Will `Tough Guy' Dick Cheney Cop Out as Usual and Take a Pardon?

By Dave Lindorff

Vice President Dick Cheney has cultivated the image of a serious
tough guy, with his grim, scowling vissage, his dismissive "So?"
comments when things go badly, his unrepentant defense of torture,
including waterboarding, and his brash statements confirming that he
approved the interrogation measures that clearly violated US criminal
statutes and the Geneva Conventions.

But it appears we willl in a few days get to discover whether Cheney
really is a tough guy, or whether he is in truth just the same
corpulent, self-centered hypocrite and gutless coward that he was back
in the 1960s when, despite being a vocal backer of the Vietnam War, he
ducked the draft not once but five times by arranging for student and
marriage deferments, which he later defended by saying he had "other
priorities" than serving his country.

If, as most people expect, Cheney is offered a pardon by outgoing
President George Bush for his role in approving the systematic torture
of US captives in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, for his role in the
outing of CIA undercover operative Valerie Plame and the subsequent
coverup of that crime, and for his role in lying about the alleged
threats posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq, the vice president will be
admitting that he is guilty of those crimes. He will also be taking the
coward's way out, after earlier strutting about and claiming to be in
the right.

It would be vintage Cheney--talking big but hiding from responsibility for his statements and his actions.

If Cheney were for real, he would tell Bush he doesn't want no
stinkin' pardon. He'd say he backed a policy of torture of captives
because they deserved it, because it would save American lives, and
because he had no respect for international law. He would dare the US
government, and other governments around the world that have a policy
of universal jurisdiction, to indict him and put him on trial for his
actions.

But that's not Dick Cheney's way. His way is to duck responsibility and to let lesser people take the heat for him.

We've seen his MO already. This is a guy who would furtively destroy
the career of a dedicated undercover agent, putting not just her, but
all of her in-country contacts in places like Iran at risk for their
lives, and then let a subordinate, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, take the
fall for him. Libby, recall, was convicted of lying about his role in
exposing Plame's identity in a federal trial that included considerable
evidence that it was his boss, Cheney, who was actually behind the
effort. He ended up being convicted and sentenced to prison, though he
was spared being locked up by a presidential clemency order. Cheney
didn't lift a finger to protect Libby, who remains a convicted felon,
unable to return to his practice of law.

If Bush pardons Cheney, and if Cheney accepts that pardon, he will
be admitting that he is a war criminal, willing to let a few
low-ranking soldiers who simply did what he says he wanted them to do
take the heat for him and his criminal actions.

While we're at it, it will also be interesting to see whether Bush,
whose media handlers have also spent the last eight years constucting
an image of him as a swaggering, tough-talkin' Texas cowboy, will grant
himself a broad pardon for his many crimes in office.

My guess is he will do both, confirming that this has been an
administration not of tough guys, but of cowards, hypocrites and
professional buckpassers.

_______________
DAVE LINDORFF is a Philadelphia-based journalist and columnist. His
latest book is "The Case for Impeachment" (St. Martin's Press, 2006 and
now available in paperback). His work is available at www.thiscantbehappening.net

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