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Lawrence O'Donnell took his turn filling in for Keith on Countdown and Rachel Maddow called out the Cheney's for their continual lying on her show the next hour. CREW's Melanie Sloan joined Rachel later in the segment to discuss the newly released interview by the FBI which did not reveal much--other than his willingness to throw Scooter Libby under the bus. More on that from Marcy Wheeler:

Hung Out to Dry: One Former VP Chief of Staff

If I were Scooter Libby right now, I’d be seething. I’d be utterly disgusted with the way Dick Cheney hung me out to dry, over and over and over, in his interview with Fitzgerald. Cheney denies any knowledge of issues he and Libby worked on together repeatedly and he denies that his own orders and instructions had anything to do with activities that ultimately (though Cheney of course didn’t admit this) ended up outing Valerie Wilson.

There are three general categories of information about which Cheney hangs Libby out to dry.

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Transcript from Lexis Nexis below the fold.

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Lawrence O'Donnell tears into Liz Cheney for her remarks criticizing President Obama for his visit to Dover AFB. Liz Cheney lies again. Chip off the old block.

O'DONNELL: When President Obama honored our Afghanistan war dead by taking part in a military ritual at Dover Air Force Base yesterday, it was easily predictable that a Republican would criticize him for it. And in our fourth story on the Countdown, the former Vice President's pet attack dog, his daughter Liz Cheney, has now done just that. And once again, she wasn't going to let the facts get in the way.

On the John Gibson radio show yesterday, Ms. Cheney was rehashing her father's fact-free critique of President Obama's war in Afghanistan, and then Mr. Gibson asked her about the President's appearance at Dover Air Force Base.

LIZ CHENEY (RADIO AUDIO): I don't know why he went to Dover. I mean, I think that clearly it is very important for a commander-in-chief, whenever he can in whatever way it possible, to pay tribute to our fallen soldiers, our fallen military folks. But, I think, you know, what President Bush used to do was do it without the cameras, and I don't understand sort of showing up with the White House Press Pool with photographers and asking the family if you can take pictures. I just... that's really hard for me to get my head around—I think it's an honorable and important thing for us to pay tribute. There's no greater sacrifice people make to the nation. But, it was a surprising way for the President to choose to do it.

O'DONNELL: As we mentioned yesterday, President Bush never went to Dover Air Force Base to honor dead American soldiers on their final journey. And Vice President Cheney... never did either.

Hey Liz, have you ever lost a relative in battle? I have. My cousin Johnny, West Point graduate like his father before him. I wish the President or the Vice President had met his casket on the way home.

You know what 'never' means, Liz? It means zero. It means that in over seven years of two wars, your dad never left the comfort of his White House office or the Vice President's mansion and got himself up to Dover to bear witness to how his warmongering fell on families of dead American soldiers. Never, not once.

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Well, I guess when Dick Cheney referred to Obama "dithering", he actually meant spending any time thinking about the situation at all, given how little time they spent preparing a report for the incoming administration. CAP's John Podesta points out the problem on This Week:

(Former Bush officials and Republicans) have been citing an Afghanistan strategy report they handed off to the Obama administration that clearly laid out recommendations for moving forward (to criticize Obama's decision process). From Cheney’s recent remarks to the Center for Security Policy:

In the fall of 2008, fully aware of the need to meet new challenges being posed by the Taliban, we dug into every aspect of Afghanistan policy, assembling a team that repeatedly went into the country, reviewing options and recommendations, and briefing President-elect Obama’s team. They asked us not to announce our findings publicly, and we agreed, giving them the benefit of our work and the benefit of the doubt.

Today on ABC’s This Week, Center for American Progress President and CEO John Podesta revealed that the Bush administration spent just one hour on that report:

PODESTA: [T]hey did present him with a report at the very end of the Bush administration, but I have it from reliable sources that the principals in the Bush administration spent one hour on that report before they handed it off to Obama.

Oh...I see...we're operating on the "shoot first, ask questions later" methodology of foreign policy. Yeah, that's worked so well for us so far.

Recently, Sen. Ted Kaufman (D-DE) — a former top aide to Biden and co-chair of the Vice President’s transition team — said that the Bush administration basically just “threw” the report “to the transition team as they were going out the door”:

KAUFMAN: So for him [Cheney] to come in at the end and say, “Well, we did it wrong for eight years. But then, in the end, we gave them a plan which really is what they should have used.” Let me tell you something: This administration came in. Rahm Emanuel was there. I was on the transition team on this. They started from scratch on Afghanistan. They took a blank piece of paper out and said, “What are we going to do to get this thing done?” … It was absolutely the perfect time to take a hard look at what we’re doing.

