War criminal-in-exile Dick Cheney--not content to spend his golden years reminiscing about how 9/11 occurred while he was allegedly the most powerful vice president in U.S. history--has popped up like a groundhog to sing his greatest hit.
Cheney, who was last seen smirking in a wheelchair on Inauguration Day, reprises his long-time role by telling Politico.com there is a "high probablity" of a nuclear or biological terrorist attack against the United States.
He also claims that Bush/Cheney kept post-9/11 America safe:
“If it hadn’t been for what we did — with respect to the terrorist surveillance program, or enhanced interrogation techniques for high-value detainees, the Patriot Act, and so forth — then we would have been attacked again,” he said. “Those policies we put in place, in my opinion, were absolutely crucial to getting us through the last seven-plus years without a major-casualty attack on the U.S.”
Cheney didn't offer an explanation about the one that actually happened on their watch, but I'm sure it must have been Bill Clinton's fault.
From Politico.com, here's more of Dick's Greatest Hits:
Cheney warned that there is a “high probability” that terrorists will attempt a catastrophic nuclear or biological attack in coming years, and said he fears the Obama administration’s policies will make it more likely the attempt will succeed.
Cheney unyieldingly defended the Bush administration’s support for the Guantanamo Bay prison and coercive interrogation of terrorism suspects.
And he asserted that President Obama will either backtrack on his stated intentions to end those policies or put the country at risk in ways more severe than most Americans — and, he charged, many members of Obama’s own team — understand.
“When we get people who are more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States against people who are absolutely committed to do anything they can to kill Americans, then I worry,” Cheney said.
Cheney unyieldingly defended the Bush administration’s support for the Guantanamo Bay prison and coercive interrogation of terrorism suspects.
And he asserted that President Obama will either backtrack on his stated intentions to end those policies or put the country at risk in ways more severe than most Americans — and, he charged, many members of Obama’s own team — understand.
“When we get people who are more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States against people who are absolutely committed to do anything they can to kill Americans, then I worry,” Cheney said.
The dire portrait Cheney painted of the country’s security situation was made even grimmer by his comments agreeing with analysts who believe this recession may be a once-in-a-century disaster.
“It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,” Cheney said. “The combination of the financial crisis that started last year, coupled now with, obviously, a major recession, I think we’re a long way from having solved these problems.”
The interview, less than two weeks after the Bush administration ceded power to Obama, found the man who is arguably the most controversial — and almost surely the most influential — vice president in U.S. history in a self-vindicating mood.
He expressed confidence that files will some day be publicly accessible offering specific evidence that waterboarding and other policies he promoted — over sharp internal dissent from colleagues and harsh public criticism — were directly responsible for averting new Sept. 11-style attacks.
“It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,” Cheney said. “The combination of the financial crisis that started last year, coupled now with, obviously, a major recession, I think we’re a long way from having solved these problems.”
The interview, less than two weeks after the Bush administration ceded power to Obama, found the man who is arguably the most controversial — and almost surely the most influential — vice president in U.S. history in a self-vindicating mood.
He expressed confidence that files will some day be publicly accessible offering specific evidence that waterboarding and other policies he promoted — over sharp internal dissent from colleagues and harsh public criticism — were directly responsible for averting new Sept. 11-style attacks.
Protecting the country’s security is “a tough, mean, dirty, nasty business,” he said. “These are evil people. And we’re not going to win this fight by turning the other cheek.”
Nixonian in background and nature, Dick Cheney will not be remembered as a man who got much right during his career of failing up. But "tough, mean, dirty, nasty" would be an apt etching on his eventual Wyoming headstone.
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