Details the myriad illegal, immoral, and unethical activities of Dick Cheney when CEO of Halliburton, his obstruction of justice, and lies to the American public since his appointment as Vice President. For information on an equally corrupt politician, see link to Tom DeLay-Corporate Whore. Be sure to visit our cavernous vault of archives.

Blogroll Me!

 


Protest Cheney

Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 10:50 AM
Subject: 7/1 Protest Cheney at Daytona

Protest Cheney at Daytona Int'l Speedway - Sat July 1

When: Saturday, July 1st, 4:30 PM

Where: Assemble at Steak 'n Shake Parking Lot, 1000 W. Int'l Speedway
Blvd, Daytona Beach (386) 253-5283

Who: Central Florida Veterans For Peace, CODEPINK of Volusia/Flagler,
Military Families Speak Out - Florida

What to Bring: Signs, Banners, Water, Bullhorn, Snacks, ("Get Out of
Jail Free" Card - just kidding)

What to Wear: VFP, CODEPINK, MFSO, VVAW, IVAW or other Organization shirts/hats

Directions:

>From North:
I-95 South to FL-40 East (Granada Blvd)
FL-40 East 1.3 mi to Clyde Morris Blvd (CR-483)
R onto Clyde Morris Blvd South 0.7 mi to Hand Ave
L onto Hand Ave West 1.0 mi to Nova Rd (FL-5A)
R onto Nova Rd South 4.7 mi to Int'l Speedway Blvd (US-92) Steak 'n
Shake on R - (386) 253-5283, 1000 W. Int'l Speedway Blvd

>From South:
I-95 North to FL-421 East (Dunlawton Ave)
FL-421 East 2.0 mi to Nova Rd (FL-5A)
L onto Nova Road North 5.7 mi to Int'l Speedway Blvd (US-92) Steak 'n
Shake on L - (386) 253-5283, 1000 W. Int'l Speedway Blvd

>From West:
I-4 East to FL-400 East (Beville Rd)
FL-400 East 3.3 mi to Nova Rd (FL-5A)

L onto Nova Road North 2.0 mi to Int'l Speedway Blvd (US-92) Steak 'n
Shake on L - (386) 253-5283, 1000 W. Int'l Speedway Blvd

 


Darkness at Noon for Democracy

A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL
June 30, 2006

Ideology doesn't matter.

You are a tyrannical thug whether you are Joseph Stalin, Benito Mussolini, or Francisco Franco.

And Cheney and his Puppet Bush are thugs in that infamous tradition.

People who are utter failures in executing policy often rise to power because they are experts at brutally seizing power and silencing dissent. It is the law of the political jungle. Kill off dissent -- and no one can expose your wretched failures.

Democrats on the Hill who still harbor an idea that what is going on is about an alleged "war on terrorism" or fight for liberty or "victory" in Iraq are in need of a new prescription for their glasses.

This is a about the raw, ruthless seizure of power and the machineries of state by one radical faction within a democracy.

And that radical faction has as one of its major goals the elimination of democracy.

Sure, they mouth platitudes about the glories of the homeland, as Hitler did. But take the Holocaust away from the history of the Third Reich and tell us, honestly, if you think the Busheviks are headed in a different direction?

Hitler was brilliant in selecting Goebbels as his propaganda minister. Both of them knew that mass media was the way to incite the masses and gain their allegiance to sanction a takeover of the state.

Hitler did it with film, radio and print media. The Busheviks are doing it with television and radio as the leading edge of their blitzkrieg toward permanent one-party control of America.

Whenever their failures are exposed, they use scare and fear tactics to subdue the public. They launch highly coordinated and disciplined dishonest diversionary tactics -- such as the bogus attack on The New York Times for printing a story on tracing banking transactions that everyone pretty much knew about anyway, especially the terrorists -- for the sole purpose of turning the already lapdog American press into a complete rebirth of the Soviet brand of Pravda.

Make no mistake about it, they are seeking laws and prosecution that will make dissent from the party line a crime.

