\nCheney: Bush’s actions legal if not impeached<\/strong><\/a> <\/div>\n<\/p>\n
Cheney referenced Abraham Lincoln as an example of another president who "suspended the writ of habeus corpus" during a war, prompting this exchange:<\/div>\n\n
SCHIEFFER:<\/strong>But nobody thinks that was legal. <\/div>\nCHENEY:<\/strong> Well, no. It certainly was in the sense he wasn’t impeached.<\/em> And it was a wartime measure that he took that I think history says today, yeah, that was probably a good thing to do.<\/div>\n<\/ul>\nThe vice president spent much of the interview defending eight years of the Bush administration’s policies, including its surveillance and interrogation programs. When Schieffer asked if the Bush administration had gone "too far" in its surveillance program, Cheney said no.<\/div>\n\nCHENEY:<\/strong> I don’t believe we violated anybody’s civil liberties.<\/ul>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Cheney also urged President-elect Barack Obama to continue the Bush administration’s interrogation policies…<\/div>\n\n
CHENEY:<\/strong> I would hope [Obama] would avoid doing what others have done in the past, which is letting the campaign rhetoric guide his judgment in this absolutely crucial area<\/strong><\/font>… We were very careful, we did everything by the book, and in fact we produced very significant results<\/div>\n<\/ul>\n<\/blockquote>\nThere is so much wrong with Cheney’s basic thought processes that it’s hard to even know where to start. Abraham Lincoln was a great man. He was the first Republican President and was a passionate Abolitionist<\/strong>. Of all the exemplary things that Abraham Lincoln did, Dick Cheney picks one of the flaws in this great man’s history to call a precedent. Cheney hardly supported Lincoln’s Mandate against racism, nor seemed to care much about Lincoln’s veneration of our Constitution, but he’s keen on Lincoln’s suspension of habeus corpus. It is unearned hubris for Cheney to equate himself with Lincoln, but to then pick this piece of Lincoln’s Presidency to emulate – priceless<\/em> hubris. <\/div>\nHe then claims that Lincoln’s suspension of the writ of habeus corpus must have been legal because Lincoln wasn’t impeached. What a piece of Cheney-think. Lincoln wasn’t impeached because he saved our Union, and he didn’t make a habit of slithering through the cracks. Cheney would do well to think that a major reason his boss, George Bush, wasn’t impeached is because we’d have him [Cheney] as President!<\/p>\n
Next we have, "I don’t believe we violated anybody’s civil liberties." I presume he’s referring to surveillance, because it’s hard to imagine that even Cheney would argue that Torture isn’t violating Civil Liberties [my guess is that he doesn’t consider P.O.W.’s to be fellow human beings]. But what he seems to be saying is that surveillance doesn’t hurt anybody. Privacy, itself, is<\/u> the Liberty in question<\/strong><\/font>. What he means is that since we didn’t go shoot the people, they weren’t hurt. That’s not for him to decide. By definition, their Liberties were violated.<\/p>\n
But then we come to his sickest thoughts. "I would hope [Obama] would avoid doing what others have done in the past, which is letting the campaign rhetoric guide his judgment in this absolutely crucial area<\/strong><\/font>." He’s big on this campaign rhetoric thing – often discounting others by saying, "Oh that’s just campaign rhetoric." But here, he reveals his true colors. Early in 2008, former Senator Lincoln Chaffee<\/strong>, a Republican "good guy" published Against the Tide<\/strong><\/a>:<\/p>\n
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