{"id":1943,"date":"2008-03-20T00:23:31","date_gmt":"2008-03-20T05:23:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/2008\/03\/20\/so-6\/"},"modified":"2008-03-20T08:52:30","modified_gmt":"2008-03-20T13:52:30","slug":"so-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/2008\/03\/20\/so-6\/","title":{"rendered":"So?<\/strong><\/font>"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Interview of the Vice President by Martha Raddatz, ABC News<\/strong><\/a><\/div>\n

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Question:<\/strong> Two-thirds of Americans say it was not worth fighting. <\/div>\n
VP Cheney:<\/strong> They ought to go spend time, like you and I have, Martha. You know what’s been happening in Iraq.\tYou’ve been there as much as anybody. There has, in fact, been fundamental change and transformation, and improvement for the better. I think even you would admit that. <\/div>\n
Question:  Let me go back to the Americans. Two-thirds of Americans say it’s not worth fighting, and they’re looking at the value gain versus the cost in American lives, certainly, and Iraqi lives. <\/font><\/strong> <\/div>\n
VP Cheney: So?<\/font><\/strong> <\/div>\n
Question:<\/strong> So – you don’t care what the American people think? <\/div>\n
VP Cheney:<\/strong> No, I think you cannot be blown off course by the fluctuations in the public opinion polls. Think about what would have happened if Abraham Lincoln had paid attention to polls, if they had had polls during the Civil War. He never would have succeeded if he hadn’t had a clear objective, a vision for where he wanted to go, and he was willing to withstand the slings and arrows of the political wars in order to get there. And this President has been very courageous, very consistent, very determined to continue down the course we were on and to achieve our objective. And that’s victory in Iraq, that’s the establishment of a democracy where there’s never been a democracy, it’s the establishment of a regime that respects the rights and liberties of their people, as an ally for the United States in the war against terror, and as a positive force for change in the Middle East.\tThat’s a huge accomplishment. <\/div>\n
Question:<\/strong>  Are you certain of victory? <\/div>\n
VP Cheney:<\/strong> You can’t, say – get up some morning<\/strong> and say, gee, the polls are critical of what we’re doing, and quit. It doesn’t work that way.<\/div>\n
\"Gallup\" <\/div>\n
Question:<\/strong>  Are you certain of victory? <\/div>\n
VP Cheney:<\/strong> I am.  <\/div>\n
Question:<\/strong> And what makes you so certain? <\/div>\n
VP Cheney:<\/strong> I am confident because I’ve worked over the years with both the Iraqi people that are involved, as well as the Americans that are involved; because I know the effort and the sacrifice that have been made by the men and women of the United States military; because I know and have watched people commit their lives in Iraq to this enterprise who have lost family members or been seriously threatened themselves by virtue of the fact they’ve been willing to sign on with Americans and be part of the enterprise… It is hard. It has been difficult. No question it’s been costly, in terms of treasure and life, but it’s worth it. And we are going to get it right. As I watch events unfold, both in Iraq and Afghanistan, I am convinced that we are changing the course of history<\/strong><\/font>, and it was absolutely the right thing to do…<\/div>\n
\"Gallup\" <\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Of course, one must weather the capricious-ness of the populus as polls fluctuate depending on the news of the day. None of us question that. But Martha Raddatz is talking about polls that aren’t volatile, polls that say the same thing over and over for a long period of time. And about, "Think about what would have happened if Abraham Lincoln had paid attention to polls, if they had had polls during the Civil War. He never would have succeeded if he hadn’t had a clear objective, a vision for where he wanted to go, and he was willing to withstand the slings and arrows of the political wars in order to get there.<\/em>" Abraham Lincoln was supporting a principle that was a glaring fundamental flaw in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence – widely supported in the country. Going to war with Saddam Hussein was against our standard of foreign policy and hardly on the minds of many Americans when this war started.<\/div>\n

What Dick Cheney is talking about is something very different from Abraham Lincoln’s resolve, The War in Iraq pays homage to a Principle that arose behind closed doors – preemptive, unilateral warmaking. It was a resolve of the tiny group called the Project for a New American Century<\/strong>. The presented goals were regime change in Iraq and prevention of Iraq’s nuclear\/chemical\/biological warfare program. That program did not exist. In the rarified atmosphere of a small non-governmental office in Washingtom, there was a plan, and  "… this President has been very courageous, very consistent, very determined to continue down the course we were on and to achieve our objective. And that’s victory in Iraq, that’s the establishment of a democracy where there’s never been a democracy, it’s the establishment of a regime that respects the rights and liberties of their people, as an ally for the United States in the war against terror."<\/p>\n

What Cheney is saying here is monsterous. He says in essence, "Who cares what people think? We were right to do this." He says, "We did it for the Iraqi people." Outrageous untruth! And the Iraqi’s opinions are as negative as those in America. When he says, "So?<\/strong><\/font>" he says that we the people<\/strong><\/em> don’t matter. What matters is he, the person<\/strong><\/em>. He’s saying, "I, the person, have resolve. Who are the people of America to question me?" And, by the way, neither he nor his friend George are in the Abraham Lincoln league. Their motives were not pure, not even related to our welfare. Their stories were not true. Their vision was clouded. Their execution was incompetent. And their time in office has been dishonest and contemptuous.
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So<\/strong><\/font>, <\/strong>my new favorite interviewer is Martha Raddatz. And, oh yeah, the polls have been saying this for three years! There is, however, one thing Cheney says that I agree with. "I am convinced that we are changing the course of history<\/font><\/strong>"…<\/strong><\/div>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interview of the Vice President by Martha Raddatz, ABC News Question: Two-thirds of Americans say it was not worth fighting. VP Cheney: They ought to go spend time, like you and I have, Martha. You know what’s been happening in Iraq. You’ve been there as much as anybody. There has, in fact, been fundamental change […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1943"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1943\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}