These are brown shirts, egomaniacs who mask their lust for total domination and the dismantling of democracy in lofty patriotic rhetoric, which has no meaning to them except as a tool to numb the masses, or to manipulate them emotionally.

These are the tactics of the demagogue.

The democratic government following the collapse of the Tsarist regime fell to the Soviets because the Soviets were more disciplined, remorseless, and cunning. The same fate befell the Weimar Republic as Hitler manipulated his ascent through a campaign of fear, ringing emotional appeals to "patriotism," scapegoating, and the manipulation of the legal process to make his takeover of the government sanctioned by the Reichstag.

If you think that is not happening here, then you are not really thinking at all. You are just a member of the masses who has succumbed to the demagoguery of the barbarians now inside the gates of the White House.

You might as well be brain dead if you don't understand the perilous risk to our Constitutional form of government that is now at hand.

This is no longer a discussion about the Iraq War.

It is the forces of democracy versus the forces of fascism.

Don't cringe when you hear the "F" word, as if it is some radical, over the top proclamation.

The radicals aren't writing the editorials for BuzzFlash. We are pro-Constitution, pro-democracy and pro-balance of powers. We are patriots.

The radicals who would undo the American Revolution are in the White House.

They are brilliant at incrementally seizing uncontested power.

It is the only thing they do well.

The same could have been said of Stalin, Mussolini, Franco and Hitler.

We don't shrink from these comparisons.

Just look around and see what is happening.

If you don't see it soon, it will be too late.

A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL

 


'Darth Cheney: Crazy as a loon'

Joshua Holland, The Gadflyer

In Cheney's view, withdrawal from Iraq would first and foremost make the United States look weak. And that, in turn, would have cataclysmic domino-style effects across the globe: Afghanistan could fall, and so could Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. The Iranians could get nukes. And the United States itself would become dramatically more vulnerable to attack, not to mention lose its ability to shape a new century favorable to American principles and interests.

Cheney really loathes weakness.

And like his fellow neoconservatives, he is consumed with the conviction that an all-powerful United States is both imperative to American security and the best thing for the world. Moral leadership, multilateralism, containment, human rights -- those are all less crucial than maintaining unquestioned power, at the point of a gun if necessary.

The fact that, despite spending tens of billions of dollars, our vaunted technological prowess hasn't restored basic services like electricity and water in Iraq makes us look weak.

Despite three years of nation-building, the institutions of the new government we've created are extensions of those parties -- drawn along sectarian lines -- that have the most powerful militias. That makes us look weak.

The fact that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have fled the country because our unrivalled military couldn't establish a minimal level of security makes us look weak.

With our attention elsewhere, Afghanistan is unraveling and the Taliban are making a comeback. That makes us look weak.

Our allies oppose many of the policy choices we've made in responding to terror -- Iraq, Gitmo, etc. -- and that makes us, in fact, weaker.

That our leaders are in denial about those realities makes us look like mindless ideologues. That costs us credibility and weakens us further.

The fact that our right-wing compulsively bashes the UN, that we pulled out of Kyoto and have undermined the nuclear nonproliferation framework -- all in the name of American strength -- makes us weaker. U.S. representatives to various international conferences have been booed by their fellow diplomats. All of that means we have less power to influence global institutions than ever.

Staying in Iraq because of arguments like Cheney's proves the paradox: we are weakened by our addiction to hegemony.

But most of all -- and most ironically -- the pervasive dread that has served Republicans so well at the ballot box here at home has shown the world that we are, despite our strength, a nation of cowards. Five years after a terrorist attack -- a bad one, yes -- we are filled with horror, we suffer nightsweats and we've developed a national paranoia towards the Muslim world. It's hard to look strong when you're shaking with fear.

After five years of rule by nutcases obsessed with hard power at the expense of real leadership, we've never been weaker. That's the consequence of basing policies on a misguided sense of American exceptionalism.

All of this is so obvious that I'm almost embarrassed to write it.

