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rulemylife -> Dick Cheney: Why So Chatty All of a Sudden? (5/13/2009 2:27:00 PM)
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Dick Cheney: Why So Chatty All of a Sudden? - TIME
In the past few days, former Vice President Dick Cheney has appeared on CBS's Face the Nation and Fox News to defend the Bush team's harsh interrogation practices. His daughter Liz has done a turn on MSNBC to echo her father. Next week, Cheney is scheduled to give a speech called "Keeping America Safe" at the American Enterprise Institute.
For a man whose public profile was almost nonexistent while he was a public servant, it's clear from his schedule alone that private citizen Cheney hasn't merely resurfaced — he's gone on the offensive. The question is, Why?.....................
....................A more likely explanation is that Cheney, who championed the idea of preemptive-attack doctrine as Vice President, knows that in politics as well the best defense is often a good offense. With the White House decision to release various Bush-era memos on interrogation, and the coming disclosure of thousands more photographs from Abu Ghraib later this month, Cheney is "trying to rewrite history," says a Republican consultant who has experience in intelligence matters. "He knows that as time goes by, he will look worse. And so he's trying to put his stroke on it." (See pictures of the aftershocks of Abu Ghraib.)
Cheney obliquely conceded as much on Sunday, when he told CBS's Bob Scheiffer, "I think it's very, very important that we have a clear understanding that what happened here was an honorable approach to defending the nation, that there was nothing devious or deceitful or dishonest or illegal about what was done." That sounds like: O.K., we got a little out of hand. But we meant well. So how 'bout we just let it go?
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