If nothing else demonstrates why the world community was happy enough with the new direction in foreign policy brought by the Obama administration that they would award him the Nobel Peace Prize, this certainly does. Imagine--taking a measured, educated and thoughtful approach as to how to deal with the mess that is Afghanistan. What a radical notion after the last eight years.

Steve Hynd at Newshoggers has a piece up on Afghanistan that focuses on why the Bush's gut reaction, no brains technique in Afghanistan has made it impossible to ever "win":

Daniel "Pentagon Papers" Ellsberg talks to Real News Network about Afghanistan. He says that he wrote McChrystal's assessment thirty years ago, only with the names changed; that counter-insurgency cannot succeed for a foreign occupier and that there can be no success that will survive after U.S. troops leave Afghanistan.

Ellsberg should be followed by reading Paul McGeogh's blistering critique of McChrystal and Obama's Afghan plan, which I noted yesterday and Andrew Sullivan picked up on today.

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Former Vice President Dick Cheney has gone too far with his latest attack against President Barack Obama, according to Sen. Carl Levin. "The comments of the former vice president were totally out of bounds. I don't think he has any credibility left with the American people," Levin told Fox News' Chris Wallace.

Cheney accused Obama of "dithering" on making a decision to send more troops to Afghanistan during a speech in D.C. Wednesday. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs rejected that criticism Thursday.

"What Vice President Cheney calls dithering, President Obama calls his solemn responsibility to the men and women in uniform and to the American public," White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said. "I think we've all seen what happens when somebody doesn't take that responsibility seriously."

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Rachel Maddow reports on the funding source behind Liz Cheney's "Keep America Safe". Surprise, surprise...a man who's helping to attempt to "polish" Dick Cheney's political legacy. I don't know how anyone could possibly "polish" that big of a turd, but it looks like it's not going to stop them from trying.

Maddow: Big news to report tonight about a new effort by the Cheney family and funded by some of the biggest money men in the Republican Party to attack President Obama on national security to try to undermine his presidency. It’s an effort that’s being led on the surface by Dick Cheney and his daughter Liz. And tonight we’re learning new details about whose bankrolling their mission behind the scenes.

In conjunction with former Vice-President Cheney’s speech this week attacking President Obama for not having yet announced a decision on the way forward in Afghanistan, a new pressure group headed up by Mr. Cheney’s daughter Liz has released this new attack ad. […]

According to Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff Keep America Safe is gearing up to run TV ads and radio ads and web ads like that in the home districts of Democratic members of Congress in the lead up to the 2010 elections. They’re promising in particular to attempt to exploit the issue of closing Guantanamo for political gain.

The lead story on the Keep America Safe web site right now says “Transferring Gitmo Prisoners To U.S. Will Set Them Free”. Well today Mr. Isikoff revealed on Newsweek’s new Classified blog exactly who is bankrolling the Cheney family’s Keep America Safe political machine. America—meet Mel Sembler. He may not be a household name to most of us, but he’s a Florida real estate mogul who is very, very well known in Republican circles.

Mr. Sembler is the former finance chairman of the Republican National Committee. He served as President Bush’s ambassador to Italy and he’s now throwing all of his considerable financial muscle behind the Cheney’s new anti-Obama venture. Mr. Sembler told Newsweek “I love Liz Cheney and what she’s doing… [I’ll be] as supportive as my budget will allow”.

Mr. Sembler is a very close friend of the Cheney family. Here he is posing with the Second Lady of the United States Lynn Cheney. He’s so close to the Cheney’s in fact that in addition to bankrolling the Cheney’s family’s new anti-Obama political group, Mr. Sembler is also the chairman of the Scooter Libby Legal Defense Trust, set up to defend Mr. Cheney’s Chief of Staff Scooter Libby when Mr. Libby was charged with lying and obstructing the investigation into the Bush/Cheney White House for outing a covert CIA officer as political revenge. The “Scooter Didn’t Do It” chairman is the new bankroller of the opposition to President Obama and incidentally the polishing of Dick Cheney’s political legacy, which seems like it might be an expensive undertaking.

Michael Isikoff joined Rachel to discuss his column at Newsweek--Update: Major Republican Donor Plans to Fund Liz Cheney’s New Organization

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Sally Quinn went on The O'Reilly Factor to announce that she and all the other Villagers are just all a-flutter over the Obama White House's puzzling decision to stand up to its an organization that clearly declared war on his administration from its outset, i.e., Fox News.

But first she had to stop and sniff disdainfully in the direction of Alan Grayson for his gauche style of political rhetoric:

O'Reilly: Do you know this guy? He sounds like a loon.

Quinn: I don't know him. But guess what? Here we are talking about him. And I think that's what this is all about -- he's obviously getting the attention she desperately needs.

