ALL ABOUT THE NUKES….Andrew Sullivan notes today that testimony in the Scooter Libby trial has made it crystal clear just how obsessed Dick Cheney was with Joe Wilson’s rather modest criticisms of the administration back in 2003. It’s also made it clear just how weird this obsession was. After all, Cheney’s pushback against Wilson started before he wrote his infamous New York Times op-ed. It was based on nothing more than a couple of anonymous interviews Wilson had given to Walter Pincus and Nick Kristof, neither of which had resulted in very much attention. Sullivan asks:
Why did Dick Cheney care so much about Joe Wilson?….His Niger report was not central to the WMD case….But Cheney cared. In fact, he cared terribly. He cared so much he risked outing a CIA agent, something he must have known was very dangerous — to both himself and his cronies. He is no fool and has been around Washington for a long time. He knew the risks, and he took them anyway….Why?
As Sullivan notes, one possible answer is: Cheney was just being Cheney. Massive retaliation is the only way he knows. And, frankly, that’s a pretty persuasive theory.
But I don’t think it’s the right one. I think the right theory is that it was all about the nukes. It’s always been all about the nukes. More here.
