From War Crimes to Fiscal Folly: Cheney's Lurid Legacy

[babylonsister]

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/21020

From War Crimes to Fiscal Folly: Cheney's Lurid Legacy
by Bill Gallagher | March 30, 2009


"Deficits don't matter."
-- Former Vice President Dick Cheney


The Republican Party's most vile, and suddenly visible, toxic asset did more than commit war crimes, lie the nation into an unnecessary war, and mount wholesale attacks on the Constitution and Bill of Rights during his string-pulling stint in the White House. Dick Cheney was also a champion and defender of George W. Bush's fiscal madness.

Cheney supported Bush in forging public policies that drained the U.S. Treasury to provide tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and ran up record deficits while spending at rates that exceeded Lyndon Johnson's pace. Johnson, at least, raised taxes to pay for his disastrous war. Cheney and Bush preferred to create billions of dollars of debt to finance their military and nation building experiments.

In late 2002, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill argued another round of massive tax cuts would result in staggering deficits and warned Bush the move would harm the economy. Cheney, infamously, cut off O'Neill snarling, "You know, Paul, Reagan proved deficits don't matter." O'Neill persisted in urging caution thus committing an unforgivable sin in the Bush administration - speaking the truth.

A month later, O'Neill was fired. Dick Cheney, not the cowardly Bush, told O'Neill he was getting the heave-ho. The last voice of fiscal restraint in the Bush administration and only cabinet member with the guts to say deficits do matter was unceremoniously sacked. In Bush world, no one ever again, within earshot of Dick Cheney, would dare utter the heresy that debt financed tax cuts create problems.

With that backdrop, it is truly laughable these days to hear Republicans and a few Democrats sanctimoniously squealing about Obama's budget and the deficits essential to prevent the recession from doing even more and lasting damage to the economy and creating indispensable stimulus.

snip//

The legacy of torture Dick Cheney wears as a badge of honor cannot be tolerated. To ignore it is to countenance the crimes. President Obama has much on his plate, but he must appoint a special prosecutor now.

During his 60 Minutes interview, Obama said, "I think that vice president Cheney has been at the head of a movement whose notion is somehow that we can't reconcile our core values, our Constitution, our belief that we don't torture, with our national security interests. I think he's drawing the wrong conclusion from history."

We don't need any reconciliation that we are a nation built on the rule of law not the rule of men who cloak themselves as our defenders beyond the law. Professor Turley understands. "You talk about values-the most important value is that the President has to enforce the law. He can't pick and choose who would be popular to prosecute."
_______