Althouse: "Those insects weren’t even poisonous," Cheney growled.

April 29, 2009

"Those insects weren’t even poisonous," Cheney growled.

"Facial slaps? Abdominal slaps? Throwing a naked man into a wall? Kid stuff. Those methods worked. They kept us safe for seven years. Safer than with that delicate Hawaiian orchid in the White House. America is coming across as weak and indecisive. Just when Rummy and I had stomped out that 'Blame America First' flower-child culture, Obama has dragged it back, apologizing profusely all over the world for the country he’s running, canoodling with greasy dictators, kissing up to those weasels in Europe, which is only free today because of our military. Friends and foes alike will be quick to take advantage if they think they’re dealing with a Creamsicle."

47 comments:

sonicfrog said...: Funny thing is, I can TOTALLY see Cheney saying something like that. And I loved the bit where he tells McCain to go join the Democrats where he belongs. It just sounds.... so.... Cheney'ish to me.; 4/29/09, 9:07 AM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: Any bets on how soon this article is quoted as factual statements by outraged leftists commenters? I say by the end of the day.; 4/29/09, 9:10 AM
Harsh Pencil said...: Damn. With top notch writing like this, I can't understand how it is possible that the NYTimes is losing money.; 4/29/09, 9:14 AM
Robert Cook said...: "Any bets on how soon this article is quoted as factual statements by outraged leftists commenters? I say by the end of the day".

No, because any "outraged leftist commenters," so-called, would merely note that this was from a column by Maureen Dowd, and therefore guaranteed fact-free.; 4/29/09, 9:15 AM
Ernesto Ariel Suárez said...: She wrote something funny, I congratulate her. She may survive the downfall of TNYT.; 4/29/09, 9:18 AM
MadisonMan said...: Either I don't find torture something to joke about, or I don't find Maureen Dowd funny. I'm not sure which.; 4/29/09, 9:19 AM
traditionalguy said...: Very interesting that Dowd was allowed by her editor to print the Republican point of view on EVIL TORTURE even if it was written tongue in cheek. The Obama news control operation will not be pleased.; 4/29/09, 9:20 AM
rhhardin said...: That's why I like Cheney.

Dowd's column goes at little awry after he tells her to go fuck herself.; 4/29/09, 9:20 AM
Ernesto Ariel Suárez said...: MM, probably both?; 4/29/09, 9:20 AM
Balfegor said...: Funny thing is, I can TOTALLY see Cheney saying something like that. And I loved the bit where he tells McCain to go join the Democrats where he belongs. It just sounds.... so.... Cheney'ish to me.

I liked it better when he was playing Dr. Strangelove in his wheelchair.; 4/29/09, 9:21 AM
Hoosier Daddy said...: Either I don't find torture something to joke about, or I don't find Maureen Dowd funny. I'm not sure which..

Well I don't think Dowd is funny and I don't think putting a catepillar in a room with a headhacking terrorist is torture.; 4/29/09, 9:22 AM
Wince said...: Taunting someone with a caterpillar is "torture" while terrorizing a city with a low flying a jumbo jet over Ground Zero NYC is, what, an Enhanced Photo Opportunity?; 4/29/09, 9:23 AM
Darcy said...: LOL. I enjoyed that.; 4/29/09, 9:26 AM
Bissage said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 4/29/09, 9:30 AM
vet66 said...: Torture? Sounds like a couple of dates I was on in the good old days!

Dowd should be so lucky.; 4/29/09, 9:31 AM
Sofa King said...: No, because any "outraged leftist commenters," so-called, would merely note that this was from a column by Maureen Dowd, and therefore guaranteed fact-free.

Oh, it'll be fake. Fake but accurate.; 4/29/09, 9:35 AM
Automatic_Wing said...: Ha, I agree completely with fake Cheney in the paragraph you quoted. He makes so much sense that Dowd had to make him say crazy stuff about Serbians to keep him from winning the argument with fake McCain and fake Feingold.; 4/29/09, 9:39 AM
Hoosier Daddy said...: There was a guy I worked with in the mills back in my yout who told me about his Marine basic training he endured and that sounded more like torture than these delicate flowers are subjected to.; 4/29/09, 9:41 AM
Rich B said...: Delicate Hawaiian Orchid? That broad sure knows how to turn a phrase.

