Did Cheney Deceive FBI On Instructions To Libby?

Zachary Roth | November 2, 2009, 5:33PM

Former Vice President Dick Cheney

Most reactions to the release of Dick Cheney's 2004 interview with FBI investigators on the Valerie Plame affair have focused on the numerous instances in which the then-vice president claimed a faulty memory about events that had occurred less than a year before.

But did Cheney at one point all but lie under oath about whether he directed Lewis Libby to give Judith Miller information from a government report on Saddam's alleged efforts to procure uranium from Africa?

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Iraq, Judy Miller, Scooter Libby, Valerie Plame

Dick Cheney

Don't Even Point! Cheney's Extreme View Of Presidential Privilege

Zachary Roth | October 30, 2009, 6:35PM

Former Vice President Dick Cheney

It's not news that Dick Cheney takes an expansive view of executive privilege. But one passage from the just released Plame interview documents makes clear just how far he took it.

When asked if he ever advised Libby that the president had decided to declassify the NIE, the vice president declined to answer in view of his concerns about sharing potentially privileged conversations between himself and the President. it was clarified for the Vice President that he was not being asked to comment on the substance of his conversations with the President, but rather, only whether he'd ever told Libby that he'd had such a discussion with the President. In response, Vice President Cheney repeated his assertion that he must refrain from commenting to the investigators about any private and/or privileged conversations he may have had with the President.

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Topics: Dick Cheney, George Bush, Scooter Libby

Dick Cheney

Cheney Wanted McClellan To Exonerate Libby As Well As Rove

Zachary Roth | October 30, 2009, 6:16PM

Former Vice President Dick Cheney

Dick Cheney told FBI investigators he wasn't happy when Scott McClelllan, then the White House press secretary, publicly told reporters that Karl Rove wasn't the source of the Plame leak.

From the just-released documents:

The Vice President was not happy about it, as it appeared that the White House press office was putting down markers for some individuals and not for others. Specifically, Vice President Cheney believed that fairness dictated that similar disqualifying statements should be made to the media on behalf of Libby and Elliot Abrams of the NSC, both of whom were the speculative targets of leak allegations by the media that week.

In other words, Cheney wanted Libby and Abrams exonerated in addition to Rove.

Of course, we now know that both Rove and Libby did leak Plame's name to reporters, though not to Novak.

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Elliot Abrams, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Scott McClellan, Valerie Plame

Dick Cheney

Cheney: Sending Wilson To Niger Was "Amateur Hour" At The CIA

Zachary Roth | October 30, 2009, 5:28PM

Dick Cheney told FBI investigators that his response to hearing that Joe Wilson had been sent to Niger to assess whether Saddam had tried to buy yellow-cake was that it was "amateur hour" at the CIA.

That's according to a summary of the FBI's interview with Cheney, which was conducted as part of Pat Fitzgerald's investigation of the leak of Valerie Plame's name. The document was just released by the Justice Department, thanks to a lawsuit by CREW.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Joe Wilson, Pat Fitzgerald, Valerie Plame

Jack Abramoff

Ashcroft Aide Pleads The Fifth In Trial Of Abramoff Crony

Zachary Roth | September 17, 2009, 5:19PM

CEO of Ashcroft Group David Ayres

We told you it was likely to happen. And now it has.

John Ashcroft's top aide from the Justice Department has pleaded the fifth in the trial of a member of Team Abramoff.

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Topics: David Ayres, Dick Cheney, Jack Abramoff, John Ashcroft, Justice Department, Kevin Ring, Lobbyists

Dick Cheney

Feds Probing Gale Norton For Corruption: LAT

Zachary Roth | September 17, 2009, 12:23PM

Fmr. US Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton

Did Gale Norton, President Bush's far-right interior secretary, illegally use her position to benefit an oil company that later hired her? Justice Department investigators want to know, reports the Los Angeles Times.

