Holder and Investigation of CIA Interrogators

As Obama and his administration heap praise upon themselves for killing Osama bin Laden, Attorney General Eric Holder is busy with his criminal investigation of CIA interrogators.

Yeah, that's still going on.

Daniel Henninger, the Wall Street Journal writes:

As the whole of America takes a bin Laden victory lap, let us pause to remember some of this celebrated event's most forgotten men: the Central Intelligence Agency officers who sit under the cloud of a criminal investigation begun in 2009 by Attorney General Eric Holder into their interrogations of captured terrorists.

That's right, the Americans whose interrogation of al Qaeda operatives may have put in motion the death of this mass murderer may themselves face prosecution by the country they were trying to protect.

It is time for the Holder CIA investigation to end. The death of bin Laden 10 years after 9/11 makes the Holder investigation of the CIA interrogators politically, emotionally and morally moot.

But it lives.

What a bizarre disconnect!

Unfortunately, this sort of weirdness is business as usual for the Obama administration.

In August 2009, Attorney General Holder announced that he was extending the mandate of Assistant U.S. Attorney John Durham into the CIA's so-called "enhanced interrogation techniques" of terrorist detainees. Former Bush Attorney General Michael Mukasey had appointed Mr. Durham in 2008 as a special prosecutor to look into the CIA's destruction of videotapes made during interrogations of two al Qaeda operatives. That investigation ended without charges last November.

Mr. Holder decided to push the Durham investigation into a second phase. "I have concluded," he said "that the information known to me warrants opening a preliminary review into whether federal laws were violated in connection with the interrogation of specific detainees at overseas locations." Mr. Holder wasn't free-lancing; both he and Barack Obama had called waterboarding "torture."

Obama and Holder continue forward with looking at our CIA interrogators as criminals.

Rather than considering them to have played an important role in protecting the American people, Obama and Holder and the Leftist gang persist in treating them like enemies.

This week the Associated Press reported that the name of bin Laden's courier may have come from CIA interrogations of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Faraj al-Libi, who received "harsh" interrogation at CIA prisons in Poland and Romania. On Tuesday, Mr. Holder said the information came from a "mosaic of sources."

Incidentally, there will be no attempt here to establish whether CIA interrogations did or did not lead to the bin Laden courier, who led our commandos to a bedroom in Abbottabad. Just as there will be no attempt here to resolve the fastidious debate unfolding over whether the Navy Seals' shooting of an unarmed Osama bin Laden was "legal." We'll leave that to the endless grinding wheels of the law journals.

Awkward!

The CIA interrogators could be national heroes.

Obviously, the Obama administration doesn't want to know. Most specifically, they don't want us to know.

If Mr. Holder has evidence of an egregious crime, he should step forward and announce it. If not, he should use this moment to put an end to the Durham investigation. Mr. Durham is not an independent counsel, whose hallowed status makes attorneys general loath to interfere. He is a special prosecutor, appointed by the attorney general and under his authority.

On June 18 last year, Mr. Holder said in a Washington speech that Mr. Durham was "close to the end of the time that he needs and will be making recommendations to me." But nothing has happened. Asked this week about the status of this investigation, a Justice Department spokesman for Mr. Durham, whose office is in Connecticut, said the project is "still ongoing."

I agree.

If Holder has evidence of an egregious crime, tell us now. If not, stop this investigation.

It's wrong for Obama to commend the CIA piece of the "mosaic" in the nearly 10-year mission to get bin Laden while Holder is trying to pin interrogators with crimes.

Henninger concludes:

After 9/11, when the fraying started, George W. Bush passed through a seven-year political minefield of media leaks and lawsuits over the Patriot Act, surveillance, renditions, Guantanamo and CIA interrogations. Now bin Laden is dead, and Barack Obama's got the credit. We're all fine with that, just as we're fine with people chanting "USA" over the dead terrorist who tried to kill us. Now how about letting those CIA interrogators come in from the cold and join the celebration?

The Democrats, Leftists including Obama, before and after he became president, put President Bush and Vice President Cheney and the administration through hell as they waged war against bin Laden.

Thank God they had the character and the toughness to not be swayed by polls. Thank God they stood up to the attacks by the Dems and did what was necessary to protect us.

With bin Laden dead, and Leon Panetta admitting valuable intelligence was gained via the CIA, it's time to end the criminal investigation of the CIA interrogators.

Is it possible for Obama to put politics and his visions of reelection aside, just for a moment?

We'll see.

Osama: Obama, Democrats - Hypocrites

I've had enough of the Democrats and the Leftists strutting around praising Obama for HIS success in achieving the death of Osama bin Laden.

For years, they attacked and attempted to undermine President George W. Bush and the Bush administration. They vehemently objected to the methods utilized to deal with the terrorist threat and protect us.

Their assault was relentless, accusing President Bush and Vice President Cheney of being war criminals.

WATERBOARDING.

ENHANCED INTERROGATION.

SECRET PRISONS.

WARRANTLESS WIRETAPPING.

Obama was adamant about closing Guantanamo Bay.

He and the Democrats opposed the very methods that allowed for bin Laden to be killed.

Here's a sampling of video, via Mark Levin:

FORMER Sen. Russ Feingold lies and rails against collecting intelligence.



David Gregory lectures President Bush on the interrogation bill.



Matt Lauer accuses President Bush of using illegal methods to obtain information.



Obama signs his first executive order - to close Gitmo.

OBAMA: Guantanamo will be closed no later than one year from now.

Of course, that didn't happen.



Dick Cheney defends President Bush and the interrogation methods used to protect the country. This is must-see.



Obama chastises Dick Cheney for objecting to Obama's plan to close Gitmo.



Obama says he "fundamentally disagrees with Dick Cheney."

So, Obama and his Democrat comrades mercilessly attacked the Bush administration, while now they're hoping to take sole credit for getting bin Laden, and wallowing in the news of his death.

It's absurd.

It's a disgrace.

Democrat Gwen Moore wanted President Bush impeached.

Yesterday, she touted the mission, military action within the borders of a sovereign nation. She didn't call for Obama's impeachment because he gave the kill order to get bin Laden in Pakistan.

Moore's statement:

"I applaud our military, our President, and his national security team for ridding the world of the dark presence of Osama bin Laden. He has held the world captive, and his death ends a tragic chapter in a horror story where extremists target innocent civilians with murder, mayhem and fear.

"Bin Laden’s death brings a sense of relief to the families who lost loved ones on 9/11 and indeed every American. Our global partners and allies and peoples all over the world – regardless of race, creed, color, country, or religion – stand vigilant and unified with us today to rebuke this extremism and break free from the bondage of fear."

Personally, I don't feel a sense of relief. I'm glad bin Laden has been brought to justice, but I don't feel safer at all. This war, and it is a war, is not over.

In sum, Obama and the Democrats are shameless in their hypocrisy.

President Bush and Vice President Cheney have been vindicated.

Without their efforts and their tireless battle against Obama and the Democrats, bin Laden would be alive today; and Obama wouldn't be planning a 2012 election photo-op at Ground Zero on Thursday.
_________________

UPDATE: During the afternoon White House press briefing, Jay Carney insists that Obama hasn't changed his mind about the Bush policy interrogation methods.

Of course, Obama kept the vast majority of those policies in place, reneging on his promises.

Naked Woman in Cheney's Sunglasses

This story is hilarious.

Yes, I'm sure the White House would post a photo of the Vice President that revealed an image of a naked woman reflected in his sunglasses.



Where's the White House photo of the President guzzling from a bottle of Jack Daniel's? I can't find that one on the website.

There's an official White House photo of Laura Bush sucking on the toes of Nicolas Sarkozy, right?



Clearly, the image is not a naked woman. Not even close. I wonder who was the first to suggest that it was, because that individual certainly doesn't know what a naked woman looks like.