Some of her imaginings make strike a little too close to home for Our President.; 4/29/09, 9:46 AM
Curtiss said...: I didn't know MoDo watched 24.; 4/29/09, 9:49 AM
The Drill SGT said...: MM,

sometimes she is amusing. today, no.

ElcubanitoKC said...
She wrote something funny, I congratulate her. She may survive the downfall of TNYT.But not at the salary they are paying her now.

There will be no employers willing and able to match what she currently makes.

Must be that employment salary bias thing again.; 4/29/09, 9:51 AM
goesh said...: Yeh? What's-his-face is over to Germany begging the krauts to take the Gitmo detainees. He is almost on his knees begging them - we will pay for the schnitzel if you take them off our hands please...; 4/29/09, 9:53 AM
Kirk Parker said...: ElCubanito,

"She wrote something funny, I congratulate her."

Nah, she tried to imitate Frank J, but failed.; 4/29/09, 9:55 AM
hdhouse said...: The quote was taken from the midst of the column and I'm somewhat surprised that the excerpt was chosen...and I'm fairly sure that anything to do with the NYT and Ms. Dowd is another "Ann tosses red meat" Wednesday.

Happily the left side of the aisle outnumbers the lunatic right by a sizeable number (not on this blog but in civilization) so she will never lack for a job or a place to post her marvelous writing ability....(still waiting for Sean or OReally? or ElRushbo to win the Pulitzer!); 4/29/09, 9:55 AM
John Kindley said...: I've noticed two significant changes in this blog since Ann announced her engagement, which I'm sure have not been lost on other fans:

Most posts are Instapundit-style blurbs; and

Simon appears to have disappeared.

That's a shame, because I wanted to tell him about my new blog at www.peoplevstate.com.; 4/29/09, 10:06 AM
Hoosier Daddy said...: hdhouse always with the great lines. A true liberal who prides himself on not paying his fair share of taxes.

How much were you able to sock away for yourself this year rather than contribute to your President's economic plans?; 4/29/09, 10:09 AM
William said...: In last week's Newsweek, there was an article about Zuma, the new South African President. The article points out that Zuma appears on the podium in a leopard skin, brandishing a spear, while the ANC anthem "Bring Me My Machinegun" plays in the background. The article goes on to point out that Zuma has been credibly accused of rape and corruption and believes that showering after sex can prevent infection with AIDS. The article explains that Zuma is an authentic man of the African people and despite outward appearances is very tolerant. His earthiness is compared favorably with that of his predecessor, the soft spoken Mbekei. The scholarly Mbekei did not connect with the people the way Zuma does. (The article failed to mention that the scholarly and ignorant Mbekei blocked AIDS programs that would have saved 350,000 lives.)....Here is my point: If this Mugabe-in-Waiting can get a favorable write up by the liberal press, what are the odds someone like Dowd will find fault with Obama or worthiness in Cheney. In her last column Dowd gave a favorable mention to I.F. Stone as one of the high points of American journalism. Alexander Vassiliev, a former Soviet operative, reveals that Stone was a Communist and an agent of the USSR.....Ms Dowd is entitled to staff her pantheon and pits as she chooses, but such choices are the choices of a bigot. The fact that she is not bigoted against the same people the KKK are bigoted against does not gainsay the fact that she is a bigot.; 4/29/09, 10:11 AM
Unknown said...: "...threatened to withhold a detainee’s heart medicine....."

Could that particular detainee have been Jim McDougal of Whitewater fame? No, wait, he died before 9/11.

Sorry.; 4/29/09, 10:22 AM
sonicfrog said...: I didn't know MoDo watched 24.Well, ever since Geneane Gerafilo joined the cast..... and no, I'm not going to bother to look up the spelling of her name.

And since we're on GF, her character on the show is so poorly written, so seemingly inserted after the fact to provide a conscience of the show, it makes me wish for Kim to come back!; 4/29/09, 10:23 AM
Rich B said...: The acronym for Delicate Hawaiian Orchid (DHO) is almost identical to that for Barrack Hussein Obama (BHO). Maybe we can start calling him the Big Hawaiian Orchid. He is like a big hothouse flower, carefully nurtured in the Chicago Botanical Garden and cultivated carefully by our friends in the Misinformation Media.

That will strike fear in the hearts of our enemies (in the plant kingdom).; 4/29/09, 10:26 AM
Joan said...: The not-funny thing is, 24 involves real torture. Does anyone really think that putting a caterpillar into a small room with an insect-phobic person constitutes torture?