 


Dick Cheney Makes a Rattle Snake Look Honorable

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS

The depth of cynicism, calculated betrayal of our troops, and dishonesty in the Bush Administration is lower than Death Valley.

It now turns out that at the same time that Dick Cheney and the Republicans in Congress (along with the GOP mainstream media) were virulently attacking Democratic senators for calling for a troop redeployment -- well, it turns out that the Administration and the Pentagon were officially "planning" just that. In short, if people who have advocated saving our troops by exiting Iraq are traitors, then the Bush Administration was covertly planning "traitorous" acts.

According to "Stars and Stripes":

The head of U.S. forces in Iraq has created a plan to reduce the number of U.S. brigades in that country from 14 to about 5 by the end of 2007, according to the New York Times.

In the same time period, the number of U.S. bases in Iraq would also shrink from 69 to 11, the newspaper reported Sunday.

Citing unnamed sources, the newspaper reported that Gen. George Casey, commander of Multi-National Force-Iraq, discussed his plan last week in a classified briefing at the Pentagon.

There's no way that Casey was "freelancing" his "plan." So that means Cheney and Bush knew about it and authorized it, while they were unleashing their attack dogs to vilify the Democratic Senators for promoting a tame version of a redeployment resolution.

That is hypocrisy and playing with our soldiers lives. It is beyond forgivable.

It is a double whammy when you consider that the Bush Administration has clearly been encouraging -- despite what they officially say -- the puppet Iraqi "Green Zone" government to offer amnesty to people who have slain American GIs. Whatever one thinks of the plan, it is hypocrisy for the Bush Administration to talk about how our GIs are barbarically killed -- and this is why we can never "give up" in Iraq -- while promoting amnesty for the very killers whom they are using to justify a continued war.

How do we know that the Bush Administration is behind the amnesty for killing American soldiers idea?

Well, when a resolution came up in the Senate last week to oppose the idea of giving amnesty to fighters who had killed American GIs, the only senators who voted for amnesty were hardcore Busheviks. And we mean hardcore, as in Lott, Coburn, Cornyn and Graham. So 19 Republicans voted for amnesty for killers of American GIs while denouncing Democratic Senators as proposing a "surrender" in Iraq.

It is hard to imagine being more dishonest, hypocritical, and despicable than the Bush Republicans.

They betray our troops, and betray our nation.

They are as dishonest as a philandering preacher.

Our soldiers deserve to be honored and respected, not to be used as pawns in a White House effort to maintain one-party control of the United States.

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIs

 


Cheney's faulty reasoning

By Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon | June 22, 2006

GIVE DICK CHENEY credit. The man doesn't give up on arguments easily -- even when the evidence has made them unsupportable and even offensive.

Cheney continued suggesting that Iraq was behind the 9/11 attacks long after the rest of the Bush administration gave that up. Last week, he did something similar, reiterating in an interview his certainty that the war in Iraq is ``in part responsible for the fact that we haven't been hit again in nearly five years. That's no accident. The fact is, we've taken the battle to the enemy. That's been the key to the safety and security of the American people these last few years, and we need to continue to do it."

This is not just post-Zarqawi giddiness: Cheney has an eye on public opinion and knows that this myth has legs. As pollster Celinda Lake pointed out in the Washington Post last week, voters respond positively to the claim ``We'll either fight terrorists there or we'll fight them here." This is likely to be a central part of the Republican defense of the war in mid-term electioneering.

So consider some reasons why this argument deserves a stake in the heart.

To begin with the obvious, Britain and Spain were both fighting in Iraq, and it didn't prevent them from being attacked. Whatever has accounted for the quiet at home, it isn't the combat in Iraq.

In addition, ``security and safety" have not exactly been the lot of all Americans in the last few years. Just before Cheney made his remarks, the US death toll in Iraq reached 2,500. The administration can breathe a sigh of relief that the tally is unlikely to reach the 3,000 mark that most people associate with Sept. 11 when the fifth anniversary of the attacks arrives in three months. But the number is close, suggesting that as a counterterrorism campaign, the war in Iraq has been a massive error. One might ask the vice president whether it would not be more correct to say that the terrorists are not attacking us in the United States because it is easier to kill Americans in Iraq.

