Cheney Memoir Against His Presidential Loyalty Principal

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Immediately upon leaving office, the release of Department of Justice internal memos cast a far more sinister light on the former President and Vice President's instaiable appitite for war.

While former President George W. Bush quietly took up residence in the Huston suburbs, former Vice President Richard B.Cheney stayed behind in Washington. He and his daughter Liz, embarked on a media tour to sound the alarm over the new administrations "far left" agenda.

However, it soon became clear that the Cheney's focus was to validate the actions of the Bush Administration, and particularly the legal opinions coming out of the DOJ's Office of Legal Council that attempt to justify torture.

For the better part of two months, Liz Cheney defended, or attempted to defend her fathers actions and was usually left without a logical rebuttal, except "at the end of the day, they kept America safe for 8 years, " which most of the country did not agree with. In order for that statement to be true, George Bush and Dick Cheney would have had to pick up a rifle and stand a post in Afghanistan or Iraq, and we all know that didn't happen. However, we do know what happened the last time that Dick Cheney did pick up a rifle.

With Cheney's memoirs taking shape, it's clear that his distain for Geroge W. Bush goes beyond Bush's refusal to grant a Presidential pardon to Cheney's former Aide, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby. Bush did however commute Libby's sentance upon conviction in the Federal Court for purgery.

"In the second term, he felt Bush was moving away from him," said a participant in the recent gathering, describing Cheney's reply. "He said Bush was shackled by the public reaction and the criticism he took. Bush was more malleable to that. The implication was that Bush had gone soft on him, or rather Bush had hardened against Cheney's advice. He'd showed an independence that Cheney didn't see coming. It was clear that Cheney's doctrine was cast-iron strength at all times -- never apologize, never explain -- and Bush moved toward the conciliatory."

Some conservatives rebut the argument, noting that Bush was nothing if not stubborn in the face of political and public opposition. Commenting on the story, Joe Scarborough pointed out on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" that Bush was defiant about the surge in Iraq despite the polls.

When former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and former White House press secretary Scott McClellan told tales out of school in their own books, Cheney blasted them in the media and said that The presidency is owed loyalty, or at least that was Cheney's view at the time.

That doesn't seem to be the case any longer since his own tell-all book will soon be going to press. Cheney is telling friends that "the statute of limitations has expired" on tensions between them. Last month, Time magazine reported that, Cheney was furious at Bush for not pardoning Scooter Libby, the vice presidential aide who, in Cheney's words, "was asked to stick his neck in the meat grinder" by not disclosing all he knew about who leaked CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity to the press.

Cheney is apparently sharing his recollections with groups of friends and associates, sort of prepping them for the disclosures to come in his 2011 book. After one group session, one Cheney associate told the Post's Barton Gellman that the former vice president is mad at 43 for being "shackled" by public opinion:

Told in one session that Bush, in his own memoirs, hoped to explore his personal feelings, Cheney responded that he had no intention of doing that.

Spanish Prosecutor Narrows Focus To Bush Six

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Spain narrows it’s focus to the “Bush Six” which places US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and other senior Bush administration officials at risk going to jail for crafting the policies that led to the torture of prisoners at Guantánamo? As of yet, no government prosecutor is targeting them in the United States. But thousands of miles away, Spanish attorney Gonzalo Boyé is chasing after Gonzales and five other lawyers, and he has a chance—perhaps not a large one—of convincing his country's legal system to charge these former Bush aides with human rights violations.

For more than a decade, Spanish courts have been the terror of torturers and genocidaires the world over. Operating under the principle of "universal jurisdiction," the country has claimed the right to investigate and, if necessary, prosecute human rights cases that occurred beyond its borders if the countries in question fail to act. Spain first invoked its status as the world's court of last resort in 1998, when Judge Baltazar Garzón of the National Court in Madrid issued an arrest warrant for former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet for his regime's torture and murder of Spanish citizens. Pinochet ultimately escaped prosecution in Spain, but Garzón's move paved the way for more cases.

Sixteen are currently moving through Spanish courts, targeting perpetrators from Israel, China, Guatemala, Argentina, and El Salvador, among other countries. Still, for all the shuffling of paper, Spain has produced only one conviction under the banner of universal jurisdiction: that of Adolfo Scilingo, an Argentinean convicted in 2005 of assassinating left-wing dissidents during the country's "dirty war."

Most recently, Garzón has turned his attention to six former Bush administration figures accused of putting forth specious legal arguments to justify clear violations of the United Nations Convention Against Torture. The so-called "Bush Six" case targets Gonzales; John Yoo, former Justice Department attorney and lead author of the "torture memos"; Douglas Feith, former deputy secretary of defense for policy; William Haynes II, Pentagon general counsel; Jay Bybee, former assistant attorney general; and David Addington, former chief of staff and legal adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney.

The investigation is the handiwork of Boyé, a human rights lawyer who represents several former Guantánamo detainees. According to their criminal complaint, they allege that the Bush Six "participated actively and decisively in the creation, approval and execution of a judicial framework that allowed for the deprivation of fundamental rights to a large number of prisoners," and legitimized "the implementation of new interrogation techniques including torture." In March, Garzón took up Boyé's case and initiated an official investigation; another National Court judge, Ismail Moreno, has since taken over the matter. Theoretically, assuming investigators gather sufficient evidence, indictments and prosecutions could follow, though it's unlikely that any of the Bush administration lawyers would choose to show up in Spain for a trial.

Boyé himself is no stranger to terrorism cases. He spent eight years in a Spanish prison for his involvement in the 1988 kidnapping of businessman Emiliano Revilla, who was held hostage for eight months by members of ETA, a Basque separatist group that appears on the US State Department's list of international terrorist organizations. Boyé claims to only have lent the kidnappers his ID and characterizes his incarceration as the result of "a very unfair trial."
Now, Boyé has become something of a de facto prosecutor. But a recent resolution passed by the Spanish parliament could undermine his case. Spain's two leading political parties—the Socialists and the People's Party—overwhelmingly passed a measure on May 19 calling for a law that would restrict the use of universal jurisdiction. Will the measure quash the Bush Six investigation?