Yesterday we reported that the Justice Department appears to be stonewalling queries from the Congressional Research Service looking into the US Attorney purge. Now DOJ says they’re working on coughing up the information. It’s just taking them a while.
How many times did Sen. Lieberman say he wouldn’t switch parties? Let us count the ways. See our tally here.
So Vice President Cheney is keeping up his criticism of Speaker Pelosi, saying the Democrats’ preferred policy would “validate the al-Qaeda strategy.” I don’t know how many times this needs to be said: stop complaining that he’s questioning anybody’s patriotism. 
Or Pelosi’s judgment. Or any of it. I know it’s a dicey phrase, especially when it’s being employed against a woman. But I think explanatory value outweighs other sensitivities. This is a perfect example of the GOP’s bitch slap theory of electoral politics. Cheney criticize; Dems, Pelosi, whoever says it’s unfair.
The point of the whole exercise is not the underlying issue of Pelosi but what the exchange is supposed to demonstrate about both players — that Cheney is strong (he hits) and Pelosi is weak (she complains when attacked.)
Why complain about anything Dick Cheney says? The man is simply too big a fool to hold any job of responsibility in the national government. Think of his history of failure, terrible judgment, reckless endangerment of the country. It’s hard to imagine that there’s anyone in this country not under active federal surveillance who has done more to advance the al Qaeda agenda than Dick Cheney.
I know that seems like hyperbole or a throwaway line. But it’s actually very true. Is America stronger now than it was before the Cheney era? Does al Qaeda have more fertile ground for proselytizing or less? Are we in a stronger or weaker position vis a vis Iran? Just one factoid you may have missed of late. A recent poll shows that since 2002 the percentage of Arabs who say their primary identity is as Muslims rather than as Arabs or members of their specific nationality has almost doubled — now it’s at 45%. That’s in just four years.
It’s true. So say it. Don’t whine. Don’t complain. The idea that Dick Cheney is telling anyone what helps or harms al Qaeda is comic. Bleak comedy, but comic nonetheless. Say so.
Lieberman just said it: He won’t switch to the GOP! Or did he?
TPM Reader TY responds to Dick Cheney’s latest goofball lies …
I think the main thing Cheney is doing here is making the point that the Iraq war is about al-Qaeda, when in fact al-Qaeda is only a very small part of the war, as the NIE indicates. The only was to validate the war is to constantly tie it to al-Qaeda (as they have done since 9/11). Pelosi and the Democrats should respond by knocking down the al-Qaeda canard. Perhaps they are tired of fighting this uphill battle but Cheney and the administration should be held accountable for continuously spreading misinformation. Even the media (yeah, sure) should question this assertion. But every time he says it, people believe it. The old trick of repeating a lie tirelessly and and it “becomes” true.
True. But the thing is, the bigger we screw-up in Iraq, the more unpopular we get in the region, the wider the pool of potential recruits for jihadist groups like al-Qaida. So, yes, it’s a canard. But the scope and magnitude of Cheney’s screw-ups and incompetence are so vast that they actually can increase the danger we face from al-Qaida, even though at the outset they had little to do with each other.
TPM Reader PR looks out his window …
I’m looking out my downtown Austin office window at Auditorium Shores where a huge crowd has been growing since the gates opened at noon to see Sen. Barack Obama speak. It’s been raining lightly now for the better part of an hour and the crowd shows no signs of letting up.
On line ticket requests totaled about 16,000 and the park looks pretty full right now. They say the capacity for the park (which holds the statue of Stevie Ray Vaughan) is 20,000.
I know Austin is the bluest dot in a really, really red state, but this turnout in this weather (even here) is amazing.
He’s hot. There’s no denying it.
The New Republic goes biweekly.
“A Weekly Journal of Opinion,” as the masthead said, since 1914.
TPM Reader LJ carts out the TPM hermeneutic to size up the contenders …
I was pondering your “GOP bitch slap theory” and was wondering how you think the various Democratic contenders would hold up to this kind of treatment in the general election. If the bitch slap is a real GOP tactic, they’ll need to be able to handle it.
Take Edwards, for example. I can’t help but recall him sitting next to Cheney during the 2006 VP debates – Cheney lies and says he’s never met John Edwards before and the next day there are pictures circulating showing Cheney and Edwards together at some kind of function. Why didn’t Edwards turn and call Cheney a bald faced liar? It would have grabbed the headlines and the next day the photos would’ve proven that Cheney is a bald faced liar. Cheney made him look weak. So I think Edwards is vulnerable to the bitch slap.
Obama. When the Australian Prime Minister said that Al Qaeda wants Obama to win, Obama responded that Howard needs to send another 20,000 Australians to the war or else he’s just spewing empty rhetoric. He didn’t whine about being attacked. Howard’s attack seems rather Cheney-esque and I don’t think he succeeded in making Obama look weak.
Clinton. It seems to me that Clinton’s statement decrying the comments of Geffen and (somewhat bizzarely IMHO) demanding an apology from Obama is essentially whining. It’s not fair that Geffen said that. It’s not fair that Obama won’t apologize for something said by a third party. Doesn’t this show that she’s incredibly vulnerable to the GOP bitch slap?
TPM Reader DB on Cheney …
Why doesn’t a prominent Democrat come out and basically repeat your post on Cheney? Why can’t a Democrat on a Sunday morning talk show scream, “Cheney is a moron! He has no idea what the hell he is doing. He is an outright disaster. He should resign effective immediately and the country will be a lot better off.” There really is no downside to this (of course the press may disapprove of the lack of civility but they’ll get over it) if whoever says it stands by it and all the other Dems back them up. Cheney is incredibly unpopular, his policies suck and he is so far removed from reality he is a parody. The only reason he remains afloat is because he is a bully. Well it is about time someone called the bully’s bluff.
So true.
Maybe not precisely those words that DB advises. But pretty damn close. In the sometimes hothouse world of blogging we go off on tears and lose sight of the fact that not everyone believes what we see as obvious. But Dick Cheney’s an exceptional case. He stands on his own unique ground of ridiculousness. And because of that he’s not simply a bully but a glass bully. Outside of the very hard right wing of American politics, pretty much everyone now sees that Dick Cheney is a screw-up and a moron of historic proportions. If you know more of the ins and outs of the administration’s history you know that the hugest blunders were Cheney policies and the policies which weren’t totally stupid were ones he fought tooth and nail. The best place to see the change even among DC establishment journalists, who used to revere him (Broder probably still does, but I think he’s emeritus now) are in the set piece interviews. Each one is now followed by a Kabuki journo debrief in which half-smiling/half-awkward-looking reporters pick apart which statements seem incorrect, which are outright lies and which seem to come from a guy who’s simply lost his mind.
He’s the crazy uncle of American politics at this point.
You don’t even have to be snide. Treat him like the joke that he is and a look of recognition and agreement will come over most people’s faces.