In a nutshell, here's what DOJ is looking into:

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Gale Norton, Interior Department, Italia Federici, Jack Abramoff, Justice Department, Oil, Steven Griles

John Ashcroft

Top Ashcroft Aide May Plead Fifth In Trial Of Abramoff Crony

Zachary Roth | September 4, 2009, 11:33AM

CEO of Ashcroft Group David Ayres

Did the Abramoff scandal extend into the highest reaches of the Justice Department?

John Ashcroft's chief of staff at DOJ may plead the fifth in the trial of Kevin Ring, the Team Abramoff operative accused of bribing lawmakers and public officials, according to court documents.

A motion filed this week by Ring's lawyers and examined by TPMmuckraker states:

Counsel for Mr. Ayres and counsel for Ms. Ayres [Ayres's wife] have indicated that each would invoke their Fifth Amendment privilege if subpoeaned.

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Topics: David Ayres, Dick Cheney, Jack Abramoff, John Ashcroft, Justice Department, Kevin Ring, Lobbyists

Torture

Whitehouse: Torture Probe Should Look At Bush Officials

Zachary Roth | September 1, 2009, 10:01AM

Another top Democrat has come out in support of the view that the torture investigation announced by the Justice Department shouldn't be limited to CIA personnel.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a former federal prosecutor who sits on the Judiciary committee, suggested in an article (sub. req.) for the National Law Journal that the probe should extend to:

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Topics: David Addington, Dick Cheney, Eric Holder, John Conyers, John Yoo, Justice Department, Russ Feingold, Sheldon Whitehouse, Torture

Torture

ACLU Lawyer: Torture Probe Too Narrowly Focused

Zachary Roth | August 31, 2009, 4:45PM

Earlier today, Jameel Jaffer of the ACLU went on MSNBC, and made a crucial point about the decision to probe torture.

The problem, argued Jaffer, is not that we're investigating clear evidence of law-breaking -- as Dick Cheney and countless conservatives would have it. Rather, it's that the scope of the investigation, as we've noted, appears to be unduly narrow. As things stand, it focuses on CIA personnel, but ignores the Bush administration officials -- both Justice Department lawyers like John Yoo, and high-ranking policy-makers like Cheney himself -- who authorized and approved torture in the first place.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, John Yoo, Justice Department, Torture

John Conyers

Who Will Torture Probe Look At? Justice Dept. Won't Say

Zachary Roth | August 25, 2009, 4:38PM

Attorney General Eric Holder

There's a critical unanswered question about the torture investigation -- or "preliminary review" announced yesterday by Attorney General Eric Holder. And the Justice Department doesn't seem eager to clear it up.

Who, exactly, is to be investigated?

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Eric Holder, Jay Bybee, John Conyers, John Yoo, Justice Department, Russ Feingold, Torture

Torture

Madeleine Albright: Cheney's Statements Are 'Pathetic'

Rachel Slajda | August 25, 2009, 1:50PM

Former Sec. of State Madeline Albright

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told CNN today that former Vice President Cheney's statements about the DOJ's investigation into interrogation techniques "are kind of pathetic."

"He should know that the Obama administration is doing everything they can to keep American secure," Albright said. "That is the major job of the president of the United States and his appointees, and I feel very confident that is taking place."

Albright is apparently referring to Cheney's response to the investigation. The decision "serves as a reminder, if any were needed, of why so many Americans have doubts about this Administration's ability to be responsible for our nation's security," he said last night.

Albright also said she's not an expert on interrogation, but cited experts, included Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), who say torture doesn't produce results. She said we need "to operate in a way that's reflective of America's values and our rule of law."

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Eric Holder, Torture

Dick Cheney

Cheney Spin On CIA Memos Befuddles Politico

Justin Elliott | August 25, 2009, 1:16PM

Former Vice President Dick Cheney

If we're going to have a discussion about torture and the CIA memos -- and it's not at all clear that we are -- it's worth reporting the positions of the interlocutors accurately.

