Ethics

Cheney's Insane Defense

By Ed Brayton

Watching the Dick Cheney farewell tour of interviews is becoming downright surreal. He steadfastly refuses to admit that the Bush administration has ever done anything wrong. In fact, the closest he's come to saying they've made a mistake is to argue that Bush should not have fired Rumsfeld because Rumsfeld was doing a great job. Seriously.

Cheney, speaking less than a month before he and President Bush leave the White House, was blunt and unapologetic about his central role in some of the most controversial issues of the past eight years, including the invasion of Iraq, warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens, and harsh interrogation tactics. Cheney also said he disagreed with Bush's decision to remove embattled Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in 2006, saying that "the president doesn't always take my advice."

"I was a Rumsfeld man," Cheney said. "I'd helped recruit him and I thought he did a good job for us."

Full post as published by Dispatches from the Culture Wars on December 24, 2008 (boomark / email).