Reporting on CNN, Veronica De La Cruz suggested, "Maybe it's Lynne."

What a classy comment!

David Letterman and Dick Cheney

The Writers Guild of America strike has now lasted 12 weeks and 5 days.

Late night TV talk shows are suffering because of it. The only guests Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien have had are NBC news personalities, politicians, and animals.

David Letterman and his Worldwide Pants, however, were able to cut a deal and bring the writers back to work.


This is what Letterman's writers produced to entertain America:

From the January 31 Late Show with David Letterman, inspired by Vice President Dick Cheney's 67th birthday on Wednesday, the "Top Ten Things Overheard at Dick Cheney's Birthday Party."

10. "Medic!"

9. "That's nice -- a card from Osama"

8. "He must be happy -- he's sneering from ear to ear"

7. "MMMMM! chocolate cake with Lipitor frosting"

6. "Clear!"

5. "Dick, you don't look a day over 93"

4. "Hey, his daughter is making out with Condoleeza"

3. "Instead of a pinata, we're gonna beat a Gitmo inmate"

2. "How about a rousing chorus of 'For He's a Miserable, Old Prick!"

1. "Duck!"

If this is the best work that Letterman's writers can do, I wish they were still on strike.

I became aware of this Top Ten List via the Media Research Center.

After reading it, I did go to the CBS website and watched the clip of Letterman delivering it. It was painful.

I used to be a regular viewer of Letterman's NBC show. (Remember when the home office was located in Milwaukee?) I continued watching when he moved to CBS. Eventually, I only tuned in to Letterman when I was interested in seeing a guest. I'd grown so tired of his mannerisms and smirks that I found myself too annoyed to enjoy the show. It was at the end of the campaign for Election 2000 that I pretty much said goodbye to Letterman for good. In addition to being bugged by his worn-out shtick, I wasn't interested in dealing with his clearly liberal political bias.

The Top Ten List above reminds me why Letterman is no longer a part of my nightly TV viewing.

To be fair, Letterman certainly isn't the only comedian to make fun of Dick Cheney, his health, and his hunting accident.

But what strikes me about this list is the fact that Letterman himself has had serious heart problems and bypass surgery. Numbers 10, 7, 6, and 5 could be applied to Letterman.

The audience laughed and applauded, but I don't think it's funny.

Moreover, I think it's particularly offensive for Letterman to mock Mary Cheney, the Vice President's daughter.

It's a double standard. Lib Letterman can joke about Mary Cheney being a lesbian and make insinuations about Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Do you think that a conservative could get away with making fun of a liberal's sexual orientation, without being slammed as a bigot?

I don't.

I think Number 2 on the Top Ten List above would be perfect for Letterman.

Mushy Dowd

Maureen Dowd seems to be trying to fill the void left open by the writers' strike.

In her column "Mushy: Handsome in Uniform," Dowd has taken one of her breaks from reality and lapsed into creative writing again.

This time she fantasizes about President Bush and his relationship with Mushy, Pakistan's General Pervez Musharraf.

She writes:

President Bush came to the steps of the Capitol yesterday for a Second Inaugural do-over. Here is the text of his revised speech:

ON this day, when we celebrate the durable wisdom of our Constitution, we must remember: Constitutions don’t work for everyone. It’s not a one-size-fits-all type deal.

We are led, by recent events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the repression of liberty in other lands.

Once I thought my daddy was a wimp for cuddlin’ up real close with dictators, tradin’ stability for freedom. But now I gotta admit, that’s a darn fair trade. As I told Mushy last night on that cool, high-tech videophone I got in the Sit Room, the best hope for expanding peace is expanding dictators.

In America’s ideal of freedom, we are ennobled by a heart for the weak. But we must also have a heart for the strongmen.

Sometimes when the soul of a nation speaks, we must listen. But if that soul is housed in a bunch of trial lawyers wearing identical dark suits and calling my man Mushy a “dog,” I say, bring on the batons. Police tear-gassing lawyers is really just a foreign version of tort reform, which I support.

Those lawyers should be in jail. Mushy told me they were reckonin’ to represent Osama when General-General catches him. Which will be any day now. He’s a man of his word.

I don’t blame Mushy for dissolving that disloyal Supreme Court. When I needed to subvert the democratic process during the 2000 recount, my Supreme Court was totally supportive.

House arrest for that fired chief justice sounds very relaxin’, especially if he’s got a feather pillow.

...I looked into Mushy’s eyes and saw a master, a man committed to helping us fight terror. And sometimes we must fight terror with tyranny. He promised me he’d be a more low-key autocrat, stop wearing that scary uniform — at least when he’s playing tennis.

From now on, it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of tyrannical movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending democracy in our world so liberty can thrive.

We will persistently clarify the moral choice before every ruler and nation: Choose oppression, which can work, as we see with our Arab allies, or freedom, which — O.K., I admit it this once — we can’t make work in Iraq.

...Condi was very worried about Mushy suspending the Constitution, but Vice says Constitutions are for sissies. He doesn’t see anything wrong with Mushy’s press blackout. He thinks we can learn a few lessons from him.

...All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: the United States will ignore your oppression and excuse your oppressors. When you stand for your liberty, we will not stand with you.

I wonder. Does Dowd really believe what she writes?

Are her columns true reflections of her opinions, or is she just giving her lib elite audience what they want?

Is Dowd really able to swallow her own tripe?

---"As I told Mushy last night on that cool, high-tech videophone I got in the Sit Room, the best hope for expanding peace is expanding dictators."

---"The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the repression of liberty in other lands."

---"When I needed to subvert the democratic process during the 2000 recount, my Supreme Court was totally supportive."

---"[S]ometimes we must fight terror with tyranny."

---"From now on, it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of tyrannical movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending democracy in our world so liberty can thrive."

---"Choose oppression, which can work, as we see with our Arab allies, or freedom, which — O.K., I admit it this once — we can’t make work in Iraq."

---"Condi was very worried about Mushy suspending the Constitution, but Vice says Constitutions are for sissies. He doesn’t see anything wrong with Mushy’s press blackout. He thinks we can learn a few lessons from him."

---"All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: the United States will ignore your oppression and excuse your oppressors. When you stand for your liberty, we will not stand with you."

This stuff is sick.

Dowd despises Bush and Cheney and Rice with every fiber of her being.

Her mercilessness is her defining characteristic as a columnist.

This piece, however, is particularly caustic.

It's hard to distinguish between her hate for Bush and her hate for America.

IMPEACH BUSH DAY

It's a big day for ImpeachBush.org.

They'll be taking to the streets all over the country today, united in their lunacy -- IMPEACH BUSH AND CHENEY.

I found this message in my inbox yesterday. I don't know how I got on this group's e-mail list.

Tomorrow, October 27
March for impeachment and to end the war!
Your help is needed.

Tomorrow, Saturday, October 27, tens of thousands of people nationwide will take to the streets demanding impeachment and an end to the war. ImpeachBush members are mobilizing nationwide to take part in these actions. The call for impeachment is being heard coast to coast. Congress is unable to hide from this constitutional requirement being demanded by their constituencies.

We are hitting the streets again on October 27 as mass actions sweep this country in mass regional demonstrations in San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Seattle, Boston, Orlando and Ft. Lauderdale, Fl., Chattanooga, New Orleans, Salt Lake City, Philadelphia, Jonesboro, and others. To see the exact locations and times for the various demonstrations, go to the ImpeachBush homepage.

ImpeachBush is mobilizing buses, printing posters, placards, banners and leaflets for October 27. Please join us on Saturday and let the message of impeachment appear in the streets from one end of the country to the other. If you cannot come, but would like to make a donation to help others participate in the demonstrations demanding an end to the war and the impeachment of Bush and Cheney, you can do so by clicking this link.