If the strategy is working, then the number of terrorists should be declining. But a State of Iraq chart published in The New York Times last Friday shows the number of foreign fighters -- those most likely to carry out attacks against Americans -- is growing, up to 1,500 from 1,000 a year ago. Those migrating to Iraq are not the remnants of Al Qaeda. Instead, as studies by the Israeli scholar Reuven Paz and the Saudi researcher Nawaf Obeid have shown, they are newly radicalized individuals with scant experience in Islamist violence.

Iraqi insurgents -- an increasingly jihadist cohort -- now number 20,000, according to the Times chart, a 20 percent increase over the last year. That comes after a year in which US troops were scoring regular successes against the rebellion.

Finally, there is the whistle-past-graveyard quality of Cheney's contention: In 2004 Madrid was bombed, and in 2005 terror crossed the English Channel and London was attacked. Just weeks before Cheney's interview, a conspiracy was broken up on this side of the Atlantic in Toronto, and its members appear to have had contact with jihadists who were operating in the United States.

The argument that fighting in Iraq is making us safer is pernicious, but it will not be knocked down by the Democrats' silliness on the issue, such as when they try to counter White House claims that Iraq is the central front in the war on terror. In last week's Iraq debate, Democratic Representative Nancy Pelosi of California said, ``Republicans in Congress continue to try to mislead the American people by suggesting a link between the war in Iraq and the war on terror. They are distinct . . . and efforts to portray one as part of the other are a disservice to the truth." They are no longer distinct, but the reason is not that US strategy has succeeded but that it has backfired, creating terrorists where there weren't any.

Critics need to argue the facts to show that the fighting in Iraq is not making us safer. And no one should expect Cheney to cease repeating this claim. It is depressingly clear what it will take for him to drop this argument. The pleasure of not hearing it again will in no way compensate for the costs.

Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon are coauthors of ``The Next Attack: The Failure of the War on Terror and a Strategy for Getting it Right."

 


'Dark Side' sheds light on Cheney

By Sam Allis, Globe Staff | June 20, 2006

"Frontline" delivers a devastating look tonight at the efforts of Vice President Dick Cheney to gain control of the war on terror after 9/11. In doing so, the show purports, he compromised the integrity of America's intelligence system.

"The Dark Side" is riveting television, heavily reported, that exemplifies what "Frontline" does best: go inside a major story and give us context. The title is a ripe double-entendre that applies both to Cheney and the turf on which the war against terrorists is fought. "We have to work the dark side, if you will," we hear Cheney say. "Spend time in the shadows of the intelligence world."

To many, Cheney is the dark side of the Bush administration, and this program will only cement that judgment. ``Frontline" chronicles the brutal campaign by two consummate political in-fighters -- Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld -- to decimate the CIA, politically emasculate Secretary of State Colin Powell, and construct a near-limitless concept of executive power during war. While many of these strands are familiar, they have not been assembled as effectively before on television to present a coherent picture of what happened after 9/11.

Cheney didn't trust the CIA after it missed the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Iranian revolution, and Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, so he created through Rumsfeld's Pentagon his own intelligence network to suit his agenda. Powell and former CIA director George Tenet were no match for this pair, who have known each other for three decades. By the time that Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis ``Scooter" Libby, was indicted last fall, Powell and Tenet were long gone and the CIA was in shambles.

Tenet leaves as a thoroughly compromised man who first opposes some of Cheney's intelligence conclusions and then caves. He receives from Bush the Medal of Freedom -- the highest honor the president can bestow -- as he is pushed out. ``You've seen this episode of `I, Claudius,' you know?" says Steve Coll of the New Yorker. ``You put the knife in one side and the medal on the other side and that's politics."

