It's interesting how statements about one issue can trip you up on another. More precisely, it's interesting how Dick Cheney's statements on fighting terror today destroys the house of cards used to justify the Bush administration slow reaction to 9/11 and its total lack of preparedness.
After 9/11, then-National Security Adviser Condi Rice said nobody could have predicted the terrorist attack on the U.S. As a matter of fact, Rice thought Russia was our biggest threat. She still wanted to fight the Cold War. Then, of course, came the discovery of the briefing that said Bin Ladin was determined to strike the U.S., giving short shrift to that lie.
Dick Cheney was certainly on board with the explanation that we were surprised by Al Qaida, but on Friday in an ABC News interview with Jonathan Karl, as quoted by Dan Froomkin in the Washington Post, Cheney was asked to respond to his now-famous assertion in 1991 that a U.S. invasion of Iraq would result in a quagmire.
Cheney: "Well, I stand by what I said in '91. But look what's happened since then -- we had 9/11."
He explained the reasoning behind going ahead with the invasion of Iraq anyway: "[W]e got hit in '93 at the World Trade Center, in '96 at Khobar Towers, or '98 in the East Africa embassy bombings, 2000, the USS Cole. And of course, finally 9/11 right here at home. They continued to hit us because we didn't respond effectively, because they believed we were weak."
Now putting aside how Cheney contradicted himself on Iraq's potential for turning into a quaqmire, Cheney is saying here that the U.S. had PLENTY OF WARNING about 9/11. If you are putting these acts of teror together now, why didn't you do before 9/11? And who exactly was in charge on 9/11 looking "weak."
It seems that Cheney and the Bush administration are at a time when they can't let a day go by without contradicting themselves.
Of course, that's what happens to liars.