O'Reilly: OK, there could be something to be said for that. He represents the Orlando area. But he's certainly kind of unhinged. When you hear rhetoric like that -- you know, the Dick Cheney shooting the guy in the face, and this and that -- doesn't it sound a little immature?

Quinn: Well, I think that it's worse than immature. I mean, what he said was so completely over the top that it sounds like -- it reminded me a little bit of Blagojevich, you know. I mean --

O'Reilly: No, that's good. That's a good -- yeah. Kinda unhinged.

Quinn: Yeah, unhinged. It made no sense. So I don't think you can take it seriously. And I also think that if he -- I can't imagine the Democrats feeling good about this. Or the White House feeling good.

O'Reilly: Or his constituents.

Quinn: But you don't want this guy on your team.

Heavens no. We want people like Sally Quinn. The kind of Village maven who would go on 60 Minutes and slag the Clintons:

"If you consider the life of Bill Clinton," she said on "60 Minutes," "whenever he leaves the White House, he's going to get on a plane, and where is he going to go?"

"What do you mean?" a baffled Mike Wallace asked.

"Well, he -- he doesn't even have a home," she sniffed. "I mean, when you think about it, he's homeless. I mean, they've lived in sort of government properties all their lives."

The kind of "social adviser" who would pen long Washington Post op-eds bemoaning the way the Clintons "fouled the nest".

Yeah, we need advice from Sally Quinn, all right.

And that commentary we should take seriously? I guess you just had to tune in three hours beforehand for that.

The thing that's been completely left out of the Dick Cheney "how dare anyone dither when it comes to blowing up our enemies and rewarding our torturers" speech is the context in which that speech was given.

The Villagers don't like to talk about specifics when it comes to the beltway dinner circuit at which so many of them feed.

This dinner, minimum $500.00 a plate, was to given by the self-described, and I am not making this up, "non-partisan organization" The Center for Security Policy. Dick Cheney was speaking at their 20th anniversary dinner, at which he received the, hold back your breakfast now, "Keeper of the Flame" award. Cheney was introduced by, among others, Don Rumsfeld, a former awardee himself. You know who else has this prize sitting on a shelf in their well-appointed Georgetown dens?

Joe Lieberman
Duncan Hunter
James Inhofe
Paul Wolfowitz
Newt Gingrich
Ronald Reagan
Jon Kyl
Caspar Weinberger

Okay, then. So why would anyone not expect a bowl full of neocon crazy in his acceptance speech? He's among friends.

Why can't the press be honest? And how, at this point in history, has that become a completely rhetorical question?

crossposted from Blue Gal

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There really wasn't a lot of substance to Alan Grayson's appearance on Hardball yesterday, but it is always pretty delightful to watch Grayson in action anyway. He just says what he thinks and lets the chips fall where they may.

The end got a little over the top, in fact:

Matthews: Dick Cheney—and that‘s how you pronounce his name—was out last night in black tie, along with his—well, his felon former chief of staff, who I think took the bullet for him in that whole matter, perjury and obstruction of justice.

And he wasn‘t out robbing gas stations. His behavior was right there in the office under Cheney‘s leadership. Anyway, the prosecutor in that case said there was a cloud over Cheney‘s head. The—the prosecutor obviously brought the justice to that guy Scooter Libby. He got convicted of a number of counts of perjury and obstruction of justice.

The president even held his nose and would not pardon these guys, wouldn‘t pardon Scooter Libby. Here‘s this guy, with all his inglorious background, out trashing the president of the United States for dithering.

Your response?

GRAYSON: Well, my response is—and, by the way, I have trouble listening to what he says sometimes because of the blood that drips from his teeth while he‘s talking.

But—but my response is this. He's just angry because the president doesn't shoot old men in the face. Oh, by the way, when he was done speaking, did he just then turn into a bat and fly away?

MATTHEWS: Oh, God. We have got to keep a level here.

Even if this kind of talk horrifies you, the fact that it's coming from a Democrat is actually a relief for those of us who've watched the party perfect its Village-approved Harvey Milquetoast routine the past couple of decades.

It's one of the traits that has really harmed the Democratic brand over that time, because it's led people to believe that they don't really have the courage of their convictions, that they won't stand up and fight for anything, that they don't really believe in anything.

Alan Grayson leaves no such impression. Even if other Democrats go fleeing in horror, he's doing them -- and us -- a real service.

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Morning Joe Oct. 22, 2009- Joe Scarborough and Lawrence O'Donnell get into it over Cheney's remarks that President Obama is "dithering" in Afghanistan and on the WMD argument for invading Iraq.

Joe Scarborough defends Cheney's remarks and is still carrying water for the Bush administration on the WMD lies. Lawrence O'Donnell calls him out for it and Scarborough resorts to personal attacks and calls O'Donnell "crazy" and says that he has "a back pile of appliances" that he's "trying to sell in the five boroughs". It got pretty heated before the segment finally ended with Scarborough getting one last dig in on O'Donnell at the very end telling him to "go sell" his "appliances".

