Dick Cheney Quotes
I can’t think of a more terrible burden to leave the next president than what Obama is creating here… Cheney said in April, 2015 regarding the Iran nuclear deal
The report is full of crap – Dec, 2014 on CIA report on torture
When sked if President Bush knew specific details of how specific interrogations were being conducted, Cheney was more vague, saying: “We did discuss the techniques. There was no effort on our part to keep him from that.” Bush, he said, was an “integral part of the program,” “had to approve it before we went through with it, and most telling: “I think he knew everything he wanted to know and needed to know.”
I don’t think that it [the Iraq war] damaged our reputation around the world…I just don’t believe that. I think the critics at home want to argue that. In fact, I think it was sound policy that dealt with a very serious problem and eliminated Saddam Hussein from the kind of problem he presented before. What would’ve happened this week if Muammar Qaddafi had still been in power with a nuclear weapon in Libya? Would he have fled? I doubt it. – NBC’S Today Show, August 2011
There is a reason why a lot of diplomacy is conducted in secret. There are good reasons for there to be confidentiality in some of those communications. And I think President Mubarak needs to be treated as he deserved over the years, because he has been a good friend…He’s been a good man, a good friend and ally to the United States. We need to remember that. – February 5, 2011
photo donkeyhotey
I think he’s learned that what we did was far more appropriate than he ever gave us credit for while he was a candidate. So I think he’s learned from experience. And part of that experience was the Democrats having a terrible showing last election. – January 18, 2011 NBC’s Today Show, discussing President Obama learning Bush policies were “right”
I think he’s learned that he’s not going to be able to close Guantanamo. That it’s — if you didn’t have it, you’d have to create one like that. You’ve got to have some place to put terrorists who are combatants who are bound and determined to try to kill Americans. – January 18, 2011 NBC’s Today Show, discussing President Obama learning Bush policies were “right”
As I say, I think he’s found it necessary to be more sympathetic to the kinds of things we did. They’ve gotten active, for example, with the drone program, using Predator and the Reaper to launch strikes against identified terrorist targets in the various places in the world. – January 18, 2011 NBC’s Today Show, discussing President Obama learning Bush policies were “right”
Go f*** yourself. – Cheney to Sen. Pat Leahy, June 2004. (I added this to confirm that this WAS said to Leahy after criticisms of Cheney’s ties to Haliburton, but NOT while the Senate was in session. Cheney called it a “frank exchange of views”; Leahy stated: “I think he was just having a bad day and I was kind of shocked to hear that kind of language on the floor.”
From Cheney’s book: In My Time
Advice to Rahm Emanuel as incoming Chief-of-Staff in 2008:
Excerpt:
“On November 4, 2008, Barack Obama was elected … [Bush chief of staff] Josh Bolten decided to host a unique session for the incoming chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, during our last weeks in office. Josh gathered all the living former chiefs of staff, about a dozen of us. Don Rumsfeld was there, Howard Baker, Jack Watson, John Sununu, and Leon Panetta, among others, and we met around the table in the office we had all once inhabited. Josh went around and asked each of us to give Rahm our most important piece of advice. By this time, of course, there’d been years of stories about how I was the evil genius controlling the Bush administration from behind a curtain, so when it came my turn I advised Rahm, ‘Whatever you do, make sure you’ve got the vice president under control.’ It was one of my better lines.”
Cheney describes the height of the 2008 presidential campaign and the backdrop of the collapsing financial markets. Cheney writes:
On September 24, 2008, Republican presidential nominee John McCain announced he was suspending his presidential campaign to come back to Washington to deal with the financial crisis. It was a move that frankly surprised many of us in the White House. After all, there really wasn’t much John could actually do, and it seemed pretty risky to announce the campaign suspension and head back to Washington without being clear about what you could actually deliver. But we wanted McCain to win, so when he asked the president to convene the congressional leadership in the Cabinet Room of the White House to discuss the financial crisis, the president did it. He called Senator Obama, McCain’s opponent, and asked him to be there as well. What unfolded that day in the West Wing was likely unique in the annals of American presidential contests.[…]
When the president turned to Senator McCain to speak, he passed. Since he had called for the meeting in the first place, that was a surprise. After a few other people expressed their opinions, most of them negative, the president came back to McCain. This time he spoke, but only for himself. It was a marked contrast with Obama, whose words carried the authority of all the Democrats in the room. Senator McCain added nothing of substance. It was entirely unclear why he’d returned to Washington and why he’d wanted the congressional leadership called together. I left the Cabinet Room when the meeting was over thinking the Republican presidential ticket was in trouble.
EXCERPT: SEPTEMBER 11, 2001
Special Agent Jimmy Scott burst through the door. “Mr. Vice President, we’ve got to leave now.” Before I could reply he moved behind my desk, put one hand on my belt and another on my shoulder, and propelled me out of my office. He rushed me through narrow West Wing hallways and down a stairway toward the “PEOC,” the Presidential Emergency Operations Center, located underneath the White House.
We stopped at the bottom of the stairs in a tunnel outside the PEOC. I watched as Secret Service agents positioned themselves at the top, middle, and bottom of the staircase, creating layers of defense in case the White House itself should be invaded. Agent Scott handed out additional firearms, flashlights, and gas masks. He’d evacuated me from my office, he said, because he’d gotten word over his radio that “an inbound unidentified aircraft was headed for ‘Crown,’” code name for the White House.
Within moments another report came in. “Sir,” Scott said, “the plane headed for us just hit the Pentagon.” Now I knew for certain that Washington as well as New York was under attack, and that meant that President Bush, who was at an elementary school in Florida, had to stay away. I turned to one of the agents in the tunnel. “Get me the president.” He picked up the handset of a phone on the wall to patch through a call.
