield.

    ReplyDelete
  48. "To say nothing about the overblown press coverage."

    That story sold itself a thousand time over right off the bat. Bad enough at home, unimaginably worse in your AO.

    Almost no one ever got the story right, but gosh did it sell.

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  49. It proved, if ever it needed proving, and to our great expense, that a picture is worth more than a thousand words.

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  50. linear,

    Re: alternate realities and the essential badness of Israel

    ;-)

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  51. ...waiting...1...2...3...

    "Why does every thread have to get turned to the X7!x? Jews...I don't give a X4y*" about the %tH22! Jews...I never even think about the "%n##! Jews...NEVER...A@389?!@ the Jews..."

    ;-)

    Unfortunately, this Jew now has to cut the grass.

    ReplyDelete
  52. ... then you need to revisit Julius Caesar.

    I'll wait for Cheney's book, and then visit both. Tenth grade English class was a long time ago.

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  53. Unfortunately, this Jew now has to cut the grass.

    I'll trade you, Allen. I've got to go dig out my septic tank hatches to install a root proof enclosure. The ground is like brick. Chemical warfare has failed. My cedar trees seem to thrive on copper sulfate.

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  54. linear,

    ...can't argue that...I've got the long straw.

    Where are poor Palestinians to cruelly exploit when you need them?

    ;-)

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  55. The belief that Saddam could go nuclear was ONE of the motives that led US to war.
    I do think that Mr Bush believed what he was saying, about Saddam and the threat of nuclear proliferation.

    That his belief was a perception that became an actionable reality. Even if it was not really a slam dunk, at all.

    Proves the point, lineman.

    What the US President believes, the US Government acts upon as if it were true. Especially the further afield from the Homeland that we go.

    Whether it pertains to Israel or Iran, India or Pakistan.

    Our Decider, he still does, decide. Only it is not Mr Bush, this tour. So the basic perceptions, based upon those Presidental beliefs, that the US embraces as reality, have changed.

    As wi"o" has stated, previously.

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  56. But drop "Israel" into the mix and the noise level definately increases.

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  57. I like Cheney and may even buy his book.

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  58. Mr Obama's perception that Afpakistan is the "important" war, just another case where a Presidents' perception shapes reality.

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  59. ...other assorted bitches, whores, sluts, and your mother...

    Jeez, a guy casually mentions "mother" and the noise level sure goes up.

    ;-D))

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  60. According to Allen's article, having group sex with a bunch of friends in an outside toilet would seem to rank highest, if activities can be combined.

    Might even boost the fertility rate.

    Gotta go down to the Mexican restaurante. See y'all later.

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  61. Maybe Trish's literary explorations can shed some light on this.

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  62. Mr Cheney saw Mr Bush's perceptions change, in the second term. Along with those changing Presidental perceptions, Mr Cheney lost influence in US policy making.

    From Cheney's perspective, Mr Bush went south. Heaven only knows what Mr Bush thought he was seeing.

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  63. Pearl Rabbit...whatever that is...

    linear, can you have group sex bondage? What can you do if everyone is tied up? That could explain the low fertility rate, but I leave that to our resident expert on all things "sessual", as the Brits say.

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  64. The Rabbit Pearl Demystified -- MyPleasure.comThe Rabbit Pearl, MyPleasure's most popular dual-action vibrator, is deceptively simple to use! Read all about the ins, outs and rotations in this article ...
    www.mypleasure.com/.../sexed/rabbit_pearl_demystified.asp
    -

    It's why God teamed up with AlGore and created the internet, allen, so things like Pearl Rabbits would not remain a cultural mystery.

    ReplyDelete
  65. Pearl+rabbit on Shine
    That's the episode where "Charlotte" got addicted to her Pearl Rabbit and would not leave her penthouse suite for 2 weeks until the "girls" staged an ...
    astrology.yahoo.com/topic/pearl+rabbit/

    ReplyDelete
  66. linear!!!!!!!

    Do know what you have done? You have just inspired the next "Green" thing, outhouses – and all because you saw beyond the mundane grind (as it were). What is Dutch sex, when you can have money AND save the world? This is the American dream, floating from the bottom up. Socialism be damned – “Power to the Pooper!”

    I think we can all agree that we here at the EB are with Al Gore on saving the universe and beyond. Right? Well, how much greener can you get than an outhouse. Scrap the wasteful plumbing. It's back to nature as G-d intended. Would we have bears alone claim fame for crapping in the woods? I say, NOOOOO!

    We can put folks to work - millions and billions of people (channeling Carl Sagan here). Factories will be built, with Federal assistance of course, to produce millions of custom crappers.

