Yes, he really is that evil

I just got through watching the Showtime documentary The world according to Dick Cheney.  It reaffirmed every bad thing that I ever thought about him. He really was a Svengali, leading the hapless Bush around by the nose for his entire first term.  But what is worse is, he remains happy in the damage he inflicted upon the United States.

He fundamentally changed this country from one where the rule of law mattered, to one where only expediency matters.  It know longer matters whether we are the good guys or the bad guys, as long as we win, within his warped definition of winning.  That Iran has become the major power in the region as a result of our crippling the only nation strong enough to counter them?  When asked about regrets, he said he would do it all over again.  While that was never addressed in the interviews, I am sure his solution would be still another war.

That he squandered all the sympathy and good will we had acquired after the September 11th attacks, creating a whole new generation of enemies?  Apparently no regrets there either.  He turned the United States from the beacon of hope we have tried to represent to the world to the school bully shaking down the other kids for their lunch money.  The concept that his actions created more danger in the world, not less, is beyond his understanding.

He set a standard, a tone, that still exists.  Laws are for the little people to follow, the lash that keeps them behind the plow, while the powerful may ignore them with impunity.  That is true in this country which has become a Security State, and it is true in how this country behaves in relation to it's international obligations.

He argued with Bush for Scooter Libby to be pardoned, but he would never come clean, that Libby was only trying to protect him.   His loyalty only goes so far.  A Chicken Hawk to the end.

While the program presented some opposing thoughts to a number of Cheney's views, there were very few tough questions asked, and few challenges to his assertions.  Yet despite the kid gloves with which the former vice president was handled, he still came off as an soulless ideologue who was uninterested in any fact which might conflict with what he had made up his mind he wanted to do.

It appears to me that in many ways he accomplished his main goal, which was to mold the United States into his own image.  He removed morality and justice from the equation, making us mirror images of the evil we found ourselves confronted with back on September 11th.  Will we ever recover?

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