The way I see it there are two ways to view Dick Cheney….One is a true believer in doing whatever it takes to protect the USA from terrorist strikes and who values security over international law and US hegemony over diplomacy.
The other way is as a cynical opportunist who also is not above making a quick buck….The kind of man who used 09/11 to launch a war against an unrelated country in the interest of seizing its oil….He is willing to do whatever it takes for US capitalism including torture.
I subscribe to the latter view with a lust for Machiavellian political backroom influence thrown in as well….I can’t think of any current political leader who less reflects the golden vision that many still see as America….I just think he’s a poor excuse for a human being and a criminal….For a greater description of Dick Cheney, I would recommend THE ONE PERCENT DOCTRINE by Ron Susskind which perfectly lays out just how evil and venal the vice president as well as how truly responsible he is for the f’ed-up mess we find ourselves in now.
Comedian Wanda Sykes joked at the national press dinner event last week that she would tell her child if two cars pull up and ask you to go for a ride and one has a stranger in it and the other has Dick Cheney in it get in the car with the stranger….I would go one step further….If I was in a room with Osama Bin Laden and Dick Cheney and I had a gun, I’m not sure who would I shoot first maybe Cheney since he seems to be sort of indestructible.
Seriously though, Cheney’s recent flurry of television appearances to justify torture, Guantanamo etc. are odd but also very telling about his true character….This is his life work and the pinnacle of his power in addition I believe further digging will expose Halliburton’s role in a number of scandals (overbilling and having trucks without cargos drive across Iraq so as to be able to bill the US government for the hours are just the tip of the iceberg ) and he is trying to nip that in the bud.
Of course, like much of the Bush Administration, there is often a complete lack of awareness of reality in much of what he says like his recent criticism of Colin Powell….I’m not the world’s biggest Colin Powell fan who now seems like a gutless fool who ruined his whole career with that United Nations speech but I certainly respect a decorated soldier and war hero over an armchair warrior and chicken hawk conservative like Cheney who took four deferments from going to Vietnam and now cavalierly sends young people to die and to kill other people.
Going back to my earlier comment about shooting Cheney, I actually believe that many of Dick Cheney’s action as vice president are treasonous- they made America less safe and helped make Cheney richer.
The word “fascist” is thrown around a lot as a pejorative but I think Cheney actually fits that description.… After all, Webster’s Dictionary describes a fascist as “someone who believes in a governmental system marked by a centralized dictatorship and an often belligerent nationalism”….Substitute neo-conservatism for nationalism and you have Dick Cheney in a nutshell.
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