Dick Cheney

Something from an interview with Harry Shearer, from March 2002:

Let’s get back to politics. How about Dick Cheney having to hand over documents about his energy task force and policies? A step in the right direction?

If you live long enough, one of the rewards is to get the privilege of seeing each political cliche mouthed in turn by partisans from each side. So that the same people who were desperately demanding that we know chapter and verse about Hillary Clinton’s top-secret healthcare task force are now saying, “No, no, no, confidentiality, it’s an important principle.” And vice versa.

It explains why, or it’s a consequence of the fact that most of our politicians are trained as lawyers. Because that’s exactly what lawyers are trained to do: Take this side, all right, now take this side. That’s what they do. And anybody who thinks that they’re doing anything else is welcome to bid for some Enron stock certificates on eBay, because that is the game.

...the right of the people peaceably to assemble… On Friday Jenny and I went to see Michael Moore on his book tour. He wrote Stupid White Men, which was nearly pulped, if not for the action of some stalwart librarians. Read about that on his site. There was an amazing turnout for conservative Navy town San Diego. The Middle School (auditorium? hall?) was filled, and Jenny and I were left outside. We got there maybe half an hour before his scheduled to speak, and they were already full. I’m not sure what the numbers were, but it was hundreds. Luckily, Mike took the time to speak to us (the slacking latecomers) before he went inside. He was inspiring, and charismatic, and funny. The book looks to be worth a look. Mike has a new round of acerbic satirical comment. He spoke about the process of getting the book to the public, and the state of the world, and had some intriguing questions he left us with about events related to 9/11.

Michael Moore’s Five Questions about 9/11 for George W Bush:
1. When domestic aviation was shut down after 9/11, there was one private airliner that was allowed to fly, a private jet, picking up members of the Bin Laden family, and taking them out of the USA. (ref: November 2001 / New Yorker / House of Bin Laden / by Jane Mayer url: http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?011112fa_FACT3 Why was this special permission allowed?

2. Your former oil company, Arbusto, was financed in part by the Bin Laden family, can you tell us more about this connection?

3. In this bbc article, it is mentioned that Afghanistan might be the location of an oil pipeline. At the time Dick Cheney was the chairman of Halliburton, an oil and pipeline services company which had many dealings with UNOCAL. What is this about?

4. Why did the USA give the Taleban government $43 million in May of 2001in humanitarian aid and in part to support the Afghani poppy industry?

5. Several outlets have reported that Osama bin Laden needs, and gets Dialysis, why don’t we hear more about this fact given that it may tend to impact how well he may or not be surviving our current offensives?

I’m paraphrasing, but these are nice food for thought. Moore said he would be sending these questions along to his newsletter and would be posting them to his site.