Friday, July 17, 2009

Don't Pay Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain

The New York Times reported that Vice President Dick Cheney told the CIA to lie

or cover up from Congress the existence of a secret program designed to capture or kill

Al Qaeda operatives in the world. Senator Diane Feinstein confirmed the report after a

briefing she received from CIA director Leon Panetta, who has now cancelled the program.

The Wall Street Journal reports that there were funds appropriated and some training done,

but the operation was never implemented.

The merits of creating a government version of Murder Inc. can be debated at

another time. Needless to say, we would condemn anyone who created an organization

the purpose of which was to kill American officials. Oh wait, we already do condemn

Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Taliban, and Iran for doing that, don't we?

The really stunning revelation here is that the Vice President of the United States

ordered an executive agency to lie to Congress. The lying part isn't even the interesting

part. The CIA lies to Congress all the time. The interesting part is that the Vice President

ordered, and they obeyed. You remember the Vice Presidency, don't you? John Gardner

once described it being worth less than a "bucket of warm spit". The Vice President has

no executive line of authority over any branch of the government. He is powerless. The

only power he possesses is as President of the Senate, where he can break a tie vote. This

raises the question as to how Cheney could order the CIA to do anything; and why would

they obey him? This new revelation is not small potatoes. The Constitution places no

power in the Vice Presidency. He has no authority. Any authority the Vice President has

he gets through the President. He can't even attend cabinet meetings unless the President

wishes him to be in attendance. So how was Cheney able to order the CIA to lie?

The constitutional and legal questions this raises boggle the mind. Did a coup

occur and was Cheney the de facto President during the Bush years? This is an accusation

that was made by many observing this administration. It was dismissed as the rantings of

partisan enemies of Bush; but now that idea cannot be so easily waved away. Where else

was Cheney giving orders? Did Cheney order the White House counsel and the Justice

Department lawyers to write legal opinions authorizing torture? (which Cheney still defends

as legal) Did Cheney order the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys? What role did Cheney play in

the NSA decision to illegally wire tap and data mine e-mails and internet traffic? Cheney

held secret meetings with oil, gas, and coal officials prior to new Bush regulations easing

restrictions on those industries. Did Cheney order these new rules? CIA analysts said that

Cheney made numerous trips to Langley, VA to pressure them into "cooking the books"

on Iraq. Under whose authority did he do that? When President Bush was out in public,

Cheney was in a secret location totally protected. Who was really the President? These

questions could appear frivolous, except that they go to the core of our constitutional

republican form of government. Was there a power in Washington that the people didn't

know about? Could Cheney have been elected President all on his own?

We need answers to these questions. Do you understand the implications of what

this could mean to our form of government? What role did Bush play in all of this? Did

the President know? Did Bush turn the Presidency over to Cheney? President Clinton

elevated the FEMA director to a cabinet role, a decision that Cheney and his ilk disagreed

with. Did Cheney reduce FEMA's role and influence; and is that how we got "Brownie",

and is that why the federal response to Katrina was so poor? Haven't you ever wondered

how it was that the musings of the Vice President caused the CIA to task a mission to Niger,

assign Ambassador Wilson to go, and then report back to the Vice President what he found?

Then, when his findings disagreed with the Vice President's contentions about Saddam

Hussein and nuclear weapons, a Cheney protege put 18 words into the President's State

of the Union speech which were not true and that the President had to eventually disavow.

Who was President of the United States from 2001-2008? It's not a crazy question

anymore. President Obama cannot dither and tap dance anymore. The American people

need to know if their government was hijacked in a bloodless (unless you count almost

5000 dead American soldiers, 50-100 thousand wounded, and as many as one million dead

Iraqis) coup? There needs to be a thorough investigation by an independent source.

Attorney General Eric Holder is said to be leaning towards investigating "rogue" CIA

agents who may have engaged in torture. President Obama is on the record as saying that

what Holder wants to do is Holder's decision alone. That isn't enough in this case. We know

that Cheney was selectively declassifying secret documents to be leaked to reporters in

the outing of covert CIA analyst Valerie Plame Wilson. Where did he get that authority?