The impeachment movement is growing now more than ever. It is needed not only to stop Bush and the war criminals that surround him, but fundamentally to make the political system accountable to the people. Our fight is a fight that has ramifications far beyond 2007. Bush must be impeached for war crimes - and he must be removed from office before he plunges yet another country, Iran, into war, massive death and devastation. Impeachment is the constitutional mechanism to stop despotism, to make the political system that reflects the will of the vast majority rather than a tiny few. It is our democratic right and one that must be enforced. We need your help now in this fight. Please make as generous a donation as you can by clicking here.

Right.

Bush must be stopped before he plunges that peace-loving nation Iran into war. Bush is Hitler and Ahmadinejad is Gandhi.

The people can make the difference. The politicians provide cover for Bush’s criminal war in Iraq, his illegal spying on the people, his creation of secret torture facilities and his other illegal and impeachable offenses.. But the people are organizing to demand that Bush and every elected official be held accountable for illegal activity. Impeachment can never be “off the table," and the impeachment movement is making it clear that we won't let it be. The pressure on Congress to act is building.

Sounds like something Springsteen would say.

For this Saturday's actions to succeed, however, we need to raise tens of thousands of dollars in just the next few days to cover the costs of literature, posters, stickers, signs, and banners and turn out around the country. Click this link to make a generous donation right now.

Go to ImpeachBush.org to see a list of the cities holding Oct. 27 demonstration.

The group is even having a sale on ImpeachBush sweatshirts!



Only $11.50! That's a bargain.

It's too late to get one for the march today, but Lefties might want to get a jump on their Christmas shopping.

Sorry. I mean holiday shopping, or winter solstice shopping, or whatever it is that Lefties celebrate in December.

Cousin Dick and Cousin Barack

One big, happy family

U.S. Senator Barack Obama (L) (D-IL) re-enacts being sworn-in by U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney (R) on Capitol Hill in Washington, January 4, 2005. With him are his wife Michelle and their two daughters Malia (L) and Sasha. (Jason Reed/Reuters)

You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family.

I would never have guessed that Dick Cheney and Barack Obama are family.

Yes, they are very distant relatives; but they do share a branch on their family trees.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- There's no sign of a family reunion planned, but U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama are distant cousins.

So says the vice president's wife, Lynne Cheney, who said she discovered that her husband of 43 years is eighth cousins with the senator from Illinois.

...Mrs. Cheney told MSNBC on Tuesday that it was "an amazing American story that one ancestor ... could be responsible down the family line for lives that have taken such different and varied paths."

The common ancestor was Mareen Devall, who the Chicago Sun-Times said was a 17th century immigrant from France.

Mrs. Cheney said she discovered the link through family research for her new book, "Blue Skies, No Fences," about growing up in Wyoming.

That's wild.

Star Wars Fan Cold Fish Hillary Clinton

When will she learn?

Hillary Clinton is not funny. She's humorless.

Madeleine Albright claims that Hillary is not a "cold fish."

Albright: There has been a real attempt to portray her as a cold fish, and she is not.

From what I've seen since Hillary came on the national scene, she is an extremely cold fish.

I'd like Bill Clinton to weigh in on this. Is Hillary as cold as she seems?

Her attempts to come off as warm and genuine are icy, staged, and tend to backfire.

The woman cannot tell a joke.

Remember this one?

HILLARY CLINTON: "I love this quote from Mahatma Gandhi - who ran a gas station down in St. Louis for a couple of years. Mr. Gandhi - do you still go down to the gas station? A lot of wisdom comes out of that gas station."

Not funny. In fact, it's offensive.

Last night, Hillary made another attempt to shed her cold fish scales and be humorous.

Didn't work.

Ben Smith writes:

"Vice President Cheney came up to see the Republicans yesterday. You can always tell when the Republicans are getting restless, because the Vice President’s motorcade pulls into the Capitol, and Darth Vader emerges," Hillary Clinton said just now at a $100-a-head fundraiser at Town Hall near New York's Times Square, referring to Cheney's efforts shore up Republican congressional support for the Iraq war.

"I’m not invited to their meetings and I don’t know what he says or does," she said, in an informal conversation on stage with former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack and retired General Wesley Clark. "But all the brave talk about bringing our troops home, and setting deadlines, and getting out by a certain date just dissipated."

She was referring specifically to the White House's successful effort to stem Republican support for Senator Jim Webb's legislation to limit troop deployments, which failed today in the Senate by a vote of 56-44, short of the 60 it needed to pass.

Yeah, that Hillary is a class act.

Referring to the Vice President as Darth Vader is so presidential.

I'm sure the MoveOn loons are loving it, but I think such comments diminish her stature.

Darth Vader?

That's so inappropriate.

Hillary should know that when you're running for president, no public conversation is "informal."

She's not just a cold fish. She's frozen solid.

Mondale Follows in Carter's Footsteps

Former Vice President to the miserable failure President Jimmy Carter is weighing in on Dick Cheney in a Washington Post op-ed piece, "Answering to No One."

Unfortunately, Mondale has decided to disgrace himself by spouting loony stuff. Rather than conduct himself in an honorable manner, he traded his dignity for spitefulness and joined the lib fray to bash the Bush administration.

It's really too bad.

Why emulate the disastrous Carter and the rabid Left?

Mondale writes of his experience as VP, serving one term with Carter.

The Post's recent series on Dick Cheney's vice presidency certainly got my attention. Having held that office myself over a quarter-century ago, I have more than a passing interest in its evolution from the backwater of American politics to the second most powerful position in our government. Almost all of that evolution, under presidents and vice presidents of both parties, has been positive -- until now. Under George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, it has gone seriously off track.

...Our relationship depended on trust, mutual respect and an acknowledgement that there was only one agenda to be served -- the president's. Every Monday the two of us met privately for lunch; we could, and did, talk candidly about virtually anything. By the end of four years we had completed the "executivization" of the vice presidency, ending two centuries of confusion, derision and irrelevance surrounding the office.

Subsequent administrations followed this pattern. George H.W. Bush, Dan Quayle and Al Gore built their vice presidencies after this model, allowing for their different interests, experiences and capabilities as well as the needs of the presidents they served.

Then, Mondale details why he considers Vice President Dick Cheney to be a power hungry nutjob.

This all changed in 2001, and especially after Sept. 11, when Cheney set out to create a largely independent power center in the office of the vice president. His was an unprecedented attempt not only to shape administration policy but, alarmingly, to limit the policy options sent to the president. It is essential that a president know all the relevant facts and viable options before making decisions, yet Cheney has discarded the "honest broker" role he played as President Gerald Ford's chief of staff.

Through his vast government experience, through the friends he had been able to place in key positions and through his considerable political skills, he has been increasingly able to determine the answers to questions put to the president -- because he has been able to determine the questions. It was Cheney who persuaded President Bush to sign an order that denied access to any court by foreign terrorism suspects and Cheney who determined that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to enemy combatants captured in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Rather than subject his views to an established (and rational) vetting process, his practice has been to trust only his immediate staff before taking ideas directly to the president. Many of the ideas that Bush has subsequently bought into have proved offensive to the values of the Constitution and have been embarrassingly overturned by the courts.

The corollary to Cheney's zealous embrace of secrecy is his near total aversion to the notion of accountability. I've never seen a former member of the House of Representatives demonstrate such contempt for Congress -- even when it was controlled by his own party. His insistence on invoking executive privilege to block virtually every congressional request for information has been stupefying -- it's almost as if he denies the legitimacy of an equal branch of government. Nor does he exhibit much respect for public opinion, which amounts to indifference toward being held accountable by the people who elected him.

Whatever authority a vice president has is derived from the president under whom he serves. There are no powers inherent in the office; they must be delegated by the president. Somehow, not only has Cheney been given vast authority by President Bush -- including, apparently, the entire intelligence portfolio -- but he also pursues his own agenda. The real question is why the president allows this to happen.

