Dick Cheney thinks that Russian meddling in our election could be an act of war. And I agree with him.

Courtesy of Business Insider:  

In a wide-ranging speech at the Economic Times' Global Business Summit on Monday, former US Vice President Dick Cheney spoke unequivocally about Russia's meddling in the 2016 US presidential election.

......

"There's no question that there was a very serious effort made by Mr. Putin and his government, his organization, to interfere in major ways with our basic fundamental democratic processes," Cheney said. 

"In some quarters, that could be considered an act of war. "I would not underestimate the weight that we as Americans assign to Russian attempts to interfere with our process," Cheney concluded.

Now I think we all know that Dick Cheney is a warmonger's warmonger, and would likely start World War 3 over somebody taking his parking place, but he is not wrong here. 

Now I am not suggesting that we need to start bombing Moscow, but I am suggesting that America's policy toward Russia be one of dealing with a hostile nation bent on undermining our democracy.

Trump's talk of unilaterally working to improve our relationship with Russia should be seen as treasonous in light of what they did during the 2016 election.

Before we can start rebuilding any kind of trust with Russia we need to first punish them for what they did in 2016 by issuing the kinds of sanctions that will make the people rise up against Putin and retake their country from the oligarchs who are oppressing them and stealing their wealth.

That is the kind of financial warfare which seems appropriate here.

And in fact we are already starting to see those protests taking place.

Now if you will excuse me I have to wash my mind out with soap for agreeing with Dick "Shot him right in the face" Cheney.

Donald Trump's chief advisor Stephen Bannon openly emulates Satan and Dick Cheney.

Courtesy of the Hollywood Reporter:  

"Darkness is good," says Bannon, who amid the suits surrounding him at Trump Tower, looks like a graduate student in his T-shirt, open button-down and tatty blue blazer — albeit a 62-year-old graduate student. "Dick Cheney. Darth Vader. Satan. That's power. It only helps us when they" — I believe by "they" he means liberals and the media, already promoting calls for his ouster — "get it wrong. When they're blind to who we are and what we're doing." 

Oh yeah, nothing troubling about this.

Bannon also claims that he is not a white nationalist: 

"I'm not a white nationalist, I'm a nationalist. I'm an economic nationalist."

Let's see an "economic nationalist" who used his online news site to promote antisemitism,  Islamophobia, and racism. And whose audience was largely made up of neo-Nazis, KKK members, and the Alt-Right.

How is that different than a "white nationalist" again?

Bill Maher points out that the only time conservatives seem to show empathy for others, is when they are affected as well.

Very good points.

I loved the Dick Cheney bit and the reminder that John McCain is tortured by his choice of Sarah Palin as his VP choice in 2008.

Like a bad case of Herpes, the Cheney family never seems to go away forever.

"No I won't be devouring your children today, but meet my daughter."

Courtesy of Politico: 

Liz Cheney is seeking a return to politics with a run for Wyoming’s lone House seat. 

The elder daughter of former vice president Dick Cheney is ready to announce Monday, the Associated Press first reported Saturday. She filed paperwork with the FEC on Friday to make her candidacy official. 

Liz Cheney ran unsuccessfully for a U.S. Senate seat in 2013, but failed to gain traction among Wyoming’s political establishment. 

In her 2013 race Liz Cheney claimed that she dropped out because of "personal reasons." That is code for "I can't get elected."

I wonder what she thinks has changed this time?

You know in the movies the children of Darth Vader turned to doing good in order to make up for their father's evil ways.

Sadly it appears that real life is nothing like the movies.

Statue of Satan placed in US Capitol. Oh wait, that's Dick Cheney.

I don;t know, still kinda looks like Satan to me.

Courtesy of ABC News:

A marble bust of former Vice President Dick Cheney was officially unveiled today in the U.S. Capitol. During a mid-day ceremony, Cheney was introduced by his former boss, President George W. Bush. 

“I must confess I’m somewhat reluctant to come back to Washington. The last time I showed up here I was hanged in the White House,” Bush said in reference to his official portrait. “This time I’ve returned only to find my vice president getting busted in the Capitol.” 