    I can see the Paris Hilton model. The possibilities are endless.

    How much E85 can your average dumper produce over a year? Why, we can incorporate stills to instantly turn that t**d into "FUTURE FUEL".

    Man, I just love this. We will make billions!!!! We will be loved! We will be awarded the Medal of Freedom. Children yet unborn will be named “Linear Thinker Jones, and Smith, and Kwasniewski. Oh Joy!

    Leave it to a Jew to see light at the end of the tunnel, as it were.

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  67. The country boys have already beat you to it, allen

    THE HUMANURE HANDBOOK
    A Guide to Composting Human Manure, 3rd Edition

    by Joseph Jenkins
    .

    This system and the solar power link a thread or two ago, it's all anyone needs to declare independence from clutchs of Obamamerica and the infrastructure police.

    Well, a good still and a micro brewery would not be a bad idea, wither.

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  68. Tose two Russian submarines, they were looking for this lost Russian cargo ship. The Pentagon man did say the Russians were helpful in fighting pirates.

    Secret cargo theory as hunt for missing vessel Arctic Sea goes on

    The missing ship feared hijacked by pirates in European waters two weeks ago may be carrying a secret cargo, it was claimed today.

    The Arctic Sea and its 15-strong Russian crew were last heard from on 29 July, when they radioed British coastguards. A day later their position was tracked to northern France but the vessel has since disappeared, and some experts said it may have been hijacked by pirates in the Baltic Sea. Others have speculated that the 4,000-tonne vessel's disappearance may be linked to a dispute with the owners.

    But Mikhail Voitenko, the editor of Russia's Sovfracht maritime bulletin, said the ship, originally thought to be carrying £1m-worth of timber from Finland to Algeria, may have been targeted because it was carrying an unknown cargo.

    "The only sensible answer is that the vessel was loaded secretly with something we don't know anything about," he told the Russia Today news channel. "We have to remember that before loading in Finland the vessel stayed for two weeks in a shipyard in Kaliningrad. I'm sure it cannot be drugs or illegal criminal cargo. I think it is something much more expensive and dangerous."

    The Arctic Sea made routine radio contact with British coastguards just before entering the strait of Dover from the North Sea at 1.52pm on July 28.

    According to Interpol, it had been boarded by up to 10 armed men masquerading as anti-drugs police on July 24. The men were thought to have left the ship in a high-speed inflatable boat 12 hours later.

    The Maritime and Coastguard Agency called the situation "bizarre" and said the hijackers might have been coercing the ship's crew when they made radio contact
    .

    ReplyDelete
  69. economies of scale...

    Let's get Detroit back in the game! ...Potty by Fisher...

    Imagine Arnold strolling casually (or not) out of the governor's mansion to the governor's outhouse, with the press in tow.
    As Napoleon held court from his toilet, so could Arnold chat through the slat. You can't buy better advertising than that.

    Nothing is more powerful than a plan with a Federal subsidy...

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  70. Perhaps a stolen Soviet era nuclear warhead was secreted upon the Artic Sea?

    Then it was boarded and possibly hijacked by pirates, in an inflatable boat, working the North Sea cargo routes.

    Where's Tom Clancy?

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  71. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  72. In 1993 Mr Cheney had no doubt about what was required, before committing US military assets, on land, over the seas or by air.

    You also need to know what constitutes victory.
    How would you define it?
    How would you know when you had achieved it?
    And finally, how do you get out? What's the end game?
    How do you wrap it all up?
    And what's the cost in terms of American lives in that involvement?

    ReplyDelete
  73. I am afraid we would have an ill-defined mission, we would take significant casualties, and would get involved without knowing how we were going to get out.

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  74. Group sex in an outdoor toilet. Yikes. Keep it tasteful, people.

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  75. Former Falcons QB Michael Vick, who served a 19-month jail sentence for conspiracy and running a dogfighting operation, signs a two-year deal with the Eagles on Thursday night.

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  76. A lot of people think Cheney changed as a person. I don't think he did. He was saying in '93 what could be said in further defense of an operation that while leaving many dissatisfied, was still characterized, with justice, as a bit of textbook brilliance - and without the baggage of global controversy. (I mean, look, when you have even the Syrians on your side...)

    But OIF, along with the whole GWOT for which it was the deliberate center of gravity, was and remains a horse of a different color and there's no end of CYA and bitchy legacy maintenance. And when shit goes that unexpectedly bad, SOP dictates a circular firing squad well into the next generation.

    George W. Bush has the grace and decency not to participate, but Cheney's continued support of Rumsfeld ought to be vindication enough.

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  77. She of the nipple drimples has suddenly become prudish? The "nookie" k'nocher blushes?