``The Dark Side" is, in a sense, CIA payback for its treatment. The program is dominated by legions of former CIA officers, some of whom left over the agency's treatment by the White House, and they detail what they view as Cheney's efforts to find the intelligence to fit the war he wanted against Saddam. Virtually no one, in contrast, appears from the Cheney-Rumsfeld camp to defend the two men's actions.

The talking heads are excellent. Most of the ex-spooks are strong, as is David Kay, leader of the failed attempt to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. So are intelligence experts Ron Suskind and James Bamford and the inevitable Bob Woodward.

``Frontline" walks us through the bad intelligence that Cheney spouted in public, even after the CIA had challenged it, like an Al Qaeda -Saddam connection and Saddam's supposed purchase of enriched uranium from Niger. We hear that the president's first reaction to the WMD evidence was, ``Is that all we got?"

We hear that Powell was not told the truth about the provenance of facts on which he based his disastrous speech at the United Nations, and that Cheney and Libby made 10 trips to the CIA -- unheard of by the White House -- to push analysts on data.

Paul Pillar, a respected former CIA officer, was a principal author of a signal report on WMDs in Iraq that proved so wrong. ``The purpose was to strengthen the case for going to war with the American public," he says. ``Is it proper for the intelligence community to publish papers for that purpose? I don't think so, and I regret having had a role in it."

 


Cheney Reasserts That Iraqi Insurgency Entered Its ‘Last Throes’ In May 2005

In May 2005, Vice President Cheney declared that the insurgency in Iraq was in its “last throes” and predicted “[t]he level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline.” Since that time, violence in Iraq has continued unabated.

Today at the National Press Club, Cheney was asked if he still believed that May 2005 was when the insurgency entered its “last throes.” He said he still did.



Cheney tries to spin his previous comments as a prediction of political progress. Cheney now says he meant that May 2005 would be the beginning of a “series of events when the Iraqis increasingly took over responsibility for their own affairs.” Actually, Cheney predicted that violence in the country, from May 2005 on, “will clearly decline.”

Full transcript:

REPORTER: About a year ago, you said that the insurgency in Iraq was in its final throes. Do you still believe this?

CHENEY: I do. What I was referring to was the series of events that took place in 1995 [sic – 2005]. I think the key turning point when we get back 10 years from now, say, and look back on this period of time and with respect to the campaign in Iraq, will be that series of events when the Iraqis increasingly took over responsibility for their own affairs. And there I point to the election in January of ‘05 when we set up the interim government, the drafting of the constitution in the summer of ’05, the national referendum in the fall of ‘05 when the Iraqis overwhelmingly approved that constitution, and then the vote last December when some 12 million Iraqis in defiance of the car bombers and the terrorists went to the polls and voted in overwhelming numbers to set up a new government under that constitution. And that process of course has been completed recently with the appointment by Prime Minister Maliki of ministers to fill those jobs. I think that will have been from a historical turning point, the period that we’ll be able to look at and say, that’s when we turned the corner, that’s when we began to get a handle on the long-term future of Iraq.

 


Libby Pardoned After the Mid-Terms. Sounds Likely.

Hot on the heels of our "Libby Defense Fund" e-mail discussing the speculative theory that Rove may have been let off the hook by orders of higher-ups in the Justice Department (most likely Alberto "Bush Consigliere" Gonzales), Newsday reports speculation that Libby will be pardoned by Bush.

"I think ultimately, of course, there are going to be pardons," said Joseph diGenova, a former prosecutor and an old Washington hand who shares that view with many pundits. If ever there were an insider to know of such plans, diGenova -- part of a husband and wife team who do legal soundbites for the Republicans -- would know.

The most likely timing for a Libby pardon would be after the mid-terms, but before Libby's trial were to begin. This would follow the pattern that old man Bush set when he pardoned Caspar Weinberger before his trial even began -- along with other Iran-Contra partcipants who were given a get out of jail free card by "Poppy" Bush.

The only certainty in this theory is that Libby won't be pardoned before the mid-terms. Rove knows that this would cause intense political damage that could tip either body of Congress into Democratic hands.