Was he doing it on his own? Did he have to ask for permission? What did President Bush

know, and when did he know it?

This isn't about lying over an affair with an intern (which led to an impeachment

trial). This is a possible coup. This is a possible usurpation of the Constitution on an

epic scale. This is the grandaddy of constitutional crisises that would make Watergate

look like a walk in the park. There must be a full blown investigation. No stone can be

left unturned. Bush administration officials have to be under oath; including the President,

the Vice President, Rice, Rumsfeld, Addington, Libby, Bolton, et al.

The movie "Seven Days in May" is one of my favorite movies. In it, the military

attempts a coup to remove the President because they disagree with him on foreign policy.

It is a scary movie and raises questions about the nature of democracy and elections and

power, and how it is wielded in this country. It is a work of fiction, but disturbing none

the less. Questions about Cheney are not fiction. Who was running this country? President

Obama has to announce a full scale investigation, no matter where the chips fall. The

American people have the right to know what happened, and how to prevent it from ever

happening again. It wasn't "Seven Days in May", but it might have been eight years in

Washington. What do you think? I welcome your comments and rebuttals. Please send

them to lionoftheleft @gmail.com

6 comments:

  1. I think Scooter Libby went to jail because he would not out Cheney for outing Valarie Plame.
    All that shredding the Bush/Cheney cabal were doing during and just before leaving office, probably did away with the best evidence.
    In the JFK movie, there is a line that states a Brown and Root (Halliburton) coverup of evidence that I believe is true. That coup was a long time in the execution. Look at Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Brown and Root, Halliburton, the military industrial complex the oil companies and how they have profitted especially with this last coup. The Banksters and the Fed have not done too shabby either. One can continue the connections of those involved in and/or profitting from or covering evidence on the JFK assasination that follows through the years up until and including the Bush coup and Cheney and most the Bush administration (both Bushs) themselves and their chosen associates while in office had connections to the drugs for guns that went from Vietnam drugs to South American guns for those illegal wars. These guys have their fingers in the pies of so much illegal activity entwined in the highest echelons of our govenment that it is clear this latest cabal was another takeover. Wasn't Vietnam about transporting oil through a narrow sea passage and Iran War about oil control and transportation and Afganistan about bombing a path through the mountains to run Halliburton gas lines down to India for transport out from there. It just goes on through the years. This mess of thugs need to be brought to trial and cleared out of our government. They are left overs from WWII.
    Left over from the Great Depression is the economy built on the manufacture of weapons. During this all, there are the Banksters/Fed who have created a fascist economy where corporations are one with the government. Corporations need to be declared legally not people. The constraints put in after the Banksters theft in the Great Depression need to be put back in, that were recently removed.

    This is turning into an article itself and is more accusations than proofs but we will get there and this is just a rant to refresh the memory and put get a bit of structure.

    Murder has no time limits for prosecution and Cheney was complicit at the very least. He and Bush I and II were definitely running against the Constitution they swore to uphold which in itself is against the law and should have gotten them impeached. Then there is international law they ran against where the world can send them to the Hague. I think Bush II and Bush I are as guilty as Cheney and as bloodthirsty in their lust for money and power. "All in all I think they have done very well for themselves." I believe that is what Ma Bush I said of the Katrina victims huddled in that Texas stadium. Well it fits these perps. The Hague should give them solitary for the rest of their days for crimes against humanity even if this country does not care to uphold the laws of the country, the Constitution.

