Better a Ditherer, Than a Dick . . .

Well, frumps, looks like somebody rattled Dick Cheney’s cage again – either that or he’s trying to look “presidential.” (God help us)

Cheney came out of hibernation on Wednesday to put on his “black tie” and accept this year’s “Keeper of the Flame” award from the Center for Security Policy (CSP), a small, Washington, DC think tank which bills itself as a “non-partisan” organization that is “committed to the time-tested philosophy of promoting international peace through American strength.”  Sharing the awards program with Cheney, this year, was “Scooter” Libby who received the Fall-Guy Award “Service Before Self” award.

So, what  exactly is the Center for Security Policy that thinks so much of Dick Cheney? according to sourcewatch.org:

“The Center specializes in the rapid preparation and real-time dissemination of information, analyses and policy recommendations . . . (t)he principal audience for such materials is the U.S. security policy-making community (the executive and legislative branches, the armed forces and appropriate independent agencies), corresponding organizations in key foreign governments, the press (domestic and international), the global business and financial community and interested individuals in the public at large.”

So What’s Your Definition of Non-partisan?

CSP’s advisory list looks like a Who’s Who of Twentieth Century Conservative Hawks headed up by Frank Gaffney, its founder, president and CEO.  Gaffney’s prescriptions for national security have always been fairly consistent and simple: Gut all arms control treaties, push ahead with weapons systems virtually everyone agrees should be killed, eliminate the Palestinians and, most important, an awe-inspiring national missile defense program is the only path to American longevity and global domination.

A quick scan of CSP’s list of affiliates demonstrates how all that saber-rattling  makes perfect sense – it just good business.  CSP’s board of advisors boasts representatives of Boeing, the makers of the Osprey, Lockheed Martin’s  vice president for space and strategic missiles Charles Kupperman and director of defense systems Douglas Graham. Former TRW executive Amoretta Hoeber is also a CSP adviser, as well as former Congressman and Raytheon lobbyist Robert Livingston. Ball Aerospace & Technologies — a major manufacturer of NASA and Pentagon satellites — is represented by former Navy Secretary John Lehman, while missile-defense computer systems maker Hewlett-Packard is represented by George Keyworth, who is on its board of directors. And the Congressional Missile Defense Caucus and Osprey (or “tilt rotor”) caucus are represented by Representative Curt Weldon and Senator Jon Kyl.”

Donations to the Center have come from a variety of conservative foundations such as: The Smith Richardson Foundation, The Sarah Scaife Foundation, The Carthage Foundation, The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, and the John M. Olin Foundation. [4]

Despite CSP’s claim of being nonpartisan, it has strong ties with the Republican Party with many members serving senior posts in the Reagan administration and George W. Bush administration.  Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense under Bush, is a recipient of the Center’s Keeper of the Flame Award (along with Cheney). The Center is quite proud of its strong ties with the U.S. Government.

Just Be Yourself, Dick . . .

So that might explain how easy it was for Cheney to connect with his audience for a little Obama-bashing, fear-mongering and a spritz of accusations of endangering “the Troops”, instead of the usual “Thank you for the award . . .” speech.

Cheney started the ball rolling with a nod to one of the Center’s pet projects – National Missile Defense:

“So among my other concerns about the drift of events under the present administration, I consider the abandonment of missile defense in Eastern Europe to be a strategic blunder and a breach of good faith.”

Here are a few choice bits from the Obama-bashing portion of Cheney’s “acceptance” rant:

“Having announced his Afghanistan strategy last March, President Obama now seems afraid to make a decision, and unable to provide his commander on the ground with the troops he needs to complete his mission.”

“Five months later, in August of this year, speaking at the VFW, the President made a promise to America’s armed forces. “I will give you a clear mission,” he said, “defined goals, and the equipment and support you need to get the job done. That’s my commitment to you.”
“It’s time for President Obama to make good on his promise. The White House must stop dithering while America’s armed forces are in danger.  Make no mistake, signals of indecision out of Washington hurt our allies and embolden our adversaries. Waffling, while our troops on the ground face an emboldened enemy, endangers them and hurts our cause.”
And then, the characteristic Cheney “big finish” in which he equates President Obama with terrorists:

“There are policy differences, and then there are affronts that have to be answered every time without equivocation, and this is one of them. We cannot protect this country by putting politics over security, and turning the guns on our own guys. We cannot hope to win a war by talking down our country and those who do its hardest work – the men and women of our military and intelligence services. They are, after all, the true keepers of the flame.”

The White House Responds

Predictably, Robert Gibbs was asked by the press, the following day for the White House’s response to Cheney’s comments and, true to their new Take No Guff position the rebuttal was, unlike Cheney’s comments, factual and forceful:

Other Democrats chimed in to defend the president, despite opposition among congressional Democrats to a major expansion of the U.S. war effort.

Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., a member of the Armed Services Committee said:

“Republicans have developed a troubling pattern of blaming President Obama for trying to fix all the problems that they created.”