But once the election is over, what does Bush have to lose?

Cheney was clearly part of the effort to besmirch Joe Wilson -- and likely gave the green light to out Valerie Plame. It is more than possible that Bush knew all about the effort, certainly after he was questioned about the outing and promised to find the leaker.

So, Bush, like his Dad, doesn't want the Libby case to come to trial.

With Rove not being indicted -- for whatever behind-the-scenes theory you choose -- and Libby being pardoned, Bush and Cheney can sail freely through the choppy waters of their last two years in office without fear of being in legal jeopardy for their roles in PlameGate.

As usual, we cauton that this is only another speculative prediction. But the Bush clan and Karl Rove don't stray much from their previous playbooks.

And "Poppy" Bush left Independent Counsel Lawrence Walsh with nothing but years of useless evidence when the senior Bush pardoned the Iran-Contra crew. No doubt, the trial of Caspar Weinberger would have exposed Bush family culpability. It's the same threat posed by a trial of Scooter Libby.

Junior, we are likely to find out, learned well from Daddy how to obstruct justice by acting like a King and simply stopping an investigation in its tracks through the power of a pardon.

 


Now, What About Cheney?

by John Nichols

Now that the long speculation about whether White House political czar Karl Rove would be indicted for the role he played in exposing the identity of a CIA operative is done, perhaps the investigation of the Bush administration "hit" on Iraq War critic Joe Wilson can focus in on the fundamental questions that have been raised by the machinations of key players in the administration with the apparent goal of punishing a former diplomat for exposing White House misstatements and misdeeds.

The attention to Rove's involvement in the effort to reveal the identity of Wilson's wife, veteran Central Intelligence Agency operative Valerie Plame -- after Wilson, a former ambassador, revealed that key players in the Bush administration had to have know that elements of their "case" for attacking Iraq had been discredited -- was always something of a distraction. Of course, as David Corn and others have ably illustrated, Rove's actions demanded scrutiny. But the fury that so many Democrats feel toward Rove caused them to obsess on the question of whether he would be indicted, rather than to recognize that the critical indictment was that of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff and a key advisor to President Bush on national security matters.

It is Libby who faces trial in January 2007 on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. And it is Libby, the neoconservative true believer who was the administration's willing henchman in defense of the Iraq endeavor, who connects this scandal to his old friend Cheney in a way that Rove, the political puppeteer, was unlikely ever to have connected it to Bush. Thus, from the time of Libby's indictment, the question that always mattered most was not: Will special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald indict Rove? It was always: Will Fitzgerald connect the dots that lead to Cheney?

No top office within the administration was better positioned than Cheney's to gather the information that was used to attack Wilson and his wife and to peddle that information to the press. In fact, as Joe Wilson told me in an interview about the leaking of his wife's name that we did early in 2004, "With respect to who actually leaked the information, there are really only a few people -- far fewer than the president let on when he said there are a lot of senior administration officials -- who could have done it. At the end of the day, you have to have the means, the keys to the conversations at which somebody might drop my wife's name -- deliberately or not -- a national security clearance, and a reason to be talking about this. When you look at all that, there are really very few people who exist at that nexis between national security and foreign policy and politics. You can count them, literally, on two hands."

Wilson added that, without a doubt, "the vice president is one of those people."

We now know just how right Wilson was. Libby has been indicted. And that documents related to that indictment are filled with references to meetings with Cheney on the very day that Libby began calling reporters as a part of a push to discredit Wilson. We have a copy of a column Wilson wrote for The New York Times with notes from Cheney attacking the former ambassador and making reference to his wife. We have transcripts of Libby saying that he acted with "approval from the President through the Vice President" when he distributed previously classified information -- specifically, portions of a National Intelligence Estimate regarding Saddam Hussein's purported efforts to develop nuclear weapons -- to the media as part of the move to discredit Wilson.

At this point, it is unclear whether Fitzegerald will see his investigation through to its logical conclusion. But there can be no question that, with Rove off the hook, the administration and its media echo chamber will be doing everything in their power to constrain the special counsel. The White House wants this inquiry shut down.

