Ward on Words

Paul Krugman's NY Times blog post,  "Shadow of the Torturers,"  is a painful reminder of inconvenient truth that all Americans not molded in the model of John Wayne had to confront back in the days of Bush-Cheney: we became a country that openly endorsed torture as a national security measure. It is interesting to note that those who endorsed the use of torture during the war on terror were also those who did anything they could to get out of serving their country during the war on Viet Nam. In the late 1960s, when the Viet Nam war was raging, GW Bush - son of an authentic war hero - joined the National Guard, not active military duty, and in the early 1970s, apparently  went AWOL  and failed to fulfill his National Guard commitments. As a young man in the 1960s,  Dick Cheney pulled any string available to get out of the draft, and in return, received five draft deferments. Though eligible to serve his nation as a soldier in a time of war, he cho...

Dick Cheney has placed himself prominently in the public eye once again, this time as an advocate for gay marriage. Speaking at the National Press Club yesterday, he said, "people ought to be able to enter into any kind of arrangement, (but) that it ought to be left up to the states." He is consistent, I'll give him that. He's long been a steadfast supporter of torture - and he's been a voice for gay marriage since at least 2004. Cheney did not focus his thoughts only on the rights of gays to enjoy matrimonial life. While at the podium at the National Press Club yesterday, he also took the time to: - Defend the war in Iraq, despite the lack of evidence that Saddam Hussein had anything to do with 9/11. - Say that the White House's refusal to declassify CIA memos on detainee torture was "foolish, deeply unfair and sets a dangerous precedent..." - Call the closure of Guantanamo prison "a terrible mistake." - Let the world kn...

Dick Cheney wants transparency. Finally, after eight years claiming executive privilege to prevent the release of key information, Dick Cheney wants full disclosure of certain memos surrounding the use of torture. He's calling for such openness as a way to help President Obama make the right choices for defending our country. As Dick Cheney himself says , "...whatever choices [President Obama] makes concerning the defense of this country, those choices should not be based on slogans and campaign rhetoric, but on a truthful telling of history." Which is why Dick Cheney yesterday gave a speech to the American Enterprise Institute, an organization devoted to strengthening the foundations of freedom, so that he could truthfully share with us the history of the world as he sees it. Of course, the AEI is the perfect place for Dick Cheney to have given this speech - if you look at their website, they proudly share their belief that the "competition of ideas is ...

Today, May 21 2009, we had the unprecedented experience of having two very powerful Americans talk very publicly about their views on the use of torture in keeping America safe. Think about it. At this moment in our history, with the economy in the toilet and our troops deployed in two wars, we're talking about whether or not the United States should continue to torture prisoners of war. We talked about whether we should waterboard enemy combatants. Throw men against the wall in an effort to make them talk. Use state-sanctioned torture to protect the interests of America. President Obama spoke today on the subject of national security at the National Archives. This is where the U.S. Constitution lives. Where the original Declaration of Independence can be found. This is home for the documents that outlined the attempts of a new country to govern in a new way - democratically. Our president spoke at that place on this day to inform the nation of the reasons why w...

Spending the last eight years in a bunker seems to have left Dick Cheney giddy with gabbiness after emerging into the bright lights of his post-(vice) presidential life. In fact, he now seems unwilling to yield the spotlight to anyone else - except perhaps to Rush Limbaugh. During his reign as the nation's second in command, he seemed strangely silent, except when he trolled the hallways of the capital looking for votes for torture, money for Halliburton and support for the war in Iraq. In retrospect, it seemed that Cheney spent the best years of his vice-presidency yammering about Iraq's threat to the world... Iraq's connection to Al Qaeda... Iraq's possession of nuclear weapons. He proved highly adept at spinning falsehoods as truth. There was a time, certainly, when much of the nation was convinced we were about to be blown up in an Iraqi-initiated mushroom cloud. So we made the preemptive strike against Iraq to protect ourselves from their massive stockpi...