Cheney's Speech on Torture and Security

What nasty, ugly piece of work this man is. What does he think he has to gain from defending torture? Contrast that with Obama's speech this morning.

Moments after President Barack Obama concluded a sober and wide-ranging address at the National Archives on Thursday, news networks cut to a shot of Dick Cheney stepping up to a podium, set to issue what was hyped as a substantive rebuttal from the former vice president.

Instead, Cheney began by cracking jokes at the length of Obama's speech. "Good morning -- or perhaps, good afternoon," he said to some chuckles. "It's pretty clear the president served in the Senate and not in the House of Representatives because, of course, in the House, we have the five-minute [speaking] rule."

From there, the attacks only became more caustic, vicious, and personal.

Cheney described the president's national security approach as "recklessness cloaked in righteousness." He called Obama's opposition to torture "unwise in the extreme," and accused critics of "phony moralizing" and "feigned outrage" over interrogation practices.

"The administration seems to pride itself on searching for some kind of middle ground in policies addressing terrorism," Cheney argued. "Triangulation is a political strategy, not a national security strategy."

The vice president's speech included other well-worn riffs from the Bush era. Cheney took multiple thinly-veiled shots at the media, noted that Obama has "found that it's easy to receive applause in Europe for closing Guantanamo," and declared that dissent from the Bush national security approach would embolden America's enemies.

Read more at Huff Po.

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