President Bush said that when he told his father, President George H.W. Bush, he would be attending today’s ceremony, “Dad perked up and he said, ‘Send my best regards to old iron-a**.’”

Well all I can say is that when tourists visit the Capital, and find themselves with a mouthful of saliva, now they know where to deposit it.

Not that I am advocating any type of vandalism, after all I'm pretty sure that is some kind of federal offense and I'm too pretty for prison, but you know some kind of gesture just to express your emotions at seeing this bust seems appropriate.

To be serious for a moment, Dick Cheney is a war criminal and traitor to this country. The only place he should be immortalized is on a list of the worst politicians in the history of the United States.

George H. Bush calls Dick Cheney "Arrogant" and "Iron ass." Oh now it's on!

Courtesy of The Guardian: 

Former US president George HW Bush has hit out at Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, two of the most senior figures in his son’s administration, labelling them too “hardline” and “arrogant” in their handling of the 11 September attacks. 

A new biography of the 41st president – Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey Of George Herbert Walker Bush – reveals that Bush Sr held Cheney and Rumsfeld responsible for the hawkish stance that “hurt” his son’s administration, Fox News reported on Wednesday. 

“The reaction [to 9/11], what to do about the Middle East. Just iron-ass. His seeming knuckling under to the real hard-charging guys who want to fight about everything, use force to get our way in the Middle East,” Bush told Meacham in the book, which is due to be published next week.

Of course Papa Bush does not extend the same criticism to his son:  

“He’s my son, he did his best and I’m for him. It’s that simple an equation.”

Well what did you expect?

Still Bush senior coming out against Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the response to 9-11 is huge.

And it comes at a rather inopportune time for Darth Cheney as there is a resolution about to be introduced to the Senate to honor the former VP and war criminal:  

Starting in December, the likeness of former Vice President Dick Cheney will grace the U.S. Capitol, in accordance with a Senate tradition honoring former vice presidents. 

The Huffington Post was tipped off by a Senate resolution "authorizing the use of Emancipation Hall in the Capitol Visitor Center for the unveiling of the marble bust of Vice President Richard Cheney on December 3, 2015."

Yeah well they better plan on having around the clock security because I CANNOT imagine a more likely target for vandalism than a bust of Dick Cheney.

Personally my all time favorite fantasy is seeing Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld, Rove, and Wolfowitz all marched off in chains to serve out the rest of their lives on a federal penitentiary as war criminals.

Jeb Bush wants us to remember what his brother did AFTER 9-11. Okay let's.

Just to add a few, Bush also started the domestic spying program under the NSA, used those colored terror charts to keep Americans in a constant state of panic, and outed a CIA agent whose husband dared to argue against misinformation suggesting that Iraq had access to yellow cake uranium.

(H/T to the Democratic Underground.)

Sarah Palin endorses conservative book club. Yes, you read that right.

Courtesy of the Conservative Book Club: 

Former Vice Presidential candidate and governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, joins and endorses the Conservative Book Club! She is also author of the bestselling books Going Rogue: An American Life and Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas. Check out her hilarious endorsement of the Conservative Book Club! She personally came by our office yesterday after participating in the Anti-Iran Nuclear Deal Rally in Washington, DC, with Sen. Ted Cruz and Donald Trump.

So the woman who could not name any magazines or newspapers that she reads is now promoting a book club.

Just how deep is this rabbit hole?

If you visit the New Releases section of the website you will see that the authors listed are a Who's Who of WTF? consisting mostly of conservative politicians, talk radio hosts, and Fox News talking heads.

These include Bill O'Reilly, Donald Trump, Glenn Beck, Mark Levin, Ann Coulter, and Dick Cheney.

That's right, Dick "The Iraq War was a great idea" Cheney.

In the children's section they have such classics as "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Patriot, Blue Commie Loving Faggot," "Alexander, and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Government," "Cloudy with a Chance of Pinheads," and of course "Oh the Places You'll Go When You Grow Up and Enlist in the Military to Defend Our Freedoms!"

Of course the great thing about the conservative book club is that all books come with large type since almost all of their members are over sixty.

Next up I understand that Palin will be endorsing a line of totally realistic wigs and one size fits all inflatable boobs.