The Democrats, present and past players, have really taken an ugly turn.

Their relentless thrashing of the Bush administration is unseemly at best, and aiding our enemies at worst.

I think much like Carter, Mondale can't bear the fact that he holds a negative place in our history.

By stomping on the current administration, he hopes to elevate himself.

It's a selfish, highly inappropriate move.

Past former presidents and vice presidents were much more restrained when it came to criticizing the sitting president and vice president.

With Carter, it's no holds barred. It's like a sickness with him. He's addicted to slamming Bush, Israel, and propping up terrorists.

Maybe Mondale is upset about Stephen Hayes' new book, Cheney: The Untold Story of America's Most Powerful and Controversial Vice President. Mondale could be jealous that he has such an overwhelmingly pitiful legacy.

Maybe he thinks if he criticizes the United States and its leaders enough he'll get some recognition. A Nobel Peace Prize for him is out of the question, but some Lefties might at least give him a nod to acknowledge that they remember he once was a heartbeat from the presidency.

Mondale concludes his column with this:

Since the Carter administration left office, we have been criticized for many things. Yet I remain enormously proud of what we did in those four years, especially that we told the truth, obeyed the law and kept the peace.

I have no idea why Mondale would be proud to have been part of the disastrous Carter era.

I think Mondale has blocked out much of what happened during those four years.

They didn't keep the peace. They helped to create the mess of Iran and the rise of radical Islam. They were impotent in dealing with the Soviet Union. Domestically, they were complete failures, unless you find "malaise" a desired state.

It took Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush to come in and clean up after them. It took years to undo the damage they did and the work isn't finished yet.

In short, Mondale should show more respect for the office he once held if he can't summon up the decency to respect its current occupant.

He should publish his scribblings on kook Left-wing blogs. Now that I think about it, I guess The Washington Post is the right place for his drivel.

I'm Disowning Russ Feingold

Russ Feingold gave up on his 2008 presidential fantasy months ago, before Thanksgiving 2006.

Even though he doesn't have front and center status anymore compared to the Dem presidential candidates, Feingold refuses to accept being in the back seat.

He longs to be in the spotlight. It probably kills him to see Dennis Kucinich getting more press than he does.

So, Feingold has a new plan.

It's as if Feingold is appealing to every fringe lib kook to start a "draft Feingold for 2008" movement.

He might be hoping that Hillary taps him to be her running mate, to get a real extremist on the ticket to appease the radical Left and make placing a vote for Hillary easier for them to swallow.

Maybe he's positioning himself to take part in a third party campaign, perhaps as Michael Bloomberg's VP. I doubt that's the case but ambition is a powerful thing and power is intoxicating.

Whatever end Feingold is pursuing doesn't matter. What counts is that he's putting his massive ego ahead of the good of the country.


He keeps coming up with new troop withdrawal deadlines for the war in Iraq. He tried to censure President Bush once already and now he's going to try again.

It's all the same: LOOK AT ME. LOOK AT ME. LOOK AT ME.

Feingold talked about his latest attention-getting plan on Sunday's Meet the Press.

I have to believe that Feingold asked for the air time. Other than the censure thing, there was no reason to have him on the program. It all seemed staged.

His performance yesterday was similar to his others on Meet the Press. He said outrageous things and talked of his outrageous schemes -- all attacking the President.

A Feingold appearance on MTP is a creepy glimpse of an ego run amok.

Some highlights:

ON GENOCIDE IN IRAQ

Feingold doesn't worry about a potential humanitarian disaster if U.S. troops withdraw from Iraq abruptly.

MR. RUSSERT: You were—used the word redeployed. John Burns, the bureau chief in Baghdad for The New York Times, who’s lived there for some time, offered these words this week: “It seems to me incontrovertible that the most likely outcome of an American withdrawal any time soon would be cataclysmic violence. And I find that to be widely agreed” among “Iraqis, including Iraqis who strongly opposed the invasion.” Is—are you concerned that we leave behind violence, catastrophe, genocide?

SEN. FEINGOLD: Let’s be clear what we have now. We now have cataclysmic violence. That’s the status quo. It is possible that things would get worse if we left; it is possible that things would get better. But this is what I believe: Right now we’re holding the bag in Iraq. The other countries in the region—Iran, Syria, Jordan, Kuwait—they have an interest in stability in Iraq because, if what you say will happen, it will cause great instability in their countries and danger for them. The only way we get them engaged, the only way they put up the money and the resources to stabilize this situation is if we stop what they consider to be an occupation of Iraq. So I think the only way to avoid the situation getting worse is for us to orderly redeploy our troops and get these other countries engaged in what is in their own interest, which is a stable Iraq.

MR. RUSSERT: So, if the country explodes, you think you get the attention of people in the region?

SEN. FEINGOLD: I’m, I’m saying it would not necessarily get worse if we, if we took the step of redeploying. I’ve heard a number of experts on the Foreign Relations Committee come in and say, in fact, it’s just the opposite. It is our occupation, as it’s perceived, that leads to so much of this free- floating violence throughout the country, not through any fault of ours, but it creates an environment that leads to more and more violence, more and more possible genocide, more and more tribal tension. Our getting out in an orderly way at least gives the opportunity for a new start in Iraq, and that’s what it’s time for us to do.

What a convoluted mess!

Feingold says that "cataclysmic violence" and genocide are happening in Iraq. It's the status quo.

His plan to address this disaster?

Leave.

That's straight from the Obama school of dealing with genocide.

ON CENSURE OF THE PRESIDENT

MR. RUSSERT: President Bush is determined to continue the war in Iraq, he’s made that very, very clear. Is there anything that Democrats can do to get him to pay attention or to hold him accountable, in their minds?

What a set up!

That question sounds as spontaneous as a Jay Leno exchange with a guest plugging a new movie.

Russert's follow-up questions are just as scripted.

Really lame.

SEN. FEINGOLD: Well, I’m shocked by the administration, in particular the president’s response to the November election. Usually, when presidents are repudiated in elections, they say, “Well, maybe I ought to reassess.” Instead, he did just the opposite. He did this surge, which went contrary to the will of the American people. I think we need to do something serious in terms of accountability. And that’s why I will be shortly introducing a censure resolution of the president and the administration. One, on their getting us into the war of Iraq—in Iraq and their failure to adequately prepare our military and the misleading statements that have continued throughout the war in Iraq. And the second, on this administration’s outrageous attack on the rule of law, all the way from the illegal terrorist surveillance program to their attitude about torture, which we heard a little bit about today on this show. This administration has assaulted the Constitution. We need to have on the historical record some kind of indication that what has happened here is, in the words of Director McConnell, as you just quoted him, disastrous. Somehow we have to address that. And I think it’s a good time to begin that process.

MR. RUSSERT: A censure resolution against the president?

SEN. FEINGOLD: Correct.

MR. RUSSERT: Anybody else?

SEN. FEINGOLD: Potentially yes. I think when it comes to Iraq, obviously the vice president. Vice President Cheney has been one of the worst actors in American history in this situation. There may be others. On the rule of law issue, on the attack on the Constitution, the current attorney general has had one of the worst records of not being honest with the Judiciary Committee, of being intentionally misleading, and of not taking responsibility for everything from the disastrous consequences of the Patriot Act to the U.S. attorneys debacle. So, yes, potentially others. But, of course, the president. Since the buck stops with the president, that is the number one.

This is all shameless grandstanding.

Russert challenged Feingold, suggesting that Americans might not respond well to his censure plan.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you think the American people will look on this saying, “Here go the Democrats just trying to create something sensational by censuring the president rather than trying to solve the problem of Iraq”?

