HOW DICK DOES IT….Robert Dreyfuss writes in the American Prospect today about the obsessive secrecy that surrounds the zealots who work for Dick Cheney:
His press people seem shocked that a reporter would even ask for an interview with the staff. The blanket answer is no ? nobody is available. Amazingly, the vice president?s office flatly refuses to even disclose who works there, or what their titles are. ?We just don?t give out that kind of information,? says Jennifer Mayfield, another of Cheney?s ?angels.? She won?t say who is on staff, or what they do? No, she insists. ?It?s just not something we talk about.?
Read the whole thing to learn more about the men and women who work for Cheney and how they’ve managed to seize control of the foreign policy apparatus of the United States government:
According to [Larry] Wilkerson, Cheney?s office and the [National Security Council] were completely separate on foreign policy. Cheney, says Wilkerson, ?set up a staff that knew what the statutory NSC was doing, but the NSC statutory staff didn?t know what his staff was doing. The vice president?s staff could read the statutory NSC?s e-mail, but the NSC couldn?t read their e-mail. So, once someone on the statutory NSC figured it out, they used various work-arounds. Like, for example, they would walk to someone?s office, rather than send an e-mail, if what they were going to talk about they didn?t want to reveal to the vice president?s very powerful staff.? But that was difficult because of Cheney ?spies? within the bureaucracy, including people like John Bolton at the State Department, Robert Joseph at the NSC, certain staffers at WINPAC (the arms control shop at CIA), and various Pentagon officials, he adds.
But is the Cheney moment over? Dreyfuss, for one, thinks not. Here’s his final sentence: “For the moment, at least, the war party led by Dick Cheney remains in ascendancy.” Make of that what you will.