But shutting it down now would prevent an examination of what Representative Maurice Hinchey, D-New York, correctly refers to "the heart of the CIA leak case."

Hinchey leads a group of several dozen House members who have urged Fitzgerald to officially expand his investigation to include an examination of the motives behind the leaks by Libby, focusing in particular on the question of whether the administration's intent was to discredit Ambassador Wilson's revelation that Iraq had never sought uranium from Niger or other African countries. If that is proven to be the case, Hinchey has argued, "President Bush and other top members of his administration knowingly lied about uranium to the Congress, which is a crime."

The New York congressman, who is the most determined Congressional watchdog with regard to the administration's misuse of intelligence information, was never one of those who waited for the Rove shoe to drop.

After the April revelation that Cheney's former chief of staff said he was authorized to go after Wilson by the president and vice president, Hinchey said: "If what Scooter Libby said to the grand jury is true, then this latest development clearly reveals yet again that the CIA leak case goes much deeper than the disclosure of a CIA agent's identity to the press. The heart and motive of this case is about the deliberate attempt at the highest levels of this administration to discredit those who were publicly revealing that the White House lied about its uranium claims leading up to the war. The Bush Administration knew that Iraq had not sought uranium from Africa for a nuclear weapon, yet they went around telling the Congress, the country, and the world just the opposite. When Ambassador Joseph Wilson, Valerie Wilson's husband, publicly spoke out with proof that the administration was not telling the truth on uranium, the administration engaged in an orchestrated plot, which now reportedly includes President Bush, to discredit Ambassador Wilson and dismiss any notion that they had lied about pre-war intelligence."

As Hinchey has argued for months, Libby's testimony about the authorization he received from Bush and Cheney must be seen in the context of a mounting body of evidence that rules, regulations and laws were bent far beyond the breaking point by the administration. The fact that Karl Rove has not been indicted does not eliminate that body of evidence. Nor does it resolve questions about Cheney's involvement in the scandal, or about the motivations of the president, the vice president and others who sought to discredit Ambassador Wilson for telling the truth. And it ought not serve as an excuse for shutting down an inquiry that has yet to examine "the heart of the CIA leak case."

 


'Caught Red-Handed' Press Events Wednesday; Third Round of 'Red Handed' Ad Campaign Targets Four Reps for Protecting War Profiteers

6/6/2006 2:59:00 PM

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To: Assignment Desk, Daybook Editor

Contact: Timi Gerson or Alex Howe, 202-822-5200

News Advisory:

-- New TV Ad Starts Tomorrow

-- Local Veterans to Demand Return of Defense Contractor Contributions

Four Representatives who voted to protect war profiteers come under fire this week when MoveOn.org Political Action unveils the third and final ad in the "Red Handed" series. Two earlier ads in the $1.3 million ad buy accused the Members of supporting the Bush administration’s flawed prescription drug plan and protecting big oil companies while Americans pay more at the pump. The ads will run through June 16th.

On Wednesday, some of MoveOn’s 3.2 million members will join veterans and family members in front of four district offices, holding giant yellow ribbons with the slogan "Support Our Troops, Not Halliburton." The war profiteer television ads will run in the districts of: Nancy Johnson (CT-5), Thelma Drake (VA-2), Chris Chocola (IN-2), and Deborah Pryce (OH-15).

They will cite the Representatives’ votes to protect war profiteering companies like Halliburton that overcharged the military for services in Iraq. They will also call for the Members to return all campaign contributions from defense contractors working in Iraq who may have influenced their votes.

"Even our troops in Iraq are subject to the effects of Washington’s culture of corruption. These Members of Congress, who took tens of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from defense contractors, protected them from stiffer penalties for war profiteering. It’s an outrage because every dollar that Halliburton took through fraud could have gone to our Army and our troops," said Eli Pariser, Executive Director of MoveOn Political Action.