SEN. FEINGOLD: Well, there’s a lot of sentiment in the country, even the polls show it, for actually impeaching the president and the vice president. I think that they have committed impeachable offenses with regard to this terrorist surveillance program and making up their own program. What I am proposing is a moderate course, not tying up the Senate and the House with an impeachment trial, but simply passing resolutions that make sure that the historical record shows the way they have weakened our country, weakened our country militarily and against al-Qaeda, and weakened our country’s fundamental document, the Constitution. I think that’s a reasonable course and does not get in the way of our normal work. But the American people are outraged at the way they’ve been treated. They are outraged at the dishonesty that they have been subjected to. The American people—we deserve better than the way we’ve been treated, and somehow this has to be reflected.

Good grief.

Feingold says that Bush and Cheney have committed impeachable offenses.

That's the way he sees it. However, Judge Feingold has decided that it would be too messy to go through an impeachment. Instead, he thinks censuring Bush and Cheney will be enough.

If Feingold really believes that the President and Vice President have committed impeachable offenses, then it's his duty to pursue impeachment.

His explanation that a censure would provide plenty of humiliation for the history books is just stupid.

He sounds like a girl in junior high seeking revenge on her arch-nemesis.

Feingold says, "[T]he American people are outraged at the way they’ve been treated. They are outraged at the dishonesty that they have been subjected to.The American people—we deserve better than the way we’ve been treated, and somehow this has to be reflected."

What a load!

I think Wisconsinites deserve better than Russ "John Doe Amendment killer" Feingold.

As a resident of Wisconsin, I am embarrassed that Feingold is my senator.

His most recent censure effort is a disgrace.

It's particularly pointless since he admits that a censure "does not have legal consequences to my knowledge."

So it's just a feel good measure?

A sloppy wet kiss planted on the radical Left?

Look at this from Feingold's U.S. Senate website:

Feingold is encouraging people to email suggestions of what to include in the censure resolution. People can email Senator Feingold at Russell_Feingold@feingold.senate.gov or visit his webpage at http://feingold.senate.gov/.

He's inviting every lib nutjob to give input on his censure resolution.

Way to get them eating out of your hand, Russ!


I can't go on like this. I hereby formally disown Russ Feingold.
___________________________

Read the complete transcript or watch the netcast here.
___________________________

A new Feingold biography!

It's called Feingold: A New Democratic Party, by Sanford D. Horwitt.

In a statement, Feingold said of the book, "I appreciate this portrayal, which shows what good fortune I have had in my life, with so many great people to point me in the right direction."

Horwitt called Feingold "the leading, most authentic progressive voice on the national stage." He traced that back to Feingold's childhood, especially his father's influence.

"Feingold, at a very early age, absorbed this true progressive tradition, in the way that some young kids absorb being baseball fans," Horwitt said. "It is deep in his bones and soul."

...When [Robert F.] Kennedy was assassinated, "Feingold was barely awake when his mother delivered the horrifying news in his bedroom, and his immediate, agonized scream carried through the house. Now two of his heroes had been gunned down within two months," following the assassination of Martin Luther King.

That day, Feingold vowed that he wouldn't let the assassinations stop their work, telling himself, "I'm going to be the guy who goes out and tries to continue their work in some way. I had no idea it would ever be this."

President Dick Cheney

The nightmare of nightmare for Lefties will become reality for a few hours tomorrow.

Vice President Dick Cheney will officially have the powers of President of the United States when George W. Bush undergoes a colonoscopy.

WASHINGTON -- President Bush will undergo a routine colonoscopy Saturday and temporarily hand presidential powers over to Vice President Dick Cheney, the White House said.

The same thing happened in June 2002.

The political climate was so different five years ago.

We were at war but we weren't at war in Iraq.

I suppose some of the loons on the Left will come up with weird theories, that Cheney will bomb Iran tomorrow or pardon Scooter Libby.

I think Helen Thomas should be placed on suicide watch.

She did say, "The day I say Dick Cheney is going to run for president, I'll kill myself."

Who knows what she'll do when Cheney actually becomes president for a while tomorrow?

I wouldn't be surprised if Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Dems are fantasizing about Cheney having a health problem and becoming incapacitated during his hours as president, forcing powers to be transferred to her.

I'll be praying that President Bush's procedure goes well.

Dick Durbin's Plan to Defund Dick Cheney

Sen. Dick Durbin has a plan.

He wants to defund the Vice President of the United States.

Sen. Dick Durbin thinks he may have found a way to get Vice President Dick Cheney's attention on the matter of the vice president's refusal to annually report how much information his office classifies and declassifies:

Pull the funding for the vice president's office.

The vice president's residence is safe, however -- the lights will remain on.

For several years, Cheney has refused to comply with an executive order – which his boss, the president, signed, in 2003 – requiring any entity within the executive branch to report annually on its classification activity.

...Durbin (D-Ill.) is chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government. So today, he included wording in his appropriation bill to suspend funds for the Office of the Vice President next year unless until Cheney complies with Executive Order 12958.

The order demands an annual accounting of the classification and declassification of government records by the Information Security and Oversight Office of the National Archives, which in turn calls on executive offices to report their volume of activity. Dozens of agencies report in each year, but the vice president's office has refused since 2003.

"This executive order establishes uniform, government-wide procedures for classifying, safeguarding, and declassifying national security information,'' Durbin noted today. "Among other obligations, it requires an "entity within the executive branch that comes into the possession of classified information" to report annually on how much it is keeping secret.

"The Office of the Vice President asserts that it is not such an “entity within the executive branch,'' Durbin said in a statement issued today. "Serious questions have been raised recently about both the legality and the appropriateness of the Vice President exempting his office from the rules that apply to all other Executive Branch officials.''

So Durbin's committee today "took the step of restricting funding for the Office of the Vice President for fiscal year 2008 unless and until they comply with the executive order.'' This bill has a few hurdles to get through, of course, not the least of which is the president's signature.

Cheney can sleep well at night, in any case.

Durbin notes that funding for the official residence of the vice president comes from a different account and is not affectied by today's committee action.

Good grief.

Durbin is nuts. And this man occupies the Dems' second highest position of power in the U.S. Senate.

It seems every day he morphs more into being like Dennis Kucinich.

What a guy!


"If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime—Pol Pot or others —that had no concern for human beings."

--DICK DURBIN

Kucinich: Articles of Impeachment, Richard B. Cheney

Dennis Kucinich has big plans, big stupid plans.

Dana Milbank of The Washington Post writes:

"I do not stand alone," Dennis Kucinich said as he stood, alone, in front of a cluster of microphones yesterday evening.

The Ohio congressman, a Democratic presidential candidate, was holding a news conference outside the Capitol to announce that he had just filed articles of impeachment against Vice President Cheney. But subsequent questioning quickly revealed that Kucinich had not yet persuaded any of his 434 colleagues to be a cosponsor, that he had not even discussed the matter with House Democratic leaders, and that he had not raised the subject with the Judiciary Committee.

I'm confident in saying that I do not stand alone in thinking that Kucinich is mentally unstable.

...It was not an auspicious beginning for the impeachment of Richard B. Cheney. Kucinich had called his news conference for noon on the terrace of the Cannon building. But minutes before the event, his office sent out a statement: "News reports this morning indicate the Vice President was experiencing a medical crisis. Until the vice president's condition is clarified, I am placing any action on hold."

This was odd, because the vice president's spokeswoman had already announced that Cheney had merely gone to a doctor's office to check on a blood clot in his leg, which is improving. Cheney himself, far from suffering a medical crisis, joined Senate Republicans for lunch at the Capitol. "The leg's doing good," Cheney announced after lunch, his lips in his trademark snarl. Indeed, he was feeling so well that he chose to start a new fight with congressional Democrats. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was not only "uninformed and misleading," but also practicing "defeatism," Cheney said. Democrats are guilty of "political calculation" and "blind opposition."

Reid visited the same microphones minutes later to return the playground taunts: "I'm not going to get into a name-calling match with somebody who has a 9 percent approval rating." And: "I'm not going to get into a name-calling match with the administration's chief attack dog."