Unfortunately, Politico today fell into a semantic trap set by Dick Cheney in his response to the declassification of the memos, which Cheney himself had sought.

Here's what Cheney said in a statement:

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Media, Torture

Dick Cheney

Big Surprise: Torture Memos Belie Cheney's Claims

Zachary Roth | August 25, 2009, 11:13AM

Former Vice President Dick Cheney

It's hardly news that Dick Cheney isn't likely to win any prizes for honesty any time soon. But yesterday offered yet another exhibit in the case.

During the debate over torture this spring, Cheney claimed that CIA memos, which he had asked to be declassified, would prove that torture proved effective in obtaining actionable intelligence.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Torture

Barack Obama

Yet More Obama Secrecy: Won't Release Info On Visits From Health-Care Execs

Zachary Roth | July 22, 2009, 10:06AM

And the beat goes on....

Here's the latest example of the Obama White House mimicking its predecessor's reflexive preference for secrecy over openness: the administration has turned down a request from a good-government group to release the names of the health-industry execs who have gone to the White House to discuss health-care reform, reports the Los Angeles Times.

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Topics: Barack Obama, Dick Cheney, George Bush, State Secrets

Leon Panetta

Congress To Probe Secret CIA Program

Zachary Roth | July 17, 2009, 3:31PM

Rep. Silvestre Reyes, who chairs the House Intelligence committee, has announced an investigation into the secret CIA program that Leon Panetta recently ended, and which Dick Cheney reportedly ordered kept secret from Congress.

From Reyes's statement:

After careful consideration and consultation with the Ranking Minority Member and other members of the Committee, I am announcing an official Committee investigation into possible violations of federal law, including the National Security Act of 1974.

This investigation will focus on the core issues of how the congressional intelligence committees and Congress are kept fully and currently informed. To this end, the investigation will examine several issues, including the program discussed during Director Panetta's June 24th notification and whether there was any official decision or direction to withold (sic) information from the Committee.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Leon Panetta

CIA

Report: CIA Assassin Program Could Operate Anywhere -- Even Inside U.S.

Zachary Roth | July 16, 2009, 11:31AM

Since the news broke (sub. req.) at the start of the week that CIA director Leon Panetta had pulled the plug on a secret program to assassinate or capture al Qaeda leaders, we've been raising questions about one key aspect of the story. In particular, what was it about the program that was so shocking that Dick Cheney reportedly ordered it kept secret from Congress, Panetta quashed it as soon as he heard about it, and Congressional Democrats risked being painted as soft on terror by shrieking about being kept in the dark?

We may have gotten a good piece of the answer here: The Washington Post reports today on how the program had been revived and then put on hold several times since 2001. But it also says, referring to the "presidential finding" with which President Bush authorized the program in 2001:

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Leon Panetta

Justice Department

Only Yoo: Report Details Bush White House Use Of Hand-Picked DOJ Lawyer To Justify Warrantless Wiretapping

Zachary Roth | July 14, 2009, 4:03PM

The fact that John Yoo was the only Justice Department OLC official who was "read into" the surveillance program -- even though he wasn't the head of OLC at the time -- has already been noted by others looking through the inspectors general report on the program released last week.

But one excerpt from the report is worth paying particular attention to, since it underlines the special role that Yoo came to play on the White House's behalf.

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Jay Bybee, John Ashcroft, John Yoo, Justice Department, Wiretapping

CIA

CIA Vet: Agency Doesn't Need Secret Program To Target al Qaeda

Zachary Roth | July 13, 2009, 3:57PM

Earlier today, we raised a few questions about the notion that the secret CIA program that Dick Cheney reportedly withheld from Congress concerned an effort to kill or capture al Qaeda leaders. And now a top counter-terror expert is doing the same.

Vince Cannistraro, a former CIA counterterrorism chief, told TPMmuckraker that because we've been in a state of war against al Qaeda since just after September 11, there would have been no need for a secret CIA program that received special legal authorization.

