CHENEY "Reveling In The Gutting Of Our Constitution" (Emptywheel)

[kpete]

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/05/12/dicks-presidential-level-torture-decision/
http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=news-000003114272

SCHIEFFER: How much did President Bush know specifically about the methods that were being used? We know that you-- and you have said-- that you approved this...

CHENEY: Right.

SCHIEFFER: ... somewhere down the line. Did President Bush know everything you knew?

CHENEY: I certainly, yes, have every reason to believe he knew -- he knew a great deal about the program. He basically authorized it. I mean, this was a presidential-level decision. And the decision went to the president. He signed off on it.

...........................

Pardon me, but what the fuck does it mean when a President "basically authorizes" torture?!?!? And what's the difference between a "presidential-level decision" and a "presidential decision," particularly when a number of key "presidential-level decisions" (such as the shoot down order on 9/11) during the Bush Administration got made by the Vice President?

I understand that some think this exchange constituted Cheney throwing Bush under the bus and it may be that.

But it reads to me instead like the groundwork for launching the same defense that Cheney was preparing in the Plame outing, that Bush "signed off on" the declassification of a bunch of things to rebut Joe Wilson, without necessarily signing off on the exposure of a CIA spy.

This is Cheney reveling in the gutting of our Constitution. And he's not even sure who gets credit for gutting it. And of course, Schieffer doesn't press him on the issue, either.

[monmouth]

1. Schieffer went way down in my book for even agreeing to this interview...n/t

[jtrockville]

2. Yes indeed. Schieffer's smirking was as sickening as W's.