How weird!

Kucinich is certainly out of the loop.

"News reports this morning indicate the Vice President was experiencing a medical crisis. Until the vice president's condition is clarified, I am placing any action on hold."

What was that about?

Did Kucinich think he could use the "medical crisis" excuse to postpone his impeachment announcement because the odds are good that the Vice Presient would be experiencing health crisis?

Why would he say something so easily shown to be utterly false?

Regarding the Cheney-Reid feud, I wouldn't call it an exchange of "playground taunts."

I think Reid is actually doing far more to harm Cheney, and thereby the nation, than Kucinich's impeachment dance.

Reid is the majority leader of the Senate, not one of hundreds of U.S. representatives.

Cheney didn't engage in name-calling. He was merely responding to Reid's disgraceful declaration that the war in Iraq is lost. Cheney was criticizing Reid's comments and rightfully so.

Reid, on the other hand, acted in a bullying, childish manner. Taunting the Vice President and calling him an "attack dog" is highly inappropriate. Reid continues to reveal himself as severely lacking in terms of civility and principles and just common decency.

Kucinich evidently realized there was no reason for him to get cold feet just because of Cheney's leg. A few minutes after the Cheney-Reid showdown, the congressman arrived in the Speaker's Lobby off the House floor, handing out news releases to any reporter he could find: "Kucinich to Move Forward with Impeachment News Conference."

Washingtonpost.com's Paul Kane showed the news release to House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), who declined to endorse the Kucinich crusade. "He was busily engaged in handing that out," Hoyer observed. "Beyond that, I don't have any thought about it."

Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), chairman of the House Democratic caucus, was equally dismissive -- "Dennis can do what he wants; I'm not going to support it" -- but used the occasion to try out some Cheney material: "This is the biggest setback for the vice president since oil went under 65 bucks a barrel."

Kucinich's relationship with his fellow Dems reminds me of the way a family grudgingly tolerates that strange bachelor uncle at holiday gatherings and other family functions. He's kind of an embarrassment, but he belongs to them.

Kucinich, however, did not find humor in the matter. Standing perhaps 5 feet 6 inches tall in shoes, he wore a solemn face as he approached the microphones, which nearly reached his eye level. He beckoned to aides, who handed out thick binders detailing the case.

Kucinich read at length from his articles of impeachment, undeterred by rush-hour traffic noise on Independence Avenue ("I'll wait till the truck goes by here," he said at one point) and wind that ruffled his text and the few strands of his hair that were insufficiently weighted by Brylcreem. Tom Ferraro of Reuters asked Kucinich if any other lawmakers supported impeachment.

"Because this resolution is so weighty in its import, it's going to be important for members of Congress to have sufficient time to study the articles," Kucinich answered.

Milbank gets rather personal.

Was it really necessary to "taunt" Kucinich about his height and his hair?

We'll take that as a no. "So at this point you stand alone?" Ferraro pressed.

"I believe I stand with millions of Americans," Kucinich parried.

I don't know about millions, but there definitely are Americans that are so rabid in their hatred for President Bush and his administration that they've lost their ability to reason.

Someone else asked why Kucinich targeted Cheney but not Cheney's boss. "There's a practical reason," the congressman explained. "If we were to start with the president and pursue articles of impeachment, Mr. Cheney would then become president. . . . You would then have to go through the constitutional agony of impeaching two presidents consecutively."

I wondered why Kucinich was going after Cheney before Bush.

Yes, it would be "constitutional agony" to impeach two presidents consectutively.

I guess he thinks it's a lesser agony to impeach a vice president and then a president.

That's much less painful.

Bush Derangement Syndrome, Cheney Variant

Charles Krauthammer, psychiatrist and political columnist, analyzes a bizarre article written by Michelle Cottle, "Heart of Darkness."

Appearing in the revamped New Republic, she attempts to answer the burning question, "What is wrong with Dick Cheney?"

Krauthammer does a great job of dissecting Cottle's theory and exposing her idiocy. He depicts her goofy premise as being so far over the edge that one can only respond with laughter. The problem is the woman is serious. She argues that Cheney's heart disease has "left him demented and mentally disordered," and she means it.

Krauthammer writes:

The charming part of this not-to-be-missed article (titled "Heart of Darkness," no less) is that it is framed as an exercise in compassion. Since Cottle knows that the only way for her New Republic readers to understand Cheney is that he is evil -- "next time you see Cheney behaving oddly, don't automatically assume that he's a bad man," she advises -- surely the generous thing for a liberal to do is write him off as simply nuts. In the wonderland of liberalism, Cottle is trying to make the case for Cheney by offering the insanity defense.

She doesn't seem to understand that showing how circulatory problems can affect the brain proves nothing unless you first show the existence of a psychiatric disorder. Yet Cottle offers nothing in Cheney's presenting symptoms or behavior to justify a psychiatric diagnosis of any kind, let alone dementia.

...[A]s a former chief resident of the psychiatric consultation service at Massachusetts General Hospital -- my house staff and I were called in to diagnose and treat medical inpatients (many of them post-op, many with cardiac disease) who had developed psychiatric symptoms -- I know something about organically caused dementias. And I know pseudoscientific rubbish when I see it.

I was at first inclined to pass off Cottle's piece as a weird put-on -- when people become particularly deranged about this administration, it's hard to tell -- but her earnest and lengthy piling on of medical research about dementia and cardiovascular disease suggests that she is quite serious.

And supremely silly. Such silliness has a pedigree, mind you. It is in the great tradition of the 1964 poll of psychiatrists that found Barry Goldwater clinically paranoid.... The disease they saw in Goldwater was, in fact, deviation from liberalism, which remains today so incomprehensible to some that it must be explained by resort to arterial plaques and cardiac ejection fractions.

If there's a diagnosis to be made here, it is this: yet another case of the one other syndrome I have been credited with identifying, a condition that addles the brain of otherwise normal journalists and can strike without warning -- Bush Derangement Syndrome, Cheney Variant.

Cottle wants to blame Cheney's history of heart problems for what she considers to be his current state of mental illness.

How crazy is that?

Don't hate Cheney. He's not evil. He's sick.

I suppose you have to give Cottle a little bit of credit for making a case that Cheney shouldn't be demonized by the Left for behavior rooted in a physical condition. Because Cheney is sick, she believes he deserves to be cut at least some slack by her comrades; but good grief, Cottle comes off as the utterly unstable one.

As Krauthammer points out, the underlying assumption is that Cheney's behavior is certifiably nuts. Her starting point is that the Vice President is mentally ill.

Cottle doesn't discuss the legitimacy of differing political opinions between liberals and conservatives. She doesn't even consider the possibility that anyone in their right mind could share Dick Cheney's views.

If Cheney thinks the way he does because of his heart issues, how does Cottle account for the millions of Americans who agree with him on political matters?

Are they all suffering from dementia, too?

It's beyond silly.

It's funny, but also scary, to think that there are libs capable of actually buying into such a lamebrained theory.

The Cheney Question

Vice President Dick Cheney on Capitol Hill, March 7, 2007. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

(You can always count on Reuters for less than flattering photos of Dick Cheney.)

Questions about Vice President Dick Cheney completing his term are so old.

Before the 2004 Election, speculation over whether President Bush would dump Cheney for a different running mate was rampant.

After Cheney's hunting accident, there were questions about him stepping down. The fringe Left and the lib media drooled at the thought of Cheney being charged with murder. Ridiculous!

Disgracefully, every time Cheney has a health issue, the Left goes bonkers.

Throughout pLame-gate and the Scooter Libby trial, the same questions have surfaced.

Will Cheney be forced to resign? Will he choose to resign?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- Dick Cheney's health problems and the perjury conviction of his former chief of staff touched off another round of a favorite Washington "what if?" parlor game: What would happen if he quit as President George W. Bush's vice president and who would replace him?

