Andrew Sullivan: "Cheney's Washington Post"

Sadly, this is so true.

First [Editorial Page Editor Fred] Hiatt fired the only opinion writer who really held Cheney to account for war crimes, Dan Froomkin. Then he hires a mediocre writer, and proud Catholic-for-torture, and Cheney's former speech-writer, Marc Thiessen, for a weekly column. So it's perhaps no surprise that Bart Gellman, the best journalist on Cheney in the country, whose series of pieces which became The Angler is the definitive expose of the paranoid incompetent who was veep under Bush ... has now moved after twenty years to Time magazine.

Watching this paper die a sad a sordid death as it gathers a gaggle of neocon sycophants and has-beens around a proud war criminal like Cheney is truly depressing.

In addition to the Dick Cheney apologists, there's also the stable - George Will, Charles Krauthammer, David Broder (and his "mad crush on Sarah Palin"), even Sarah Palin herself now and then - of global warming deniers and right-wingers in general on the editorial page. In short, The Washington Post has become little more than a (slightly) more centrist version of the Moonie Times. We'll see if the Post meets the same fate...

Andrew Sullivan on "Despicable," "Disgraceful" Cheney Speech

With regard to Dick Cheney's frothing at the mouth speech yesterday, I have nothing more to add to this, by "libertarian conservative" Andrew Sullivan:

A simple note having now read the former vice-president's despicable and disgraceful speech. It confirms the very worst of him, and reveals just how callow, just how arrogant, and just how reckless and unrepentant this man is and has long been. There was not a whisper of regret or reflection; there was a series of lies and distortions, a reckless attack on a graceful successor, inheriting a world of intractable problems, and a reminder that while serious men and women will indeed move on, Cheney never will. He remains a threat to this country's constitution as he remains a stain on its honor and moral standing. I never believed I would hear a vice-president of the United States not simply defend torture but insist on pride in it, insist on its honor. But that is what he said, with that sly grin insisting that fear always beats reason, that violence always beats dialogue, and that torture is always an American value.

Dick Cheney, plain and simple, does not share core American values. More disturbingly, this Dr. Evil doppelganger is now, by default, the leader of the Republican Party. No wonder the Republicans now only claim 21 percent of the American people, and dropping. "Disgraceful" and "despicable" might have something to do with that.