Former White House lawyer: Cheney dares US to indict him

[BlueJessamine]

Source: Raw Story

Vice President Cheney is daring the Obama administration to indict him for authorizing torture, according to a former White House lawyer, and it’s time to call him out on his bluff.

“I have written many times in this space that I oppose any criminal prosecution of prior-administration officials on torture or other issues relating to the Iraq War and the war on terrorism, especially those CIA interrogators who relied in good faith on the instructions of policymakers and the legal opinions issued by Justice Department senior officials,” former Special Counsel to the President for Bill Clinton Lanny Davis writes in a column published by the Washington Times Monday. “I have agreed with President Obama on the need to look forward, not backward.”

Davis continues, “But … I have changed my mind about the need to indict former Vice President Dick Cheney for complicity in illegal torture.”

His insistence on putting himself on multiple TV programs and conservative radio talk shows, not only defending torture but offering the defense that it worked, has changed my mind. Not only that - he went on to attack Mr. Obama as weakening the United States in the war on terrorism because Mr. Obama immediately announced that torture would no longer be allowed.

Dem’s fighting words. They are also, in my view, reckless and irresponsible. They seem to be laying down a marker that in case, God forbid, there is a terrorist attack, Mr. Cheney can be the first to blame it on Mr. Obama’s policies and say, “I told you so.”


Read more: http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/05/19/cheney-dares-us/

[bullimiami]

1. there was a terrorist attack. a huge one. and cheney had been told it was coming and did nothing.

how many 9-11s did they have to allow to be seen as a failure?

i say ONE.

[Joe Chi Minh]

5. Not exactly the world's foremost most authority on defence against

terrorism, is he? One of the "foolish virgins" in the parable lecturing the sensible one on the need for prudence and providence. Only a Republican....

[Tangerine LaBamba]

2. Lanny Davis is an odd duck -

his affiliation with Joe Lieberman really troubles me, and now he's writing for the Times? The Moonie paper?

But, I agree with him here. While I've never been a conspiracy theorist, I have a theory about Cheney that I can't shake, and that is that he's colluding with some group that will, I honestly believe this, attack the US or do some kind of damage to some installation of ours overseas. Something huge and ghastly.

And then Cheney will be standing on top of the death and destruction, saying "I told you so."

I've thought that ever since he came up out of the bunker. He is that evil, I honestly believe it ............................

[TacticalPeek]

3. Oops - let me fix that typo:

"especially those concentration camp guards who relied in good faith on the instructions of policymakers and the legal opinions issued"

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

4. I will never understand it if he is NOT indicted

There's enough now just in the public record to indict him on multiple fronts.

I still want someone to ask Dick Cheney to his face, if torture worked, if it was legal, if it kept us safe, why was it stopped?

[autorank]

6. Vince Bugliosi has the indictment appropriate for Cheney

Here's a review of Bugliosi's book: "The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder"
http://thejournal.epluribusmedia.net/index.php/book-reviews/38-all-reviews/151-a-review-of-bugliosis-the-prosecution-of-george-w-bush-for-murder

He believes that Cheney and ?Rice are also indictable for the same crime as Bush - fabricating evidence to justify
a war that had no real justification. The murder charge is straight forward. If you conspire to lie and initiate
an act where people die as a result of your conspiracy to lie, you're guilty of murder. Any DA in the country
who has a soldier who died in Iraq can bring charges.

The book is great, really persuasive.

Cheney wants a trip to the rodeo, this is it.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

7. In a similar vein

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/5/18/727464/-Cheney,-Nuremberg-and-aggressive-war:-the-day-the-smirking-stopped
"To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

It's a great Kos diary that pretty much comes to the same conclusion as Bugliosi. Who are we to deny Dick Cheney his place in history as one of the truly all time villains? I'm surprised no DA in Vermont, for instance, has taken up the challenge outlined by Bugliosi.


The Kos diary is being discussed here.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5682952&mesg_id=5682952

[pjt7]

8. Patrick Leahy needs to make Vermonter's

& American's proud.

Go after & nail this criminal.

& if he takes you down with him, you will still be Patriot forever & you're family will be that much stronger in it's belief in you & fundamental principles.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

9. ??? Who is the "you" in your last sentence? nt

[livefreest]

10. well D#@% spent the last 8 years trying to shrink Americans' balls.

he's still on his ball-shrinking-fear-mongering-tour. will it work? i can't say it's not working.