The game has been played frequently in recent years, usually after the vice president, who has suffered several heart attacks, has had a health scare or has done something particularly embarrassing, like blasting a fellow hunter with birdshot.

The latest round of "what if?" began with the perjury trial of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Cheney's former chief of staff, who was convicted this week of trying to obstruct an investigation to determine who leaked a CIA operative's identity to the press.

The discovery of a blood clot in the vice president's leg fueled further resignation speculation.

What a bunch of sickos!

Some tragedy befalling OUR Vice President that would force him to leave office is the basis for a favorite Washington parlor game.

Very nice.

Former Texas Democratic congressman Martin Frost played "what if?" in a piece for Fox News online last month, wondering if Bush might replace Cheney with Sen. Joseph Lieberman, who lost his Democratic primary in Connecticut and had to run as an independent with Republican support to win re-election.

...The British media took up the theme. The Evening Standard asked "Will a blood clot force Cheney to step down?" and reported "widespread speculation that if Mr. Cheney is unable to complete his term in office through ill health he will be replaced by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice."

Ooooh. This is so much fun!!!

Let's imagine that Cheney is too ill to serve, meaning he's comatose or dead!

I think it's ghoulish.

Larry Sabato, a professor at the University of Virginia, told the online Cybercast News Service that if Rice were interested in the presidency and became vice president, the other Republicans in the 2008 race would have no chance.

"Right now, this seems wide open, you have a few top-tier candidates," he said. "But the situation can change quickly if Bush picks Rice as his new vice president."

Why do the lib media always run to Larry Sabato?

Remember this from Election 2006?

Sabato said, "[George] Allen said the N-word but I won't say how I know."

The guy is a nut.

...Interesting to think about, perhaps, but is it likely? Hardly, say political aides on Capitol Hill and analysts who study the vice presidency.

"There is no speculation over here of him stepping down," said a Republican leadership aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "I don't know why he would. He isn't the one who got convicted."

What would an article be without someone speaking "on condition of anonymity"?

The Cheney question is idiotic.

I agree with Stephen Hess.

" 'No serious political analyst can make a case that he would or should resign,' he said."

The key word is "serious."

Larry Sabato, Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews, David Gregory, George Stephanopoulos and those of their ilk are not "serious" political analysts.

They're partisan hacks.

The Unhinged Left Mourns

Dick Cheney is alive and well.

The Left is in mourning.


Relatives carry a body after a suicide blast outside the main U.S. military base in Bagram February 27, 2007. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters)

The Left is mourning because Vice President Cheney wasn't among the dead in an attack on a U.S. base in Afghanistan.

BAGRAM, Afghanistan -- A suicide bomber attacked the entrance to the main U.S. military base in Afghanistan on Tuesday during a visit by Vice President Dick Cheney, killing up to 23 people and wounding 20.

Cheney was unhurt in the attack, which was claimed by the Taliban and was the closest that militants have come to a top U.S. official visiting Afghanistan. At least one U.S. soldier, an American contractor and a South Korean soldier were among the dead, NATO said.

Cheney said the attackers were trying "to find ways to question the authority of the central government." The Taliban said Cheney was the target.

About two hours after the blast, Cheney left on a military flight for Kabul to meet with President Hamid Karzai and other officials, then left Afghanistan.

The Left isn't happy.

Read some of the comments that were hosted by The Huffington Post, until the page was sanitized after coming under criticism for its utter lack of civility.

“Geoman 77” (if that’s his real name) opines, “Cheney's spokeswoman said he was fine. F**k.”


“ResistanceIsFutile” gets right to the point: “S**t!”


“Fantanfanny” shows some carefully calibrated outrage: “So Cheney is personally responsible for the deaths of 14 innocent people...and then he waddles off to lunch!! What a piece of s**t!”


“Irual” shows his/her/its outrage by using a lot of exclamation points: “To (sic) bad they missed!!!!!!!!!!!!”


“TBD” shows the kind of plucky optimism that made America great: “Better luck next time!”


“Pakiman47” waxes wistful: “What a different world we would be living in today if they had succeeded.”


“Ncjohn” hears history’s echo: “In 1944 Claus von Stauffenberg's bomb unfortunately missed Hitler. I see the parallel and the inherent risk. This is to that what 9/11 was to the burning of the Reichstag. I am waiting for this effort to obliterate Cheney to be linked to Iran just like 9/11 was purposefully linked to Iraq by the ghouls who control our country.”


“Jazzman” sees the same parallel: “Isn't this the moral dilemma that Deitrich Bonheoffer found himself in when he chose to join a plot to assasinate (sic) Hitler. If we know that Cheney is plotting to light up the entire Middle East region by instigating an attack on Iran, if we know he is lying to do so, if we know that he is launching these wars to line the pockets of his corporate friends, and establish hegemony around the globe, if we know that he intends to hijack civil liberties and destroy constitutional government in this country, should we cheer if someone could stop him before hand?”

These people are vile.

They are truly sick.

They disgrace themselves and they disgrace the Democrat Party.

Remember, they are the Dem base.

The demonization of Dick Cheney by the Democrats -- elected officials, Dem presidential wannabes, and the rank and file -- has been positively unconscionable.

These sort of despicable comments aren't unusual for the Left-wing. It's business as usual.

Wishing the American Vice President had been killed today is so ugly; but it's typical ugliness, commonly found on Left-wing sites.

These people spewing this vitriol are the supporters of John Murtha, Russ Feingold, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Carl Levin, and all the rest of the "Blame America first" crowd.

Those horrible, hateful words reflect the Democrat Party of today.

The mindset of the people of the Dem base is truly a disgrace.

It's unpatriotic to wish Vice President Cheney dead. They are unpatriotic.

It's anti-American.

Let's take politics and nationl borders out of it.

It's evil from a moral standpoint.

Be proud of yourselves, elected officials of the Democrat Party.

Be proud when you cash those checks from your supporters, those saddened that OUR Vice President wasn't killed in Afghanistan while on a mission to protect the American people from al Qaeda.

___________________________

Read Vice President Cheney's remarks.

The Problem with Pakistan

The White House is taking a tough stand with Pakistan.

That's overdue.

From The New York Times:

President Bush has decided to send an unusually tough message to one of his most important allies, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, the president of Pakistan, warning him that the newly Democratic Congress could cut aid to his country unless his forces become far more aggressive in hunting down operatives with Al Qaeda, senior administration officials say.

The way The Times phrases this bugs me.

Pakistan isn't one of President Bush's most important allies. Pakistan is one of AMERICA'S most important allies in the War on Terror.

I can't stand it when libs use that sort of language -- Bush's war, Bush's allies, etc.

The decision came after the White House concluded that General Musharraf is failing to live up to commitments he made to Mr. Bush during a visit here in September. General Musharraf insisted then, both in private and public, that a peace deal he struck with tribal leaders in one of the country’s most lawless border areas would not diminish the hunt for the leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taliban or their training camps.

Now, American intelligence officials have concluded that the terrorist infrastructure is being rebuilt, and that while Pakistan has attacked some camps, its overall effort has flagged.

“He’s made a number of assurances over the past few months, but the bottom line is that what they are doing now is not working,” one senior administration official who deals often with South Asian issues said late last week. “The message we’re sending to him now is that the only thing that matters is results.”

I think it's the right move.

Musharraf has to cooperate or lose U.S. aid. It's that simple.

Last week, I found this extremely disturbing story on Al Jazeera:

Suspected pro-Taliban fighters have beheaded an Afghan refugee, accused of spying for the US, and left his body by a road.

The man's corpse, with its severed head and limbs, was found on Monday near Ghulam Khan, a town in Pakistan's North Waziristan region, close to the Afghan border, a Pakistani intelligence official said.