I think that this should happen every single time that Dick Cheney starts to speak.

My favorite part of the video is the skinny old dude who cannot manage to pull the sign out of the young woman's hand, and seems to have broken a nail trying.

By the way this is how the White House responded to Cheney's criticism of the Iran deal.

I think we refer to that as checkmate.

Chris Wallace to Dick Cheney on Iran: "In all fairness didn't you leave President Obama with a mess?" This happened on Fox News!

Courtesy of Crooks and Liars: 

"You and President Bush, the Bush-Cheney administration, dealt with Iran for eight years, and I think it was fair to say that there was never any real, serious military threat," Wallace noted. "Iran went from zero known centrifuges in operation to more than 5,000." 

"So in fairness, didn't you leave -- the Bush-Cheney administration -- leave President Obama with a mess?" the Fox News host asked. 

"I don't think of it that way," Cheney replied. "There was military action that had an impact on the Iranians, it was when we took down Saddam Hussein. There was a period of time when they stopped their program because they were scared that what we did to Saddam, we were going to do to them next." 

"But the centrifuges went from zero to 5,000," Wallace pressed. 

"Well, they may have well have gone but that happened on Obama's watch, not on our watch," Cheney wrongly insisted. 

"No, no, no," Wallace fired back. "By 2009, they were at 5,000."

What a day. First CNN lobs softball questions at Sarah Palin and then Fox News holds Dick Cheney's feet to the fie over Iran. 

Up is down, black is white, and I just don't know what to think.

The real e-mail scandal that Republicans DON'T want to talk about.

@amychozick @marstu67 @HillaryClinton pic.twitter.com/PJfWgblkw0

— Idea (@idea46) August 15, 2015

Republicans are having a field day with their fake outrage over Hillary's private e-mail server, but the fact is that it does not even come close to the crap pulled by the Bush administration.

Newly released photos show that Dick Cheney watched the towers burning to the ground on 9-11 with his feet up.

So there are these newly released photos of the Bush administration on 9-11 that I think are supposed to show them emotionally distraught and seriously considering how they should respond.

But what struck me, was this one of Cheney with his feet on his desk calmly watching the screen as if he were watching a tennis match or something.

Now have little doubt that all of you remember how you felt on that day. Did any of you feel like leaning back in your chair with your feet up to watch these towers burn?

Speaking just for myself I was so distraught that I watched for much of the morning while standing in front of my TV to upset to even sit down. And when the first tower fell my knees literally buckled.

I spent almost a solid week after that day rewatching the footage until my wife finally pried the remote out of my hands and told me I needed to get the hell out of the house and do something to take my mind off of it.

Yet there sits Dick Cheney, Vice President of the United States, with his feet up.

Speaking of the Bush family, you probably need to take the fifteen minutes minutes to watch Jon Oliver's take on torture. And hey, it also features Helen Mirren.

(Yes I know fifteen minutes is a long time in internet terms, but trust me it is worth your time.)

Here is more courtesy of Raw Story:  

With a CBS poll showing the 69 percent of Americans believing that waterboarding is torture and 57 percent believing “aggressive” interrogation techniques help stop terrorist attacks, Oliver set out to point out that not only doesn’t torture work — it may make a comeback since it is only restricted by executive order, which can be tossed out by the next president. 

With the help of British actress Helen Mirren, Oliver compared the reality of torture to the version most American’s believe from television shows like “24.” 

With Mirren reading from the report about “rectal rehydration” — in the case of one detainee who was force fed a meal of hummus, pasta, nuts, and raisins pureed and introduced rectally — an aghast Oliver challenged his viewers to “try not to think about that the next time you eat hummus.”

Oliver's point that the only thing that is keeping us from torturing people right now is an executive order, that the next President can repeal on a whim, is yet ANOTHER reason to make damn sure that our next Commander-in-Chief is not a Republicans. And certainly NOT another Bush!

P.S. To end this post let me just trot out one of my own personal conspiracy theories, which is that the program "24" (Which is cited several times in this video.) was purposefully broadcast into our homes to help Americans become comfortable with the idea of torture. After all we saw it saving American lives every week on our television sets.

