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06.24 Mr. Holder, You Must Hold Torturers Accountable

Health & Environment

06.29 Thinking about Climate

06.26 False Health-Scare Ad on CNN

06.25 Louella Learns the Limits of Medicare

06.23 The Simple Answer to America’s Health Care Crisis: Medicare for All

06.23 Tell ABC: Include Single-Payer in Healthcare Debate

06.23 Serving the Medical-Industrial Complex

06.22 Thinking about Recoveries

06.20 Obama's Health Care Waterloo

06.15 Obama, Like Clinton Before Him, is Blowing the Chance for Real Health Care Reform

06.11 Two Key Health-Care Numbers

06.10 Big Breakthroughs for Single Payer Health Care

06.10 Readying Americans for Dangerous, Mandatory Vaccinations

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06.29 WP's Connolly Back, on Health Reform

06.17 Hypocrisy and Hope: Western Coverage, Iranian Courage

06.15 Excusing Outrages of the Right

06.11 Tying Obama to Bush's Budget Mess

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06.30 Obama's Torture Hypocrisy

06.30 Court Circular: Annals of Imperial Continuity

06.29 Obama, They Want You to Fail

06.26 Who to Trust on a Truth Commission?

06.26 Tarnished Shields: The Morally Bankrupt 'Family Values' Republican Leadership

06.25 America's "Bases of Empire"

06.24 Twelve Angry White People: Jury Nullification in a Pennsylvania Coal Town

06.24 Touring Empire's Ruins

06.23 Employers are Undermining the Economic Stimulus Program

06.19 Criminalizing Dissent: Obama Pot Calls Iranian Kettle Black

06.17 Afghanistan's Operation Phoenix

06.16 Are You Ready for War with a Demonized Iran?

06.13 Where's the Anger as the Wheels Come Off Obama's and the Democrats' Recovery Program?

06.10 Waiving the Rules for Old Glory

06.10 Obama's Era of Openness Is Closed

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07.03 Reviewing Marjorie Cohn and Kathleen Gilberd's "Rules of Disengagement"

07.01 Iraq: A Bitter Strategic Failure

06.25 It's All Good, Again: 'Uptick' in the American-Made Tides of Violence in Iraq

06.22 Obama Opposes Plame-gate Release

06.21 Dexter's Legions: The "Good" Killers of the "Good" War

06.18 Extending the Tradition: Proudly Taking American Torture Into the Future

06.15 New UN Report Denounces America's Human Rights Record

06.14 Fear Rules

Economics & Business Non/Mis/Malfeasance

07.01 Michael Hudson's "Super Imperialism:" The Economic Strategy of Imperial America

06.23 Obama's Financial Reform Proposal - A Stealth Scheme for Global Monetary Control

06.10 Cyberscares About Cyberwars Equal Cybermoney

International

07.01 Pirates of the Mediterranean

06.29 Color Revolutions, Old and New

06.25 Iran Divided & the 'October Suprise'

06.23 Astringent Corrective: AbuKhalil on Iran's Turmoil

06.22 Reviewing F. William Engdahl's "Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order:" Part I

06.20 Are the Iranian Protests Another US Orchestrated “Color Revolution?”

06.20 Through a Glass Darkly: Sifting Myth and Fact on Iran

06.19 Iran's Election and US - Iranian Elections

06.16 The Ir-Af-Pak War: Obama Looses the Manhunters

06.12 Israeli War Crimes Against Children During Operation Cast Lead

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  Cheney's Refrain: 'I'm a Believer'

COMMENTARY:

Cheney’s Refrain: ‘I’m a Believer’

by Walter Brasch
In all of his appearances before the FBI and the Grand Jury, Libby was flanked by his lawyers, a right not granted to those detained under the PATRIOT Act or who are given the appellation, “enemy combatant.”
It’s hard to believe that Vice-President Dick Cheney believes in Constitutional rights—at least after all that he and his protégé, George W. Bush, have done to the American people the past five years.

First, there is the USA PATRIOT Act, which twisted and shredded the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth amendments to the Constitution. Those amendments once guaranteed the rights of freedom of speech, press, assembly, and religion, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances; freedom from unreasonable searches; due process and the right against self-incrimination; the right to counsel, a speedy trial, and the right to a fair and public trial by an impartial jury; reasonable bail and freedom from cruel and unusual punishment; and an equal protection guarantee for both citizens and non-citizens.

There are the “No Fly” lists, databases that track what meals you ate, and innumerable “spy-upon-your-brother” programs.