A note found with the corpse identified the man as Nek Amal, from Zozak village in Afghanistan's neighbouring Khost province.

The note said Amal was "a spy of America".

...Scores of people, including tribal elders and religious leaders, have been killed by suspected fighters in recent years in the border region for alleged collusion with the Pakistani authorities or spying for the US.

A suicide bomber dressed in a doctor's coat has blown himself up at a hospital in Khost, wounding at least two Nato soldiers.

The Taliban beheaded a man and severed his limbs. They kill people on whims. They blow people up in hospitals.

The terrorists are barbarians.

Their tactics, gruesome murders, and mutilation of corpses are difficult to grasp. They are so horrific.

Are we really expected to believe the blowhard Dems that if the U.S. left the region this violence would end?

How can the Dems be so naive to think that the solution is to cut and run?

The Islamic extremists came to our country and attacked us on September 11, 2001.

We weren't in Afghanistan then. We weren't in Iraq then.

When Islamic terrorists first tried to bring down the World Trade Center in February 1993, President Bush didn't hold elected office. Bill Clinton was in office and the Dems ruled Congress.

The terrorist attacks continued throughout the 90s, during that supposedly blissful era of peace and prosperity while Clinton was in office.

The point is Bush's policies didn't create the Islamic extremists. Bush didn't recruit those terrorists.

The Dems like to blame Bush and claim that he caused the violence.

He didn't.

He inherited it.

The Dems like to play politics. They conduct their games by lying to the American people.

When I think about the barbarism of our enemies, I can't believe that the Dems are putting all of their energy into attacking President Bush for purely political gain.

It puts our nation at risk. It's unconscionable.

Bush did not create the Taliban. Toppling Saddam Hussein did not create Islamic extremism.

It's a lie to suggest otherwise.

I'm sick of the Dems' lies.
_____________________________

Update:

This is good news.

ISLAMABAD (AFP) -- US Vice President Dick Cheney paid a surprise visit Monday to Pakistan amid growing concern about President Pervez Musharraf's efforts to take on Al-Qaeda and Taliban extremists.

Pakistan's military ruler has been seen as a close US ally in the "war on terror," but Washington recently announced there were new Al-Qaeda training camps on Pakistani soil and indicated it wants Musharraf to do more.

There is also concern about a threatened spring offensive from the resurgent Taliban in neighbouring Afghanistan, where the government has repeatedly said Pakistan is not doing enough to stop the cross-border movement of militants.

Cheney's trip, which was not made public ahead of time for security reasons, came as the New York Times quoted senior US officials saying Musharraf would get an "unusually tough message" that US aid to Pakistan could be cut unless Al-Qaeda is hunted down more aggressively.

Good work, Vice President Cheney!

I have a great deal of respect for the Bush administration.

They keep plowing ahead even as the Dems do everything in their power to hinder their efforts.

Mommy Mary Cheney

Mary Cheney and Heather Poe


Vice President Dick Cheney's daughter Mary is pregnant.

Why is this a big deal?

Well, she will have the baby out of wedlock and she's gay.

Activists on both sides of the gay marriage/parenting issue are having a field day with this.

From the Right:

Janice Shaw Crouse of Concerned Women for America calls the pregnancy "unconscionable," and says, "Not only is she doing a disservice to her child, she's voiding all the effort her father put into the Bush administration."

Carrie Gordon Earll of Focus on the Family says, "Children deserve the very best we can offer, and gay adoption -- by definition -- intentionally denies children either a mother or a father. Adoption laws should put the needs of children first, above the desires of adults."

From the Left:

Jennifer Chrisler of Family Pride says, "The news of Mary Cheney’s pregnancy exemplifies, once again, how the best interests of children are denied when lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender citizens are treated unfairly and accorded different and unequal rights and responsibilities than other parents."

Chrisler also says, "Grandfather Cheney will no doubt face a lifetime of sleepless nights as he reflects on the irreparable harm he and his administration have done to the millions of American gay and lesbian parents and their children."

Amy Argetsinger and Roxanne Roberts push their pro-gay marriage agenda by answering selected "questions" about Mary Cheney's pregnancy.

There is something "unconscionable" about Mary Cheney's pregnancy.

It's unconscionable that the child is being exploited by both the libs and the conservatives.

Wasn't John Kerry's shameless exploitation of Dick Cheney's gay daughter a problem during the 2004 campaign?

Kerry used her in an attempt to turn conservative voters against the Republicans, as if Dick Cheney was somehow being hypocritical for loving his daughter.

I thought that was terribly inappropriate.

I think it's wrong for Mary Cheney's pregnancy to be used to advance a political agenda, WHATEVER that may be.

It's unconscionable for the Left to use this baby to attack Dick Cheney and the Bush administration.

It's also unconscionable for the Right to use the baby to attack Mary Cheney and her partner.

Dick Cheney and John Kerry

I love Dick Cheney's line about John Kerry's various degrees of apologies.

He was forced to make statement after statement to address his disgraceful remarks insulting the intelligence of American troops, the best and the brightest.

As the day went on, it became clear that the Dems were willing to throw Kerry overboard. Therefore, he had no choice but to back off the "botched joke" excuse. Kerry was obviously being pressured by his party to apologize.

According to The New York Times, Dick Cheney said, "He was for the joke before he was against it."

HAHAHA

BOO

Vice President Dick Cheney was booed when he threw out the first pitch for the Washington Nationals home opener.

Video

So what? Is it news that baseball fans can behave boorishly?

The incident prompted libs at thinkprogress.org to leave some very revealing comments -- equally boorish.

Some examples:

Why couldn’t someone throw a hotdog at him or something?

Comment by Ben — April 11, 2006 @ 2:24 pm
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He’s not even on the mound!! Now we all know where the gay gene his daughter got came from. Limp Wristed POS!!

Comment by CheneyKilledNatalieHalloway — April 11, 2006 @ 2:25 pm
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Next time add Bush as a catcher .. and then you will really have the booing of a lifetime !!

Comment by Manuel — April 11, 2006 @ 2:27 pm
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He would have been right on target if Harry was the catcher.

Comment by Jeanne — April 11, 2006 @ 2:30 pm
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I doubt Cheney cares - but it was encouraging to know that he was loudly booed.
That should be the least of his criticisms. Being marched out of the White House to the Capitol where he would be placed in wooden stocks and pelted with rotten fruit by citizens, before being taken to court and tried for “high crimes and misdemeanors, being found guilty and having to spend the rest of his days with a cell mate named “Bubba,” would be a far more suitable criticism.

Comment by Marie — April 11, 2006 @ 2:31 pm
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The only baseball play I’d like to see Cheney pull off is a suicide squeeze.

Comment by Badmoodman — April 11, 2006 @ 2:53 pm
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hah, great comments - this is gold, gold i tell you!… but i got nuttin’ sorry… except that cheney is a dick…

Comment by maxpowers — April 11, 2006 @ 3:49 pm
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Yes, those liberals are so enlightened and compassionate and sophisticated, and obviously intellectually superior to conservatives.

Right.
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Update: The Associated Press weighs in on the earth-shattering news that some people booed the Vice President.

Greeted by a loud chorus of boos along with some cheers, Vice President Dick Cheney threw out the ceremonial first pitch at the Washington Nationals' Major League Baseball home opener on Tuesday.

...The vice president paid a visit to the Mets and Nationals clubhouses before the game, which the Mets won 7-1. Mets' third baseman David Wright said after the game he was thrilled to meet Cheney and shrugged off the booing. "When you've got 50 percent of America that's Republican, 50 percent that's Democrat, you're probably going to get mixed reviews," Wright said.

Where are the comments from the booing fans, the "Cheney is Satan" bloc?

Why wouldn't the AP cite someone critical of the Vice President? That's so uncharacteristic.

AP, really dropped the ball on this one.