Scarborough was out in California where it was about 4:30 in the morning. Anyone else think he stayed up too late the night before this airing?

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Frank Gaffney finishes up this shout-fest on Hardball by telling Ron Reagan Jr. that his father would have been ashamed of him. Can't win an argument, resort to personal attacks and name calling. Classy there Gaffney. About as classy as Matthews who can't come up for air for five seconds and quit talking long enough allow the man a chance to respond without being talked over.

And why is neo-con Frank Gaffney who just held an "awards dinner" for the likes of Dick Cheney and Scooter Libby treated like someone credible we should pay any attention to? Or Cheney for that matter? Dick Cheney speaks and these idiots all rush to cover him, like anyone cares what Dick Cheney thinks about anything. Can't he just go back to shooting his friends in the face on hunting trips and leave the rest of us alone?

Lawyers, Guns, & Money: Poor FOX, for them being ignored is the same as being muzzled.

William K. Wolfrum: Wow, come to think of it, Fox Business Network isn't much of a business network.

Oh No They Didn't: Sesame Street Disavows American Apparel. No, really.

Joe My God: Whoops, male McCain voters lost more than an election last November, if ya know what I mean.

Jack & Jill Politics doesn't sugarcoat it about Cheney, and here's some motivational speaker advice for Dubya.

The Freedom Toast presents a parody of the GOP. Theme--the "Addams Family".

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From Real Time Oct. 16, 2009. Bill reminds us that just because George Bush is gone, comedians still have plenty to work with thanks to the crazy that is the Republican Party.

Maher: It turns out there were plenty of ridiculous Republicans behind him that we just couldn't see.

Bob Dole was told to keep his trap shut by non other than the odious Mitch McConnell, the man who has as an approval rating as low as Dick Cheney's.

The GOP’s 1996 candidate for president said he was asked by current Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., not to issue a bipartisan statement calling for passage of health care reform legislation.

“We’re already hearing from some high-ranking Republicans that we shouldn’t do that — that’s helping the president,” Dole said. He later specified that the people he referred to included one “very prominent Republican, who happens to be the Republican leader of the Senate,” according to The Kansas City Star .Dole was also quoted as saying that partisanship by his own GOP was behind the delay in reaching agreement on a final health care bill..

I don't expect Dole to suddenly go on the air and rip into his party, but the fact that this much got out says a lot. The republicans have no plan for health care reform so any words that come from older republicans on the hot topic carries a sting to it.

Mitch will be on Face the Nation today and I wonder if Bob Schieffer will bring it up or read a David Brooks column. Maybe they'll just want to talk about the Nobel Peace prize. What do you think?

As the United States ponders its next steps following this week's multiparty talks with Iran over its nuclear program, many of the cast of characters from Tehran fiascos past are coming out of the woodwork to weigh in once again. On Friday, the pardoned Iran/Contra architect Elliot Abrams emerged on Fox News to suggest that Iranians "would not rally around the flag" in response to a U.S. military strike. Meanwhile, Michael Ledeen surfaced on the pages of the Wall Street Journal to warn "change in Iran requires a change in government." Of course, Ledeen conveniently omitted his own nefarious role in the Iran/Contra scheme of the Reagan administration, a which policy consisted of giving the mullahs in Iran a cake, a Bible - and U.S. arms.

The Iran-Contra scandal, as you'll recall, almost laid waste to the Reagan presidency. Desperate to free U.S. hostages held by Iranian proxies in Lebanon, President Reagan provided weapons Tehran badly needed in its long war with Saddam Hussein (who, of course, was backed by the United States). In a clumsy and illegal attempt to skirt U.S. law, the proceeds of those sales were then funneled to the contras fighting the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. And as the New York Times recalled, Reagan's fiasco started with an emissary bearing gifts from the Gipper himself:

A retired Central Intelligence Agency official has confirmed to the Senate Intelligence Committee that on the secret mission to Teheran last May, Robert C. McFarlane and his party carried a Bible with a handwritten verse from President Reagan for Iranian leaders.

According to a person who has read the committee's draft report, the retired C.I.A. official, George W. Cave, an Iran expert who was part of the mission, said the group had 10 falsified passports, believed to be Irish, and a key-shaped cake to symbolize the anticipated ''opening'' to Iran.

The rest, as they say, is history. After the revelations regarding his trip to Tehran and the Iran-Contra scheme, a disgraced McFarlane attempted suicide. After his initial denials, President Reagan was forced to address the nation on March 4, 1987 and acknowledge he indeed swapped arms for hostages (video here):

"A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not. As the Tower board reported, what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages."

Of course, the sad saga didn't end there.

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