I don't actually have any proof of that, but it's one of those things that just seems a little too coincidental to actually be a coincidence.

And just to screw with you further the creator, Joel Surnow, is a Republican who is good friends with Rush Limbaugh. He filmed the pilot for the show in March of 2001, and aired the first episode on November 6th less than two months after the attacks on 9-11.

Surnow now owns the actual American flag that was flown over Baghdad during the 2003 invasion. 

Not saying you should read too much into this, just saying these facts exist.

Donald Rumsfeld says that he never thought forcing democracy on Iraq was a good idea. Now he tells us.

Courtesy of MSNBC:

In an interview with British newspaper The Times, Rumsfeld said that efforts to oust Saddam Hussein and replace his tyrannical regime with democracy were unworkable, and that he had concerns about the plan from the beginning. 

“I’m not one who thinks that our particular template of democracy is appropriate for other countries at every moment of their histories,” Rumsfeld told The Times. “The idea that we could fashion a democracy in Iraq seemed to me unrealistic. I was concerned about it when I first heard those words.”

WTF?

Rumsfeld has just as much blood on his hands as do Bush, Cheney, and Wolfowitz, among others. And there is nothing he can say now that will wash them clean.

Remember this is the guy who once said:

"There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know."

Sounds to me as if there were more knowns than unknowns, but this asshole didn't have the balls to say them out loud when it could have prevented the deaths of thousands of American soldiers and hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Iraqis.

I wonder how many more rats will jump ship in the months to come?

Jon Stewart finally interviews the disgraced New York Times reporter Judith Miller the way she needs to be interviewed.

Click image to play extended interview.

I watched this last night standing on my feet.

That's how excited I was to see somebody finally, at long last, holding Miller's feet to the fire.

I had already watched several interviews which had me yelling at the screen in anger, and here was one that had me yelling at the screen in support.

Here is more from the Daily Beast:  

Stewart did not let Miller off easy, claiming that Miller partook in a “concerted effort” to lead us into a war with Iraq. 

“I think it was a concerted effort to take us into war in Iraq. You had to shift, with energy, the focus of America from Afghanistan and al Qaeda to Iraq. That took effort,” Stewart said. “Somebody pointed the light at Iraq, and that somebody is the White House, and the Defense Department, and Rumsfeld. He said right after 9/11, ‘Find me a pretext to go to war with Iraq.’ That’s from the 9/11 papers and the study.” 

Much of the focus of their on-air tussle was Miller’s front-page Times story from September 8, 2002, headlined, “U.S. Says Hussein Intensifies Quest for A-Bomb Parts.” In it, Miller and her Times colleague Michael R. Gordon cited anonymous officials from the Bush administration who believed that Iraq had “stepped up its quest for nuclear weapons and embarked on a worldwide hunt for materials to make an atomic bomb.” 

Here is part of their heated exchange:

MILLER: “Jon, were we not supposed to report what it was that had the intelligence community so nervous about Saddam?” 

STEWART: “No. You should have reported it, though, in the context of this administration was very clearly pushing a narrative, and by losing sight of that context, by not reporting—” 

MILLER: “I think we did.” 

STEWART: “I wholeheartedly disagree with you.” 

MILLER: “That’s what makes journalism.” 

STEWART: “It’s actually not what makes journalism...”

At one point in the interview Miller claims that a statement by David Albright, an expert she claims she trusted on nuclear weapons, which disagreed with the White House about Iraq's ability to build that type of weapon, was cut due to space. Which is one of the most bullshit answers I have ever heard in my life.

Usually at the end of an interview,  even with somebody that Stewart disagrees with wholeheartedly, he is always magnanimous and makes a joke and shakes their hand to signify no hard feelings.

But not this time.

At the end of this interview Stewart looks disgusted with the fact that Miller will not take responsibility for her biased reporting, and expresses how deeply sad that makes him.

Michele Bachmann and Dick Cheney agree that Barack Obama is the worst President in the history of the United States.

Does anybody else hear that ringing?

Courtesy of Raw Story:  

Former Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) denounced the proposed nuclear deal between the U.S. and Iran in a radio interview on Wednesday, calling it “literally the worst part” of President Barack Obama’s time in office. 

