Planet Cheney: A Strange, Angry Place

Another one of those "I don't think anybody..." lines, this time from the Big Dick:

If you had asked shortly after 9/11 what the odds were that we could go better than five years without another attack on the homeland, I don't think anybody would have been willing to take that bet.

Cheney goes on to say that if Saddam were still in power, he would be engaged in a nuclear arms race with Iran! He says Saddam was "not being contained", he had undermined "the entire sanctions regime", and he "retained the capability to produce [weapons of mass destruction] in the future".

And yet, as Wolf Blitzer points out, Cheney himself said repeatedly throughout the 90's that Saddam was contained.

THE VICE PRESIDENT: If he were still there today, we'd have a terrible situation. Today, instead --

Q But there is a terrible situation.

THE VICE PRESIDENT: No, there is not. There is not. There's problems, ongoing problems...

This little quote is also interesting:

I think we underestimated the extent to which 30 years of Saddam's rule had really hammered the population, especially the Shia population, into submissiveness. It was very hard for them to stand up and take responsibility in part because anybody who had done that in the past had had their heads chopped off.

That's the only "blunder" Cheney is willing to concede. And he positively bristles with anger at any suggestion of criticism:

VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY: Just think for a minute -- and think for a minute, Wolf, in terms of what policy is being suggested here. What you're recommending, or at least what you seem to believe the right course is, is to bail out --

Q I'm just asking questions.

VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY: No, you're not asking questions.

Q Yes, I am. I'm just asking --

VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY: Implicit -- implicit -- implicit in the critics --

Q -- your critics are --

VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY: Implicit in what the critics are suggesting, I think, is an obligation to say, well, here's what we need to do, or we're not going to do anything else. We're going to accept defeat. Defeat is not an answer.

Cheney refuses to discuss an attack on Iran, or the Libby case, or criticism of him from John McCain, or GOP Presidential candidates, or even his daughter's pregnancy. I think Wolf pissed him off. How's this for snappy:

Q Do you think Hillary Clinton would make a good President?

THE VICE PRESIDENT: No, I don't.

Q Why?

THE VICE PRESIDENT: Because she's a Democrat.

TPMmuckraker has the full interview.