I'll take Liz Cheney over MoDo any day.; 4/29/09, 10:38 AM
Anonymous said...: still waiting for Sean or OReally? or ElRushbo to win the PulitzerAny prize given to Walter Duranty isn't worth having.; 4/29/09, 11:02 AM
yashu said...: Heh. For some reason, on reading that excerpt, what came to mind was something William Blake said of Milton (re the depiction of Satan in Paradise Lost)-- Milton was "of the Devil's party without knowing it."; 4/29/09, 11:12 AM
Meade said...: EDH said...
"Taunting someone with a caterpillar is "torture" while terrorizing a city with a low flying a jumbo jet over Ground Zero NYC is, what, an Enhanced Photo Opportunity?"

Exactly.

And where are the conclusions of legal memorandums signed by Obama administration lawyers that allowed the use of a modified Boeing 747 and two F-16 fighter jets? Shouldn't those lawyers be raked over the coals, Bybee-style?

So to speak.; 4/29/09, 11:17 AM
Cedarford said...: sonicfrog said...
Funny thing is, I can TOTALLY see Cheney saying something like that. And I loved the bit where he tells McCain to go join the Democrats where he belongs. It just sounds.... so.... Cheney'ish to me. Dowd "channeled" Cheney pretty well. You could see him easily reading it and saying "Gosh, I WANT to say that, but I'm too smart!"

The McCain stuff, especially. No one inflected more damage on the matter of enemy interrogations and GITMO than McCain. He gave full cover to the Left, endorsed their "line", and piled in on it in the media as "the saddened spotless hero who suffered and thus is America's greatest expert" on holding enemy forces.

1. He called the military at Abu Ghraib "the greatest recruiters of terrorism", ignoring it was 6 hillbillies on the graveyard shift running amok and said nothing about his "Dear Friends" at the NYTimes and 3 Networks who actually were doing terrorist recruitment by 200 front page articles on Abu Ghraib effectively calling Bush and the Armed Forces Nazis, then leading with the NY Times pieces on TV each night.

2. McCain helped sabotage military commissions.

3. McCain gave valuable help to the Left and the terrorists in defining torture downwards from real torture to "anything a radical Muslim in captivity would find unpleasant".

4. McCain fell in love with the Army Field Manual, designed to instruct an unskilled private in how they must behave taking a uniformed combatant or civilian prisoner...or things like what to do about finding an unexploded bomb, or 1st Aid...But unlike the wounded person obviously going on to treatment by doctors or the bomb takien care of by explosive ordinance experts....sought to bind all others higher up the chain in the case of POWs to nothing more than the private in the field was trusted to do. Basically, what the preening, narcissistic, egotistical McCain thought made him look good on TV - and communicated his compassion, his integrity, how he nobly suffered.

5. And the worst thing McCain did was provide cover, with his version of what happened to HIM - that interogation NEVER works. Not unless the subject volunteers info willingly. Because McCain, near the bottom of his class - asserts that anyone can lie to and outwit any interrogator and the truth and facts never determined unless "trust and friendship" are established.

[The McCain line of course ignores that interrogators in police, prosecutors offices, insurance fraud investigators, and lawsuits as well as the military exist in every country because they are successful. They DO use pressure tools - mental, emotional, in some places physical to get results. The cross-check for lies and verify facts. Sometimes they ask what they already know as true to get someone on the spot. I am pretty sure Bernie Madoff is getting a good grilling complete with sleepless days, threats of being locked up with a psychotic black gangbanger, and his wife going away for 80 years unless he spills his guts.]

And we know that "interrogation" works. On McCain. Brushing aside his POW stories of how he lied and always outsmarted everyone else, though the Soviets say they got a "treasure trove" of vetted, valuable info in return for billions in weapons aid to N Vietnam. We know coerced interrogation works on McCain from the Keating 5 case. Fed investigators hauled McCain in and knew within hours that McCain was misrepresenting himself and the facts and his involvement. Threats followed and McCain "broke" the next day, spilling his guts, naming names, begging for lieniency. Then he did his odd "POW-style" apology tour, confessing to constituents on a tour he did that "he was wrong, he let them down"...

I personally wouldn't be surprised if Cheney walking in to vote last Nov 4th -voted straight Republican, until he reached the top ballot. Then, knowing McCain very well - selected Obama.; 4/29/09, 12:18 PM
mariner said...: rhhardin:
Dowd's column goes at little awry after he tells her to go fuck herself.