“This puts Iran in a position where they would have the firepower to be able to take out not only Israel, but they would have the firepower to use intercontinental ballistic missiles against the United States with nuclear-tipped warheads,” she told Florida Live host Dan Maduri. “This virtually guarantees, in my opinion, a World War III. I think that alone would qualify Barack Obama for being the worst president that the United States has ever had to endure.”

Now I would usually simply ignore this statement as it comes out of the red lined maw of a complete imbecile who is so ignorant that she loses over works her brains cells simply by trying to remember her own phone number.

However I read that she was not alone in her determination concerning the quality of President Obama's presidency. Dick Cheney was totally vibing on what she was saying.

Courtesy of Politico: 

Former Vice President Dick Cheney says President Barack Obama is the worst commander in chief the United States has ever had, in view of the recent Iranian nuclear agreement. 

Asked about the deal by conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on Tuesday, the former vice president said the Iranian regime is “one of the most radical” in history and that “Obama’s about to give them nuclear weapons.” 

“I vacillate between the various theories I’ve heard, but you know, if you had somebody as president who wanted to take America down, who wanted to fundamentally weaken our position in the world and reduce our capacity to influence events, turn our back on our allies and encourage our adversaries, it would look exactly like what Barack Obama’s doing,” Cheney said when asked whether he thought the president is naïve or something else. 

“I think his actions are constituted in my mind those of the worst president we’ve ever had,” he said.

You know there are days when I wonder if I could be any more proud of this President. 

I mean if both Michele Bachmann and Dick "Let's bomb the fuck out of Iraq" Cheney think he sucks, then you just know he is doing a FANTASTIC job!

Cartoon of the day.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair may face charges of war crimes after release of report. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney chuckle quietly to themselves.

Courtesy of the Telegraph:  

Tony Blair could face war crimes charges as a result of the Iraq war inquiry report, the House of Lords has been told.

Okay let me confess that if Tony Blair gets convicted of war crimes while members of the Bush administration are still walking around scott free I ma going to lose my shit.

We just had our own report released which illustrated a number of criminal activities that were undertaken by this country under the direction of that criminal administration and NOTHING came of it.

And not to give Blair a pass because he deserves to swing as far as I am concerned, but the Iraq war was the brain child of Dick Cheney and George Bush. Blair was just the cowardly piss ant that allowed himself to be bullied into signing on so that they would not take his lunch money and give him a wedgie.

Let me ask one more time, what the fuck is wrong with us America?

Well it's all I want for Christmas.

The New York Times pushes for the prosecution of those in the Bush Administration responsible for torture. That's all of them, right?

Courtesy of the New York Times: 

The American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch are to give Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. a letter Monday calling for appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate what appears increasingly to be “a vast criminal conspiracy, under color of law, to commit torture and other serious crimes.”

The question everyone will want answered, of course, is: Who should be held accountable? That will depend on what an investigation finds, and as hard as it is to imagine Mr. Obama having the political courage to order a new investigation, it is harder to imagine a criminal probe of the actions of a former president. 

But any credible investigation should include former Vice President Dick Cheney; Mr. Cheney’s chief of staff, David Addington; the former C.I.A. director George Tenet; and John Yoo and Jay Bybee, the Office of Legal Counsel lawyers who drafted what became known as the torture memos. There are many more names that could be considered, including Jose Rodriguez Jr., the C.I.A. official who ordered the destruction of the videotapes; the psychologists who devised the torture regimen; and the C.I.A. employees who carried out that regimen. 

Starting a criminal investigation is not about payback; it is about ensuring that this never happens again and regaining the moral credibility to rebuke torture by other governments. Because of the Senate’s report, we now know the distance officials in the executive branch went to rationalize, and conceal, the crimes they wanted to commit. The question is whether the nation will stand by and allow the perpetrators of torture to have perpetual immunity for their actions.

I still have my doubts that the President will sign off on this, after all we know too well how this will be framed by the Right Wing.

But if there is enough public outcry he ultimately may have little choice.

Yesterday I complained that the German human rights groups were doing what we should have been the first to do. And now it looks like we might have been shamed into doing so.

Could this be a Christmas miracle in the making?