There was a news story last week that got a little attention - not a whole lot, mind you, but there were a few mentions. "On the question of whether or not Iraq was involved in 9-11," former vice president Dick Cheney told Fox News, "there was never any evidence to prove that."
I was very surprised by this.
Not that Dick Cheney reversed what he had been saying for over five years - oh, sure, that wasn't expected, but I just chalked it up to his body finally had filled up with lies, and his soul was rejecting the oldest one to make room for the next.
No, what surprised me was that it got a little attention.
Not that it got some attention, I don't mean that. No, I mean that the attention it got was so little.
People are looking at the giant, floating head and ignoring that Toto had just pulled away the curtain showing the man pulling the levers.
This isn't about someone acknowledging that his friend was shot in the face, but that he left out saying the rifle he's holding has smoke coming out of it.
The reason there was even any "question" in anyone's mind about a link between Iraq and 9-11 at all, is because not only did the Bush Administration put the question there, but Dick Cheney himself led the charge, relentlessly repeating it at any opportunity he had, before he'd go scurrying to the protection of his dark, hidden hole.
In fact, even this doesn't go far enough, because Dick Cheney's comment the other day, "On the question of whether or not..." was never even "a question" to Dick Cheney. It wasn't just that he said there was a link - he insisted there was No Doubt. None. That we would be greeted as liberators. And it's more than that. Because Dick Cheney himself pressured the CIA into falsifying information that raised the "question" in the first place.
And it's more than even that. When Joseph Wilson wrote an op-ed that there was no evidence linking Iraq to 9-11, something Dick Cheney now acknowledges, it was Dick Cheney's own office that put in motion the plan to out a CIA agent, who was Wilson's wife. A plan that got Cheney's aide, Lewis Libby put in federal prison.
And it's more still than that - because to find this evidence, Dick Cheney lead the effort to torture prisoners. And even torturing them, "no evidence" could be found.
But further, and most of all, it's even more than that. Because this whole fake "question" about whether there was a link between Iraq and 9-11, which Dick Cheney long-insisted there was, and which Dick Cheney pressured the CIA to falsify, and for which Dick Cheney's office outed CIA agent expert on terrorism - all of which Dick Cheney now says doesn't exist.
It was this non-existent information that was used to get the United States of America, and the world coalition forces, involved in the Iraq War.
A war that has caused 4,311 American deaths. Caused over 100,000 Americans to be wounded. Caused over 1.3 million Iraqi deaths. A war that has already cost $676 billion.
A war started because Dick Cheney and the Bush Administration tried to draw a fake link between Iraq and 9-11. Tried to convince Americans that Saddham Hussein was an imminent threat to the United States. Tried to insist himself that there was No Doubt of anything of this. Tried to torture prisoners into backing up his insistence.
And now Dick Cheney says there was "never evidence" linking Iraq to 9-11. Never. Not that there was "no evidence" - Never Evidence. So, while Dick Cheney was insisting to Americans that there was no doubt of any evidence - he knew (by his own acknowledgement now) that there was never any evidence.
This isn't a story. This is the lead, banner headline that should remain the lead, banner headline until it's drilled into the American consciousness and until Dick Cheney, George Bush and their co-conspirators are hauled before Congress or a court of law to explain all their actions that they lied to the world, and now say there is "no evidence." And never was.
And still the media puts Dick Cheney and his sidekick daughter on the air to assault the American public. It's reprehensible. When Dick Cheney left office, around 9% approved of his job. Probably around 0.09% knew who his sidekick daughter was. And these two are the people we're supposed to listen to, critiquing the President of the United States who the American public elected to replace their disgraced party??
Running a test pattern would be of more value.
"On the question of whether or not Iraq was involved in 9-11, there was never any evidence to prove that."
There you have it. What more do you need? Right from the horse's mouth.
Or, more likely, another part of its anatomy.