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Topics: CIA, Defense Department, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Leon Panetta

Barack Obama

Holder May Investigate Torture -- But Several Probes Are Already Underway

Zachary Roth | July 13, 2009, 2:34PM

The pendulum appears to have swung back in the other direction on the issue of criminal investigations into Bush-era torture. It had looked for a while like President Obama's stated desire to look forward not back had carried the day. But now it appears that Attorney General Eric Holder -- independent of his boss's political concerns, which is how things should work -- is leaning back towards initiating a probe. The news was first reported over the weekend by Newsweek, then picked up today by the New York Times and Washington Post.

But whatever Holder ultimately decides, there are already several ongoing government efforts to investigate torture, which figure to substantially fill out our still patchwork understanding of the issue. So as we wait for official word from the Justice Department on a criminal inquiry, it's worth being clear about what those efforts are, and how they relate to each other.

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Topics: Barack Obama, CIA, CIA Tapes, DOJ Office of Professional Responsibility, Dick Cheney, Eric Holder, Jay Bybee, John Yoo, Justice Department, Steven Bradbury, Torture

Dick Cheney

New Info Brings More Questions On Secret CIA Program

Zachary Roth | July 13, 2009, 12:13PM

We've gotten some more information in recent days about that secret CIA program that the agency withheld key information from Congress about, and that CIA director Leon Panetta promptly shut down when he learned about it last month. But the new reports only raise more questions.

On Saturday, the New York Times reported that the CIA withheld information about the secret program "on direct orders" from then-Vice President Dick Cheney. The Times did not identify the program, but noted that, according to intelligence and congressional officials, it involved neither the CIA's interrogation program nor its domestic intelligence (e.g. warrantless wiretapping and surveillance) activities.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Leon Panetta

Barack Obama

More Obama Secrecy -- This Time On Cheney's Plame Interview

Zachary Roth | July 2, 2009, 2:46PM

Perhaps we shouldn't be surprised at this point. But the latest example of the Obama administration mimicking the Bushies in opting for secrecy over openness feels like one of the most infuriating yet.

The Justice Department is declining to release Dick Cheney's interview with federal investigators looking into the Valerie Plame leak, arguing -- as it did under President Bush -- that doing so would discourage future high-level officials from cooperating with criminal investigations.

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Topics: Barack Obama, CIA, Detainees, Dick Cheney, Justice Department, Torture, Valerie Plame

Torture

Torture Advocates Mum On Whether They Support Waterboarding Roeder

Zachary Roth | June 8, 2009, 2:18PM

For years now, torture supporters have been using the "ticking time-bomb" scenario to argue that it's irresponsible to issue a blanket ban on torture. If we knew that a bomb was set to explode imminently, goes the argument, and that torture could help obtain information to avert the disaster and save hundreds of lives, who wouldn't do it?

This has always borne more relation to an episode of 24 than to the actual war on terror. Even torture supporters have admitted that no such ticking time-bomb case has ever occurred. But it looks like we may now be confronted with a version of it in a very different context -- and this time, it's hard not to notice that those same torture supporters don't seem to be rushing to call for the waterboard just yet.

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Eric Holder, John Cornyn, Right-wing extremism, Scott Roeder, Torture

Alberto Gonzales

DOJ Torture Emails: How The Times Could Have Reported The Story

Zachary Roth | June 8, 2009, 1:01PM

Over the weekend, the New York Times reported that Justice Department lawyers agreed in 2005 that harsh interrogation techniques were legal. The impact of the story -- which was based largely on email messages written at the time by James Comey, then a high-ranking Justice Department official -- has been, it seems, to bolster the Dick Cheney position in the ongoing torture debate in Washington.

But the Times also, to its credit, released Comey's emails in full, allowing us all to make our own judgments about what they show. And after a close look at the emails, it seems clear that the paper could have used them to write a very different story -- with a very different effect on the public debate.

