from the washington post

Few Defend Cheney
The runaway comment magnet today is Bart Gellman's outstanding piece telling us that former Vice President Richard B. Cheney is working on a book that will express great disappointment with his former boss, President George W. Bush.

The unusual thing about the comment string, which is growing exponentially by the minute, is that there are relatively few Cheney supporters at the hour this is being written. Usually these things even out, but right now those who dislike Cheney are in a clear majority. There is anger about Iraq and the nonexistent weapons of mass destruction, there are several calls for prosecution, there are Vietnam vets complaining that Cheney didn't serve in that conflict.

Gellman writes that "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."

Gellman and Jo Becker won a Pulitzer prize for their 2008 Post series on Cheney's role in the Bush administration.

The conversation got off to a great start when blakesouthwood wrote, "This ought to be good."

lcarter0311 added, "More than good. Why do I get the feeling that Cheney for whatever reason thought he was the President and Bush was his veep?"

sharronkm wrote, "Probably the reason Bush was moving away from Cheney in the second term was because he realized how badly he had been mislead by Cheney and was waking up to the fact that Cheney's advice had been wrong. Liz Cheney's remark that her father was doing this because of his "love of history" is bunk..."

tradeczar wrote, "...as a Vietnam Vet it strikes me that those who praise Bush and Cheney because we weren't "hit" again remind me of those who still maintain that we could have won in Vietnam had the generals had their way. Delusion is an awesome force."

newageblues wrote, "Cheney would have more credibility as a security hawk eager to go to war to try to protect the country, if it wasn't for the reason he didn't serve in the military during the Vietnam War. As he later unapologetically explained it, he had "other priorities". How can you take such a slimy hypocrite seriously?"

John1263 wrote, "... It would be good for America if the people around cheney also realized the statute of limitations is up and start giving testimony to the DoJ so cheney can start measuring the drapes for a cell in federal prison..."

losthorizon10 said, "These two jackals sent our troops to Iraq to die and get blown apart for their little neocon fantasy, and they lied us into a war when they knew full well that there were no WMD's there... Let them both rot in prison. And let Valerie Plame turn the key on their cell doors."

deano1 wrote, "I love this, we need Cheney to "keep on." He's one of the best reminders of how out of touch the republican party is with the principals of Democracy. Cheney is upset that they didn't go far enough. In Cheney's world, far enough would have been a dictatorship for the good of the people to keep them free..."

pejesq charged that "Cheney and Bush were in office when the worst terrorist attack in American history occurred. At the time of the attack, a report detailing the Al Queda threat was sitting on Bush's desk unread. Cheney will spend the rest of his life trying to make up for that mistake and, especially, trying to convince the world that he was not at fault and he has, in fact, made the world a safer place. Unfortunately that's just a fantasy..."

jbleenyc wrote, "...Instead of just going off into the good night and enjoying a nice retirement, this man is still full of plots and ego. His revelations in his new book could further cement the views the American people now have about him... He probably feels grateful for the sacrifices Libby made on his behalf and is so bitter that he could not help his aide with a full pardon..."

alloleo said, "I just don't see why we should think there's any virtue in Cheney's maintaining a blinkered, unchanging, unresponsive view of the world. He gets his mind stuck on a few simplistic ideas, few of them correct but all of them "tough", then rides them to the bitter end and his cronies and lackies call it "conviction". That's no way to run a country..."

mharwick suggested, "It is all about the pardon refused and the firing of Rumsfeld. George W. Bush did not pardon folks lightly. Bill Clinton had his pardongate. Bush did not."

The article quoted John P. Hannah, Cheney's second-term national security adviser, as saying that the former vice president is driven by the nightmare of a hostile state acquiring nuclear weapons and passing them to terrorists.

This caused dj333 to write, "This is a concern most serious people don't share because it doesn't really make much sense: very few states would pass nuclear weapons on to non-state actors (read "terrorists") because they would want such weapons to end up being used on them or their allies..."

swatkins1 warned, "A far more dangerous enemy is the one within the borders of the United States. The far right neo-con seething anger and hate that is poising itself to take matters into their own hands, an American Taliban, led by Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh. The real danger, the real threat is fomenting in the shadows. Right inside the border."

dfnsatty wrote, "So Cheney has contempt for public opinion? Maybe that's because he withheld so much information that the public could not form sound opinions. It's the same ploy Hitler and many other dictators have used - don't reveal anything and then say 'I can make a better decision because I know more than you'."

gagalbert said, "Cheney is right of course. W did go soft. The only thing I did not like about Cheney is that he refused to run for the presidency. He would have been a great improvement from the guy we have now. And with each irrational post from the nutcakes and haters I see here, it supports my case even more..."

To which washpost18 replied, "There's enough irony [there] for gagalbert to make another hammer with which to continue hitting itself in the head with. Stay eloquent, conservos!"

Complaints about The Post:

The article's first paragraph said Cheney "threw himself into public combat against the 'far left' agenda of the new commander in chief." This caused standard_guy to ask, "Damn, how far left does Obama have to go to take the quotation marks off of "far left"? The quotation marks tell you all you need to know about the WaPo."
mplambert asked, "Do you notice how the Post rarely allows someone other than a Republican to voice an opinion on Cheney? Probably because even just one moderate voice would be enough to paint him as a fascist blunderer."
paulinlodi asked, "Why is it that our political class at every level of government, state and federal, is so deeply, thoroughly, irreformably, pathological? And
why does WaPo encourage, promote and glorify these very sick people?"