everybody’s out of town

Gosh, if you ever wanted to hear an echo in your own echo chamber, just yell into the left side of the blogosphere Wednesday Afternoon – Thursday Morning. With everybody (but me) seemingly on their way to that “hate fest” known as Yearly Kos, there is scant little posted on many of my favorite sites.

So, nowhere do I see anyone who can provide me with the choice text of former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s testimony before the House Oversight Committee where I swear I heard Rummy say that he wasn’t going to admit that he knew that Cpl. Pat Tillman was fragged or that his “blue on black” killing was covered up because no one could produce any evidence that said that he (Rumsfeld) knew. . . which to my mind is quite a bit different from actually saying you didn’t know.

Cheney’s appearance on Larry King seems a tad under-covered, too. Though there is this great video on TPM that reveals Cheney’s rather transparent “tell.”

And then there is this matter, which, admittedly does have two big diaries dedicated to it over dKos, but I really wish someone was out there to boil it all down a bit. . . .

The story, which springs from a string of anonymous comments left on TPM since July 27, seemingly from someone with some inside knowledge. The comments, as best I can figure (and there are a lot of comments, so I am seriously reducing this), assert that by getting all wrapped up in Gonzo’s parsing of his parsing about the “TSP” or some “other” program, Congress, and those Americans that care, are sort of barking up the wrong tree.

The comments paint a picture of a much, much bigger program, run out of the NSC (National Security Council)—not the NSA—that is engaged in wholesale domestic surveillance of all kinds, and detentions and abductions, perhaps inside the US, and that all of this started prior to October 1, 2001.

The NSC, of course, does not have to report to the Department of Justice or its Office of Legal Counsel, and operates outside the jurisdiction of the FISA court.

Dick Cheney, naturally, has experience with such a dodge. A little poking around reminds me that then Representative Cheney (WY) helped steer the House Iran-Contra investigation away from George HW Bush, and, as vice president, Cheney had meetings with Iran-Contra felon Elliott Abrams and Iran-Contra player Saudi Prince Bandar where he discussed “lessons learned” from that Regan-era scandal. Iran-Contra was run off the books through the National Security Council.

And, I will add that, with this in mind, I notice that Cheney in his back and forth justification of his fourthbranch role in government, keeps mentioning that he sits on the NSC.

Guess it’s on his mind.

Why, it’s almost as if he’s begging someone to ask the right questions. . . .

So that he can then lie some more when he answers.


If anyone out there has answers to any of this (or, if not answers, ideas will do), please drop me a line.