Video of Cheney going back on just about everything....As he attempts to rescue his own legacy, former Vice President Dick Cheney has taken to blaming everyone but himself for the Bush administration’s bad decisions. This may have reached a point of ultimate absurdity on Monday, when Cheney was asked about his reaction to 9/11 during an appearance before the National Press Club.
In a moment acutely noted by The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart, the NPC interviewer suggested to Cheney, “On Sunday, in the Washington Post, [former White House counterterrorism chief] Richard Clarke had a column — and he was, of course, there at that time as well — in which he characterized the Bush administration as basically being in a state of shock. And I’m wondering what your characterization of what those post-9/11 days were like…”
In that column, Clarke blasted what he called the “9/11 trauma defense” for torture. He wrote that “when Bush’s inner circle first really came to grips with the threat of terrorism, they did so in a state of shock, a bad state in which to develop a coherent response. Fearful of new attacks, they authorized the most extreme measures available, without assessing whether they were really a good idea.”
Cheney naturally was unable to acknowledge this criticism. In his patented f-you manner, he replied, “Dick Clarke? Dick Clarke who was the head of the counter-terrorism program in the run-up to 9/11. He obviously missed it.”
“Holy crap!” commented an awestruck Stewart. “Did he just blame 9/11 on Dick Clarke?”
“The same Dick Clarke,” Stewart continued. “who had written a letter to Condoleezza Rice on January 25, 2001 — five days after Bush and Cheney took office — warning them about al Qaeda and asking for a high level meeting? Or the same Dick Clarke that on September 4, 2001 — a week before the attack — sent them a memo warning them of an attack that would leave hundreds dead?”
“Or are you maybe talking about the Dick Clark who hosts New Year’s Rockin’ Eve?” Stewart added sarcastically. “Because that one I can understand — not the other one.”
Stewart was as appalled, however, by the audience’s response to Cheney as by Cheney himself. “Let’s now look at the moment,” he suggested, “that epitomizes everything that is wrong with Dick Cheney — his arrogance — the media — their acquiescence — and the delightfully witty relationship between the two.”
“You said that Richard Clarke must have missed 9/11,” the NPC interviewer asked. “Wasn’t he warning the White House for months of chatter about an attack?”
“That’s not my recollection,” Cheney sneered. He added to laughs from the audience, “But I haven’t read his book.”
“That’s a good one, Mr. Cheney!” Stewart chortled, mocking the Nation Press Club audience’s response. “I guess you never read the memos either … and then we went to war in Iraq because of bad intelligence distributed in your behest … and then we started torturing people. Good times!”
This video is from Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, broadcast June 3, 2009.
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Subject: Does Dick Cheney have multiple personality disorder? 
Thu Jun 04, 2009 2:17 pm