 


Senators won't grill phone companies

Updated 6/7/2006 10:48 AM ET
By John Diamond, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — A last-minute deal Tuesday with Vice President Cheney averted a possible confrontation between the Senate Judiciary Committee and U.S. telephone companies about the National Security Agency's database of customer calling records.
The deal was announced by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., the committee chairman, and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah. They said Cheney, who plays a key role supervising NSA counterterrorism efforts, promised that the Bush administration would consider legislation proposed by Specter that would place a domestic surveillance program under scrutiny of a special federal court.

In return, Specter agreed to postpone indefinitely asking executives from the nation's telecommunication companies to testify about another program in which the NSA collects records of domestic calls.

If passed, Specter's legislation would give the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court power to oversee the NSA program and render an opinion on the constitutionality of conducting domestic surveillance without a warrant. The court, established by the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), normally considers case-by-case requests by intelligence agencies to conduct surveillance inside the USA.

The deal prompted protests from Democratic lawmakers, who said the Republican-controlled Congress had refused to challenge the administration's expansion of presidential authority. "Why don't we just recess for the rest of the year, and the vice president will just tell the nation what laws we'll have?" said Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, ranking Democrat on the committee.

Specter has challenged the administration to justify the legality of intelligence programs inside the country.

After the hearing, Specter said his hand had been forced by the telephone companies' refusal to discuss classified programs. Representatives of more than one company — which ones were not specified in the meeting — agreed to appear, Specter said, but told the panel they would not talk about classified information. Hatch said President Bush "is willing to work with us as long as it doesn't detract from the president's constitutional powers."

At least one Democrat shared Republican concerns about forcing telephone officials to discuss classified programs. "Companies that are trying to be good citizens shouldn't be held out to dry," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

Feinstein said there were two programs at issue: the NSA surveillance of international calls with one end in the USA and in which one participant is suspected of terrorist activity; and a program that "does not involve content" of conversations.

The surveillance program was disclosed in December by The New York Times and then acknowledged by the administration. The other program, which has not been formally acknowledged by the White House, was disclosed last month by USA TODAY. The program involves the collection of domestic calling data — the numbers and times of calls — by the NSA for use in tracking calling patterns by people suspected of terrorist activities.

In the wake of the USA TODAY story, Specter, who had proposed legislation to give the FISA court power over NSA's warrantless surveillance program, said he wanted phone company executives to testify about any involvement they had with the NSA.

 


UNCLE DICK / AMERICA'S SHADOW PRESIDENT & DECIDER
Everyone in the Bush administration reports to Dick Cheney including Bush himself.

by Allen L Roland
http://www.opednews.com

Uncle Dick is truly the shadow president and his fingerprints are all over every lie and deception of this corrupt administration .

The Center for American Progress explains how Uncle Dick effects the implementation of Congressional legislation ~ and that Cheney, not Bush, is the ultimate decider in this near fascist administration.


CHENEY'S OFFICE REGULARLY SCREENS LEGISLATION TO DETERMINE WHETHER BUSH WILL IGNORE LAW

by Judd Legum, Faiz Shakir, Nico Pitney
Amanda Terkel and Payson Schwin / American Progress Report

A report this weekend by Charlie Savage of the Boston Globe details the heavy influence Vice President Dick Cheney and his chief of staff David Addington have had in carrying out the administration's controversial "unitary executive" theory.

(Savage previously reported on how President Bush had "quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office.")

The Vice President's office "routinely reviews pieces of legislation before they reach the president's desk, searching for provisions that Cheney believes would infringe on presidential power," Savage reports.

When such flags are raised, Addington is the "leading architect of the 'signing statements' the president has appended to more than 750 laws," asserting Bush's right "to ignore the laws because they conflict with his interpretation of the Constitution." (Read U.S. News's recent comprehensive profile of Addington.)

The Bush administration has "used such statements to claim for itself the option of bypassing a ban on torture, oversight provisions in the USA Patriot Act, and numerous requirements that they provide certain information to Congress, among other laws."