She was just indulging a little fantasy.; 4/29/09, 12:31 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: Why is Maureen Dowd using Arianna Huffington's photo for her profile pic?; 4/29/09, 1:28 PM
hdhouse said...: Hoosier Daddy said...
hdhouse always with the great lines. A true liberal...."

Thank you Hoosier. Now don't give up hope. You'll get the knack of writing sometime. One day, you'll just wake up, put pen in hand, and off you'll go like that Michael Savage I know you have in you.

ya'betcha!; 4/29/09, 2:36 PM
former law student said...: I'm waiting for Spanish Magistrate Baltasar Garzón to hand down indictments against Cheney and Rumsfeld.

There was a time, as Jefferson asserted, that the US had "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind," but that time ended during the W. administration.; 4/29/09, 2:45 PM
Unknown said...: This is a great new high for Maureen Dowd. She's finally graduating to fantasy romance novelist. This is a big step up for her from bondage fiction.; 4/29/09, 2:57 PM
Cedarford said...: former law student said...
I'm waiting for Spanish Magistrate Baltasar Garzón to hand down indictments against Cheney and Rumsfeld.

There was a time, as Jefferson asserted, that the US had "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind," but that time ended during the W. administration.Woooooo! That sure would be serious. A pipsqueak, self-important Spanish lawyer in love with camera spotlights hands out his INDICTMENTS!
Ooooohhhh, the moral authority and the fear that would hit his targets are overwhelming!

Just like his handing out "indictments" against terrorists, genocidal Sudanese, N Korean generals - if the puffed-up Baltasar Garzón happened to be a preening narcissist on the Right, instead of the Left.

What will he do to enforce his little scraps of paper?

The day he convinces Spanish authorities to back his little stunt and arrest either past Admin officials of the USA of the Bush or Clinton Administration (Bubba's rendition program and 'atrocities' in Serbian bombing) - is the day Hell would come on down the Spaniards.

Sort of like what a US colonel told a Belgian lawyer venting at a dinner party about how Belgium should arrest John Ashcroft on an upcoming visit.

The colonel said that would be a mistake.

The Belgian puffed up and said "And what would you do, come in and invade and kill innocent Belgians to get your Nazi Ashcroft back? Not let Belgian law decide?"

Colonel: "If it came down to that, yes, I think my government would".

Silence.

The Belgian: "You actually are serious!!"

Silence.; 4/29/09, 2:58 PM
Balfegor said...: There was a time, as Jefferson asserted, that the US had "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind," but that time ended during the W. administration.

Pish posh. I'm reading a biography of Lord Salisbury at the moment, and it's amusing to see how he waxed apocalyptic on how perfectly awful and barbaric the Lincoln administration was in their conduct of the war. Lincoln didn't care a fig what the world thought -- he had a war to fight. In Lincoln's own inimitable words, "every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said 'the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.'"

Not exactly the language for an elegant British drawing room or a French salon.

Re: Cedarford's anecdote, I am reminded of the incident with Lord Palmerston and the Kingdom of Greece.; 4/29/09, 3:41 PM
Diamondhead said...: "I'm waiting for Spanish Magistrate Baltasar Garzón to hand down indictments against Cheney and Rumsfeld."

Haha. You're a moron beyond parody.; 4/29/09, 3:42 PM
hdhouse said...: Cedarford said...
"Sort of like what a US colonel told a Belgian lawyer venting at a dinner party about how Belgium should arrest John Ashcroft on an upcoming visit..... yada yada yada"

Who told you that story? Gordon Liddy?; 4/29/09, 3:59 PM
kentuckyliz said...: If Maureen Dowd only fucked herself, she wouldn't have got promotions and her own column.

Ba dum bum chhhhh; 4/30/09, 7:19 AM
kentuckyliz said...: BTW what people miss is that a legal opinion about caterpillar in the box was sought. The "torture" method wasn't ever actually used.

If it had, I bet the caterpillar would have been screaming, "Get me out of here!"; 4/30/09, 7:21 AM
Thorley Winston said...: And since we're on GF, her character on the show is so poorly written, so seemingly inserted after the fact to provide a conscience of the show, it makes me wish for Kim to come back!Agreed, although the exchange shehad with Jack which ended up with him yelling "if you feel that your need to complain is more important than protecting the lives of the people who depend on us GO WHINE SOMEHWERE ELSE!" was priceless.; 4/30/09, 9:15 AM

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