    I, for one, am shocked, shocked to have seen this conversation go from one Dick to another (so to speak). We are adults, you know?

    One does hate to be prickly.

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  78. She of the nipple drimples has suddenly become prudish? The "nookie" k'nocher blushes?

    - allen

    Damn, allen, but you can string a few words together.

    ReplyDelete
  79. linear, can you have group sex bondage?

    Beats me, Allen. You raise a valid question about everyone being tied up. Kinda conjures up an image of a Republican group sex bondage party.

    In an outhouse. Pandering to the green vote.

    Where's doug when we need him?

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  80. She of the nipple drimples has suddenly become prudish? The "nookie" k'nocher blushes?

    She had to know it would lead to this when she made the coy admission about her new taste in literature.

    She who said Joe Pesci is the Mark Levin of comedy stars. Or was it the other way around?

    ReplyDelete
  81. ...would not be a bad idea, wither.

    vs.

    ...either.

    I like "wither"...

    ReplyDelete
  82. I've been meaning to address this:

    "Affirmative action and political correctness behind the promotions that led to that situation."

    There were many factors that contributed to the situation there. These were not among them. And I say that understanding the damage that affirmative action did within the military, and the exceptional challenges that PC constructs.

    It was the perfect storm, in a way, of detainee operations, but the greater danger always lurked at the point of capture. As it does in everyday police work.

    Anyway, we dig ourselves out. But it was and in some ways still is a mountain to dig out of.

    ReplyDelete
  83. I will also buy Cheney's book and try to get it signed by him.

    Cheney's reputation today proves my point that the press can vilify anyone they choose and once they do, that person is dead in the water. Period.

    Abu Ghraib? Forbid cell phones and cameras in secured areas and we would not know England, we would not know waterboarding, and the world would be a better place.

    ReplyDelete
  84. The statue -- depicting Black Partridge shielding a white woman from another Indian's tomahawk -- was commissioned by railroad-car magnate George Pullman, whose estate was near the site of the encounter. The statue stood there from 1893 to 1931, then was installed in the lobby of the Chicago Historical Society.

    In the 1970s, Native Americans protested its display.

    "From their perspective, Black Partridge was a traitor," said James Grossman, co-editor of "The Encyclopedia of Chicago."


    Battle of Ft. Dearborn Park

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  85. There were many factors that contributed to the situation there. These were not among them. And I say that understanding the damage that affirmative action did within the military, and the exceptional challenges that PC constructs.

    We disagree. I don't have the energy or inclination to pursue the argument. As always, I value your perspective.

    The last word is yours @ 12:38am.

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  86. Gag, you have to differentiate between, on the one hand, authorized and controlled operations (waterboarding) and what occurred at Abu Ghraib. They are not one and the same and it is unfortunate to see them linked.

    Simply because uproar among the usual suspects attaches itself to both, does not liken them in (il)legitimacy or effect.

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  87. Quarterback Michael Vick, released from jail in May after serving 23 months for bankrolling a dogfighting ring, has been given a "second chance" by the Philadelphia Eagles and signed a two-year deal with the team.

    ...

    The 29-year-old Vick had been free to sign with any NFL team and was reinstated to the NFL on a conditional basis on July 27 by Commissioner Roger Goodell.

    ...

    Atlanta rewarded their franchise player in 2004 with a 10-year contract worth $130 million -- the richest deal in the NFL at the time.


    Signs With Eagles

    ReplyDelete
  88. "We disagree."

    I know. And I wish it weren't so.

    Night, linear.

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  89. Good night Trish.

    If you stick around a few minutes, I'm going looking for It's good news week at Youtube.

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  90. I see your point Trish, but one provided smoke for the other in the eyes of the msm, who unfortunately and apparently has the final word.

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  91. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cv3u-f5DWYA

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  92. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  93. Stairway to Heaven?

    I'm sorry, I have to go shopping for a blog where not everyone is rooted in a generation of atrocious fashion and cliched music.

    What is wrong with you people?

    ReplyDelete
  94. Hey, it's good every once in awhile.

    once in a great awhile.

    ReplyDelete
  95. we could use some remedial training in the music department.

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  96. Comment of the Moment

    “ I say US Airways should pay a fine for killing those poor geese that forced their plane to crash land into the Hudson”

    — Cathy
    Exxon Fined for Causing Bird Deaths

    ReplyDelete
  97. "in the eyes of the msm"

    - gag

    Everyone hates the msm. Doesn't matter which side you're on, they're always in the pocket of the other guy.

    The worst thing they engage in is just lazy, sloppy work. That's not a conspiracy. It's just lazy, sloppy work.

    ReplyDelete