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Topics: Alberto Gonzales, David Addington, Dick Cheney, George Bush, Harriet Miers, Justice Department, Steven Bradbury, Torture

Dick Cheney

Cheney's Campaign To Keep Lawmakers In Line On Torture

Zachary Roth | June 3, 2009, 12:11PM

The Washington Post reports today that, during 2005, Dick Cheney sat in on several of those CIA torture briefings, in an effort to persuade wavering lawmakers to keep backing the torture program.

The news doesn't really come as a shock -- indeed, some close observers had already guessed that the then-veep was involved in the briefings. But it does add to the picture of Cheney embarking during the middle years of the Bush administration on a focused, stealthy campaign to make sure the US didn't give up what he saw as its right to torture.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Intelligence, Torture

Dick Cheney

Levin: Cheney "Bore False Witness" On Torture

Zachary Roth | May 29, 2009, 4:07PM

Over at TPMDC, we posted video of a speech given Wednesday night by Sen. Carl Levin, in which he pushed back against Dick Cheney's no-middle-ground approach to torture.

But one specific rebuttal of Levin's that particularly stood out, in part because not enough people have challenged Cheney's claim, comes at the 3:53 mark.

Says Levin:

When former Vice President Cheney said last week that what happened at Abu Ghraib was the work of a quote few sadistic prison guards acting on their own, he bore false witness.

And when he said last week there was no link between the techniques at Abu Ghraib and those approved for use in the CIA's secret prisons, he again strayed from the truth.

The seeds of Abu Ghraib's rotten fruit were sown by civilians at the highest levels of our government.

Hard to put it better than that.

Watch:

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Torture

CIA

How Cheney Turned A Right-Wing Meme Mainstream

Zachary Roth | May 21, 2009, 2:21PM

It looks like we've figured out what Dick Cheney meant when he said President Obama has "reserved unto himself" the right to order enhanced interrogation techniques.

In February the Wall Street Journal reported (sub. req.) :

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Topics: Barack Obama, CIA, Dick Cheney, Torture

Dick Cheney

Cheney Still Pushing Bogus Saddam-Al Qaeda Link

Zachary Roth | May 21, 2009, 1:10PM

Here's something else that's noteworthy from Cheney's speech. He again falsely implied that Saddam was working with al Qaeda:

We had the anthrax attack from an unknown source. We had the training camps of Afghanistan, and dictators like Saddam Hussein with known ties to Mideast terrorists.

It's unclear which "Mideast terrorists" those were. After all, Saddam had for over 30 years been the leader of a major Mideast country. It would be surprising if you couldn't find that he had "ties" to terrorists of some kind. But Cheney's purpose in bringing it up is clearly to suggest that Saddam had meaningful connections to the terrorists who hit us on 9/11. That's long been known to be a lie.

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Iraq

Dick Cheney

Was Cheney Talking About Obama's Executive Order?

Zachary Roth | May 21, 2009, 12:52PM

We asked earlier about what Dick Cheney might have been referring to when he said President Obama had reserved the right to order enhanced interrogation when he deems it appropriate.

Could Cheney have been referring to this passage from Obama's executive order on interrogations?

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Topics: Barack Obama, CIA, Dick Cheney, Torture

Torture

What Did Cheney Mean That Obama Has Reserved Right To Torture?

Zachary Roth | May 21, 2009, 12:11PM

We were struck by one excerpt from Cheney's speech:

This might explain why President Obama has reserved unto himself the right to order the use of enhanced interrogation should he deem it appropriate. What value remains to that authority is debatable, given that the enemy now knows exactly what interrogation methods to train against, and which ones not to worry about. Yet having reserved for himself the authority to order enhanced interrogation after an emergency, you would think that President Obama would be less disdainful of what his predecessor authorized after 9/11. It's almost gone unnoticed that the president has retained the power to order the same methods in the same circumstances. When they talk about interrogations, he and his administration speak as if they have resolved some great moral dilemma in how to extract critical information from terrorists. Instead they have put the decision off, while assigning a presumption of moral superiority to any decision they make in the future.

