Heck, he's probably trying to keep himself in shape so he'll be ready to run the next administration's House of Horrors.

I could seriously weep for my country, that it is being run by those who can so easily justify what has been done in our names; with no accountability for their actions, there is no reason anymore for those who lead us to choose principle over power.

Cheney should be persona non grata, not treated as a hero by the talk shows and Politico; if our system of justice won't hold Cheney to account, the least that could be done would be to ostracize him into irrelevance - instead of keeping the blood-lust alive week after week after week.

Of course, no one will ask him.

C&L writes:

"I was a big supporter of waterboarding," Cheney said in an appearance on ABC's This Week on Sunday. He went on to explain that Justice Department lawyers had been instructed to write legal opinions to cover the use of this and other torture techniques after the White House had settled on them.

Section 2340A of the federal criminal code makes it an offense to torture or to conspire to torture.

If that is so, how can anyone in public office justify letting Cheney off the hook.

I just have the feeling that nobody in the Obama administration gives a hang.

absent proof that he had legal authority to order/authorize torture and used it, that he tortured people himself, or he engaged in a conspiracy to torture detainees, i don't see anything actionable in his comments.

After declaring waterboarding a "no-brainer," Cheney said, "Thanks to the leadership of the president now, and the action of Congress, we have the authority and we are able to continue the program."

Cheney was referring to the 2006 Military Commissions Act, the sweeping legislation that creates a system of drumhead military tribunals and allows the president to lock up anyone as an "unlawful enemy combatant" on his sole say-so. Bush signed the measure into law October 17.....

The law also cedes to the president the right to decide what interrogation techniques are lawful under the Geneva Conventions and US law, in effect giving the Bush administration a blank check to continue its torture methods.

It is clear from Cheney's comments that the White House sees this act, passed by a substantial majority by both houses of Congress, as not only a license to torture, but an affirmation that the president as "commander-in-chief" has the power to do whatever he likes in the name of waging the so-called "global war on terror."

[snip]

Speaking to the New York Daily News editorial board on October 11, Clinton said she recognized that in some situations interrogations called for "severity." According to the newspaper, the conversation included mention of waterboarding, hypothermia and other methods recognized internationally as torture.

"I have said that those are very rare, but if they occur there has to be some lawful authority for pursuing that," she responded. "Again, I think the president has to take responsibility. There has to be some check and balance, some reporting. I don't mind if it's reporting in a top secret context."

Asked again about the permissibility of torture, she declared: "In those instances where we have sufficient basis to believe that there is something imminent, yeah, but then we've got to have a check and balance."

"If a reporter asked if you and Hardin were friends, I'd say "good friends".
If they asked if you were good friends, I'd say "lifelong friends".
Give them no place to go, nothing to report. No story.
I mean, it's no sense in|defusing a bomb after it's already...it's already gone off."

Imo, the crimes of Cheney were made possible in part because in the past we chose "look forward, not back" in regards the crimes committed under Reagan and Bush I.

If we let Cheney slide now there will be more incentive for others in the future to have a Cheneyesque contempt for the notion of accountability.