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-TN., also defended Obama on MSNBC:

“I think President Obama is entitled to take sufficient time to decide what our long-term role ought to be in Afghanistan,  I want him to take the time to get it right.”

Incompetent War Fighters = Military Jargon for EPIC FAIL!!!

One of the most strident of  Obama’s defenses came from a somewhat unexpected, but eminently effective, source:  National Security Network Senior Adviser Gen. Paul Eaton (Ret.), who served more than 30 years in the United States Army and from 2003-2004 oversaw the training of the Iraqi military.

Gen. Eaton let Cheney have it with both barrels in an official memo on the National Security Network:

“The record is clear: Dick Cheney and the Bush administration were incompetent war fighters. They ignored Afghanistan for 7 years with a crude approach to counter-insurgency warfare best illustrated by: 1. Deny it.  2.  Ignore it. 3. Bomb it. While our intelligence agencies called the region the greatest threat to America, the Bush White House under-resourced our military efforts, shifted attention to Iraq, and failed to bring to justice the masterminds of September 11.

“The only time Cheney and his cabal of foreign policy ‘experts’ have anything to say is when they feel compelled to protect this failed legacy. While President Obama is tasked with cleaning up the considerable mess they left behind, they continue to defend torture or rewrite a legacy of indifference on Afghanistan. Simply put, Mr. Cheney sees history throughout extremely myopic and partisan eyes.

“As one deeply invested in the Armed Forces of this country, I am grateful for the senior military commanders assigned to leading this fight and the men and women fighting on the ground. But I dismiss men like Cheney who inject partisan politics into the profound deliberations our Commander-in-Chief and commanders on the ground are having to develop a cohesive and comprehensive strategy, bringing to bear the economic and diplomatic as well as the military power, for Afghanistan — something Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld never did.

“No human endeavor can be as profound as sending a nation’s youth to war.  I am very happy to see serious men and women working hard to get it right.”

Bravo, General Eaton.

What’s the Mission, Again?

Johann Hari, a columnist for the London Independent, has written an interesting column, picked up by the Huffington Press.  It’s entitled  Everything You Have Been Told About Afghanistan Is Wrong: The Three Great Fallacies and I recommend it, highly.  Hari’s article skillfully dismantles three of the most familiar arguments for committing troops to Afghanistan:

• Argument One: We need to deprive al-Qa’ida of military bases in Afghanistan, or they will use them to plot attacks against us, and we will face 9/11 redux.
• Argument Two: By staying, we are significantly improving Afghan human rights, especially for women.
• Argument Three: If we withdraw, it will be a great victory for al-Qa’ida. Re-energised, they will surge out across the world.

Cheney for President??

Back in September  a Wall Street Journal columnist, James Taranto wrote an Op-Ed piece floating the notion that, if national security were a major issue in 2012, what better Presidential candidate could there be than Dick Cheney?

After the belly laughs subsided, it became apparent that a few die-hards were actually taking the joke seriously.  They are most likely paid-up members of the club that wouldn’t be terribly upset by a terrorist attack proving that Bush/Cheney were, indeed, the only defense standing between Americans and certain death at the hands of jihadists – nevertheless, the Republican Party is so desperate for some sort of savior that I wouldn’t be surprised by any nominee they put forward.

John McLaughlin, a pollster and GOP operative, was a little more diplomatic than I but, essentially, he said the same thing; he sees an “opening for a Cheney candidacy premised on a hypothetical national security failure from the current White House.”

McLaughlin told the Huffington Post that “a Cheney nomination would be a serious consideration because he really has been a defender of policies that the majority of people now think are successful.  Although right now a lot of people are focused on the economy, if there ever was some sort of foreign policy crisis people will look to Dick Cheney and say he had it right.”

I think McLaughlin must have drunk too much of the Tea Party Silent Majority Kool-Aid.  For starters, the latest polls show those who identify themselves as Republicans have dropped to a 30 year low, coming in at 19% of voters.   So it’s not a “lock” to be a popular candidate for an unpopular party.

A large number of Americans turned out specifically to oust Bush/Cheney and I don’t think that the image of the odious, lying, secretive leadership that led America into a colossal domestic and foreign mess will have softened any in three years time.  Especially if we have to continue listening to Cheney and Cheney, Jr.’s fear-mongering rants and snide wishes for utter failure.

If the best the GOP can do is this bitter, sickly old white guy who enjoys sending young Americans off to fight for his personal dreams of global domination then my wish for the Republican Party is a quick and painless death.  Dick Cheney has demonstrated epic political and diplomatic flaws and has pretty sparse qualifications for the POTUS job.  Even the GOP, as it exists, can do so much better . . .

Technorati Tags: President Barack Obama, Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby, Center for Security Policy, Gen. Paul Eaton, Johann Hari, James Taranto, Huffington Post, Keeper of the Flame, Afghanistan

Tagged as: Afghanistan, huffington post, James Taranto, Keeper of the Flame, n Hari