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Topics: Barack Obama, Dick Cheney, Torture

Dick Cheney

Cheney: Even Arguing About Torture is Helping Terrorists

Zachary Roth | May 21, 2009, 11:54AM

Here's maybe the most radical argument of an extremely radical speech:

And when they see the American government caught up in arguments about interrogations, or whether foreign terrorists have constitutional rights, they don't stand back in awe of our legal system and wonder whether they had misjudged us all along. Instead the terrorists see just what they were hoping for - our unity gone, our resolve shaken, our leaders distracted. In short, they see weakness and opportunity.

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Torture

Dick Cheney

Cheney On Torture: Misinformation And Straw Men

Zachary Roth | May 21, 2009, 11:42AM

Here are some of the key excerpts from the part of Cheney's speech where he addresses torture. There are some obvious problems with all of them.

Over on the left wing of the president's party, there appears to be little curiosity in finding out what was learned from the terrorists. The kind of answers they're after would be heard before a so-called "Truth Commission."

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Torture

Dick Cheney

Cheney: If You Disagree With Me, You Don't Take 9/11 Seriously

Zachary Roth | May 21, 2009, 11:21AM

Here's what might you might call the nut graf of Dick Cheney's forthcoming speech, which was released a little earlier:

So we're left to draw one of two conclusions - and here is the great dividing line in our current debate over national security. You can look at the facts and conclude that the comprehensive strategy has worked, and therefore needs to be continued as vigilantly as ever. Or you can look at the same set of facts and conclude that 9/11 was a one-off event - coordinated, devastating, but also unique and not sufficient to justify a sustained wartime effort. Whichever conclusion you arrive at, it will shape your entire view of the last seven years, and of the policies necessary to protect America for years to come.

In other words, if you oppose Dick Cheney's approach to the war on terror, you're not taking 9/11 seriously.

You can see why Cheney would want to frame the debate this way.

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Topics: Dick Cheney

Dick Cheney

Gitmo Investigator: Interrogators Were Tasked To Find Qaeda-Iraq Link

Zachary Roth | May 18, 2009, 11:03AM

On Friday, McClatchy provided a big new addition -- which hasn't got the attention it deserves -- to the growing pile of evidence suggesting the Bush administration used torture to build a political case for the Iraq war.

The news service dug up comments made in 2004 by Dick Cheney to the-now defunct Rocky Mountain News. Said the then-veep:

The (al Qaida-Iraq) links go back. We know for example from interrogating detainees in Guantanamo that al Qaida sent individuals to Baghdad to be trained in C.W. and B.W. technology, chemical and biological weapons technology. These are all matters that are there for anybody who wants to look at it."

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Guantanamo, Torture

Dick Cheney

Liz Cheney Won't Deny Her Father Suggested Questions On Iraq-Qaeda Ties

Justin Elliott | May 17, 2009, 4:59PM

In an appearance on ABC's This Week today, Liz Cheney employed a classic non-denial denial when asked about a report her father's office pressured interrogators to use torture to find evidence of Iraq-Qaeda links.

George Stephanopolous asked Liz Cheney about a Daily Beast piece reporting that the vice president's office in 2003 suggested interrogators waterboard an Iraqi detainee who was suspected of having knowledge of a link between Iraq and al Qaeda.

Asked specifically by Stephanopolous if she would deny "that the vice president's office did ask specifically to have information about Iraq-al Qaeda connections presented to this detainee," Cheney offered this muddled response:

I think that it's important for us to have all the facts out. And and, the first and most important fact is that the vice president has been absolutely clear that he supported this program, this was an important program, it saved American lives. Now, the way this policy worked internally was once the policy was determined and decided, the CIA, you know, made the judgments about how each individual detainee would be treated. And the Vice President would not substitute his own judgment for the professional judgment of the CIA.