There are the mass designations of “enemy combatants” that allow the Administration to hold anyone in secret, with no legal recourse, for as long as it wants. Of course, that pesky Supreme Court said otherwise, but what’s a Court’s opinion worth when the President believes he has a “mandate” from the people?

There were the officially-sanctioned tortures of prisoners in Guantánamo Bay and Iraq, and of the Administration’s doctrine that the Geneva Conventions were “quaint” and outdated. Even after the Senate, by a 90-9 vote, passed a no-torture amendment to the $440 billion Defense Appropriations bill, President Bush threatened to veto the entire package if the amendment wasn’t removed. It would be the first veto in his five-year presidency.

Mixed into all of this were the secret meetings with the oil industry to determine the nation’s environmental policies, and myriad Vice-Presidential and Presidential appearances where only those who affirm their loyalty to the Bush–Cheney agenda are allowed to attend.

But, Vice-President Cheney has now seen the light—hallelujah!—and believes in the Constitution and civil rights. Praise the Bush!

I. Lewis (“Scooter”) Libby, who doubled as the Vice-President’s chief of staff and Assistant to the President, had just been indicted by the federal government and charged with one count of obstruction of justice, two counts of perjury, and two counts of making false statements. A 22-page indictment against Libby, who resigned shortly before the indictment was made public, came after a 25-month investigation by special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, a Republican and US Attorney in Chicago. The indictment charged that Libby told reporters that Valerie Plame, wife of former ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, an outspoken critic of the Bush–Cheney plan to invade Iraq, was a CIA covert agent. In the Bush–Cheney era, anyone contradicting the Administration’s political philosophy is unpatriotic, maybe even treasonous. Wilson had to be dealt with.

According to the indictment, an unidentified “Official A,” widely believed to be Karl Rove, the President’s deputy chief of staff and chief political strategist, revealed Plame’s identity to syndicated conservative columnist Robert Novak who dutifully published it in a July 14, 2003 column. Rove faced the Grand Jury four times, but wasn’t indicted.

About the same time Rove was leaking, Libby also leaked the news to New York Times reporter Judith Miller, whose primary responsibilities the past couple of years were to channel just about anything the Bush–Cheney Administration said. Miller’s story didn’t get published, but she went to jail for 85 days for disregarding a federal subpoena requiring she divulge her source.

Libby also “leaked” the information to Matthew Cooper of TIME magazine, which did publish it. It wasn’t long before most of the nation’s media jumped onto the story—not of the leak, but of Plame’s marriage and job. No one in the “We-protect-America-at-all-costs” Administration or the media seemed to care that revealing the name of a CIA covert operative violated federal law and the nation’s security.

In an official statement, the Vice-President praised his friend and strongly reminded the American people that “In our system of government an accused person is presumed innocent until a contrary finding is made by a jury after an opportunity to answer the charges and a full airing of the facts. Mr. Libby is entitled to that opportunity.” A remarkable statement from a man who believes “enemy combatants” should rot in cages, and Americans captured by the PATRIOT Act are guilty.

Libby wasn’t charged with violating the Espionage Act for releasing confidential information or disclosing the identity of an undercover agent, but with lying to federal prosecutors, the FBI, and the Grand Jury. In all of his appearances before the FBI and the Grand Jury, Libby was flanked by his lawyers, a right not granted to those detained under the PATRIOT Act or who are given the appellation, “enemy combatant.”

Should Libby go to trial, there is no question that Cheney, Rove, and several other Administration officials will be called to testify. Assuming they don’t perjure themselves, they will have to acknowledge that they pushed America into a war for reasons that were known to be false, and to cover their lies they tried to discredit Joseph Wilson and others who revealed the truth. They will have to confess they told others about Plame’s CIA role, and that they knew what Libby was doing, and may have even encouraged Libby to expose Plame’s job.

Of course, all of this is just conjecture. As the Vice-President said, a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty.


Assisting on this story was Rosemary R. Brasch. Walter Brasch’s latest book is America’s Unpatriotic Acts; The Federal Government’s Violation of Constitutional and Civil Rights, available through most major on-line bookstores. Contact Dr. Brasch through his website, walterbrasch.com or at brasch@bloomu.edu.



Copyright © 2005 The Baltimore Chronicle. All rights reserved.

Republication or redistribution of Baltimore Chronicle content is expressly prohibited without their prior written consent.

This story was published on October 31, 2005.

 

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