Dick

There is a lingering plague afoot in this nation. After a thorough high colonic, the parasite that caused this pestilential eruption lingers, continuing to spew filth and corruption. I speak of none other than our former Vice-President, the incredibly aptly named Dick Cheney. This scion of corporate corpulence, this Sith Lord with his hand firmly wearing his former boss like some sort of demented flesh sock puppet, the being that single-handedly orchestrated the greatest single assault on our Constitutional freedoms since King George III, has risen from the slime of his "undisclosed location" to show the moral bankruptcy that characterized the administration of Bush the Younger.

Hyperbole aside, I am constantly amazed at the unmitigated gall of this Dick. Since skulking out of office, he has done nothing but criticize the foreign policy of the Obama administration. On closing Gitmo: It's a bad decision. It's a first-class facility (ABC News). When President Obama officially ended torture? "President Obama campaigned against it all across the country, and now he is making some choices that, in my mind, will, in fact, raise the risk to the American people of another attack." (CNN) The crowning glory came on April 20 when the most secretive government official since that other Dick (Nixon, for you young'uns), who has fought tooth-and-nail to exert executive privlidge wherever possible (and in a few impossible places), was quoted by UPI as saying that the Obama administration didn't release enough information!

After the work-product from the twisted hobgoblins that made up the Bush "Justice" department was made public, Dick had the nerve to say, "One of the things that I find a little bit disturbing about this recent disclosure is they put out the legal memos, the memos that the CIA got from the Office of Legal Counsel, but they didn't put out the memos that showed the success of the effort." (UPI) The implication is that there are volumes of interrogation reports and other documentation of all the plots foiled by America's descent into Inquisition. From Dick's own pen, the truth is somewhat underwhelming.

Dick filed a request for documents from his old office under the Freedom of Information Act. Apparently he had a file labeled "Detainees" in his office. From that he wants the documents that, one assumes, will vindicate his torturing of prisoners. So, how many memos does Darth Cheney think it will take to clear his "good name"? Two, total pages: 21. Is there anyone out there still buying the bullshit?

President Obama made a mistake when he said the the CIA operatives that followed orders to torture shouldn't be prosecuted. The saving grace of that moment was when he said that investigation and prosecution of the torture incidents was up to the Attorney General. AG Holder, the very reputation of the American nation and her people is at stake. Lady Liberty was not just assaulted, she was clubbed, dragged into a dark alley, sodomized and her purse ransacked for cabfare. It is essential that you order investigations and, where the evidence indicates, prosecutions. To make any investigation more than a fancy cover-up, you MUST follow the evidence wherever it leads, even if that destination is the highest office in the land. The ghosts of torture victims throughout history cry out for the restoration of America's reputation as that shining beacon of freedom and liberty that she has been in the past, and is on her way to being again.

Yes, We Did!

President Obama. I STILL think it sounds cool! I got to watch the whole inauguration ceremony live, and except for that sanctimonious hypocrite Rick Warren it was a wonderful experience. Aretha was in fine voice and as one of my co-workers said, "There are only a few places you can wear a hat like that.", but she pulled it off with style. I still think she should have sung "Respect", but tradition must be served. Perhaps in four years?

Our new President is about to sign an executive order to close the gulag at Guantanamo. That's a great first step, but I think that more needs to happen. In the unlikely event that someone with the ear of President Obama reads this, my advice as an American that longs to see his country regain the moral high ground is this: Please order Attorney General-Designate Holder (Still Designate thanks to partisan Republican bullcrap) to investigate the illegal wiretapping, eavesdropping, no-bid contracts and, most of all, the use of torutre by the Bush administration. If sufficient evidence is found, those responsible should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. If that means that the former President and Vice-President go to jail, so be it.

I am not advocating a "witch-hunt". Merely following the evidence wherever it leads, even if (and especially if) it leads all the way to the top. The U.N. Special Investigator on Torture, Manfred Noack said today that, "The American government has a clear obligation to prosecute members of the Bush administration for war crimes" as a signatory to the U.N. Convention on Torture. Mr. Noack specifically named Donald Rumsfield and former President Bush. In fact, under those conventions, the U.N. might be able to start prosecution on its' own!

Wouldn't it be better for us to clean our own house than to let the rest of the world do it for us?