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  2. It is only human to wish punishment for the perpetrators of evil. However, we need to get beyond 'only human' and get out of the mentality of violence. It helps me to realize that JUSTICE and PUNISHMENT are really two different things.
    Justice does not demand punishment, not necessarily. That is the way of the Penal Code which has been programmed into us from earliest childhood. Let us examine the notion of Restorative Justice. Suppose we offered every perpetrator of all the things you have mentioned, including the perpetrators who brought down those three buildings in NY on 20010911 and are responsible for whatever it was that pierced the Pentagon.
    This is not Amnesty; this is offering to each one, who acknowledges his or her role in any of the above, assurance that in return, he or she will be permitted to restore all ill-gotten wealth to the wounded survivors of war in all lands and families of victims, and serve no time in jail nor be executed.
    In other word, Reparations for the crimes.
    Even people who broke no law but profited excessively from defense contracts need to restore the excess profit to this fund that will care for the real needs of the wounded and families.
    So will anyone conspire with me in this?
    For private communication, use this email address: 911wasaninsidejob@comcast.net
    James of Cloverdale

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  3. So, Cheney should have to pay reparations for what --- the cost of the paperwork to pursue him, the cost of burying the dead after him.

    Reparations may have worked in a small town society before the electronic age but crimes can reach world wide now.

    I am still suffering from where 9-1-1 touched my life and I am the other side of the country from that one. People, the public, are stll dying from the toxic particles in the air that the EPA in New York said was okay for the public to breath and with no medical help or reparations. Obviously the recidivism rate for being imprisoned does not speak well for changing people's ways either. Prisons speak better for perpetuating the profits by causing return incarcerations. Being hung up financially for the rest of ones life would be a deterent to some.

    I have always wondered about the idea of making them put up with others of their own kind on, like middle men cons, making money off of having inserted themselves into the middle of every human interaction they can and charging for it - put them all together with only their energy life-sucking selves to sustain life with an island where they had to live closer to nature and growing and making everything to keep themselves alive, nature being used as a way to get closer to whatever one calls God. I think there was a Steve McQueen movie that had something like that with evil people in charge though.
    If the corporations and people involved in the JFK assassination had actually come to light and not been covered by media/government people involved in the cabal and had been kept from doing further damage in some way, we would not have had the drugs for guns Vietnam and RICO activity of that era where some of the same perps who had connections to the JFK thing and then after that RICO drugs for guns Vietnam/Central American wars mess, those perps spilled over into being involved in the Bush I and Bush II administrations and involved in even worse death and destructions and general illegalities.

    So, something needs to be done. We are failing badly on all fronts. Petty crimes fill our prisons and line the pockets of the Bush family and runs on the stock market for 401k's to profit from (sick). Meanwhile the people who ran the hedge fund scams and the checks and balance people who failed their jobs and let them go through as prime investments when bad bets were bundled together into a huge bad bet (White collar corporate crime) are getting off and given high paying jobs in this new administration and being asked to help plan the cure for this mess and just looting more. Madoff was the sacrificial one perp imprisoned and quickly too I might add. If it had been a ATM pull over heist by a bunch of 20-year-old brown or yellow-skinned guys all would have done time. They and the system that permits white collar/corporate crime needs to be fixed and they need to be stopped some how. And wazzup with resort type prisons for white collar corporate crimes! Maybe reparations and rehabilitation centers and better mental institutions would take out a good portion of the prison populations though for the petty crimes, drug-related and just-went-nuts criminals.

    Also, is it or is it not okay to talk about crime and punishment on this site? That is exactly what we are into here. Don't want to cause any trouble for anyone including me.

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  4. Thanks SPAKITTY for your reasoned reply.
    Bernie, it is OK for you to be involved in a discussion of Reformative Justice for confessed perpetrators?

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  5. Ouch and not what I said. I said crime and punishment. Behave.

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  6. My friend, never tell a guy who misbehaves to behave -- what possible good can come of that?

    You know that no one is going to admit misbehaving -- including of course me.

    My question is:
    [To Lion of the Left: Is it OK for you to be involved in a discussion of Reformative Justice for confessed perpetrators?]

    Your question is:
    [...is it or is it not okay to talk about crime and punishment on this site?]

    You ask your question, I ask my question.
    I never said or implied that I was asking your question.
    So You Behave Yourself, or the flirtatios old man with the wavy hair will wink at you.
    (<-;}

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