Here's the video of the exchange, (h/t ThinkProgress):

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Liz Cheney, Torture

Barack Obama

If Torture Stopped In 2004, How Is Obama Endangering Americans By Banning It?

Zachary Roth | May 15, 2009, 12:00PM

There's another part of Lawrence Wilkerson's widely circulated blog post from yesterday that hasn't been given the attention it deserves.

Wilkerson, the former US Army colonel who was Colin Powell's chief of staff at the State Department, wrote:

My investigations have revealed to me--vividly and clearly--that once the Abu Ghraib photographs were made public in the Spring of 2004, the CIA, its contractors, and everyone else involved in administering "the Cheney methods of interrogation", simply shut down. Nada. Nothing. No torture or harsh techniques were employed by any U.S. interrogator. Period. People were too frightened by what might happen to them if they continued.

What I am saying is that no torture or harsh interrogation techniques were employed by any U.S. interrogator for the entire second term of Cheney-Bush, 2005-2009. So, if we are to believe the protestations of Dick Cheney, that Obama's having shut down the "Cheney interrogation methods" will endanger the nation, what are we to say to Dick Cheney for having endangered the nation for the last four years of his vice presidency?

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Topics: Barack Obama, Defense Department, Dick Cheney, Torture

Torture

Focus Shifting To Evidence Bushies Ordered Torture To Boost Case For Iraq War

Zachary Roth | May 14, 2009, 6:21PM

At last, the torture debate looks to be heading toward what's been the big question lurking in the background all along: was the Bush administration using torture in large part to make a political case for the invasion of Iraq?

Writing on The Daily Beast, former NBC producer Robert Windrem reports that in April 2003, Dick Cheney's office suggested that interrogators waterboard an Iraqi detainee who was suspected of having knowledge of a link between Saddam and al Qaeda.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Iraq, Torture

CIA

CIA Denies Cheney's Request To Declassify Torture Docs

Zachary Roth | May 14, 2009, 2:38PM

Dick Cheney's request to have declassified two CIA documents that he says will prove torture is effective has been denied.

In a letter obtained by both Steven Hayes of The Weekly Standard and Greg Sargent of the Plumline, the CIA wrote to the National Archives that saying that the documents are the subject of the a Freedom of Information Act request, and therefore can't be released.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Torture

Dick Cheney

Liz Cheney Asked To Stay On MSNBC Set To Take On Robinson

Zachary Roth | May 12, 2009, 4:58PM

Earlier today, we posted some video of a combative exchange on MSNBC's Morning Joe between Liz Cheney and Eugene Robinson on the subject of Dick Cheney's vocal support for torture.

Here it is again:

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Topics: Dick Cheney, Media, Torture

Dick Cheney

Is The Most Forceful Advocate For Probing Torture ... Dick Cheney?

Zachary Roth | May 11, 2009, 12:22PM

This goes way beyond strange bedfellows. But it looks like Dick Cheney has emerged as the single most forceful proponent of a full investigation of the Bush administration's torture policies.

In an interview on CBS's Face The Nation yesterday, the ex-veep claimed, as he has before, that the Obama administration's rejection of torture has made us less safe. But he also went further ever in repeatedly arguing -- contra congressional Republicans -- that we need to look back at the details of the torture program before moving forward.

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Topics: CIA, Dick Cheney, Torture

Philip Zelikow

Zelikow: I Think Cheney Tried To Destroy My Torture Memo

Zachary Roth | May 6, 2009, 12:01PM

Mother Jones has advanced the story of an alleged bid by the Bushies to destroy a memo, written by a top state department lawyer, that offered an alternative view on the legality of torture.

Last month, as we noted, Philip Zelikow, a top lawyer for Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, wrote that the Bush White House "attempted to collect and destroy all copies" of the memo. But he hadn't said who at the White House he suspected of being behind that effort.