Tuesday, September 16, 2008
 Via RawStory.com Sept. 16: "Presented by journalist Barton Gellman in his new book, Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency. . .
How Cheney convinced former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, a leading Republican opponent of war with Iraq, to vote in favor of the war resolution:
"Cheney ... had ... a borrowed hideaway office in the Capitol building," Gellman explained. "He brings Armey in ... and he lays out a big stack of papers and says, 'Let me explain to you what's really going on. ... Saddam is much more dangerous than we want to tell the public.'"
"He told Armey two things that he's never said in public and that are not true," Gellman continued. "He said that Saddam personally, and his family, had direct ties with al Qaeda. And he said that Iraq was making substantial progress towards a miniature nuclear weapon."
According to Gellman's book, Cheney told Armey that Iraq would soon have "packages that could be moved even by ground personnel" and "a delivery system in their relationship with organizations such as al Qaeda." These claims, writes Gellman, "crossed so far beyond the known universe of fact that they were simply without foundation."
Although Cheney's mini-nuke fabrication has not previously been revealed, Cheney did state somewhat cryptically in a September 2002 interview with Tim Russert, "That’s why it’s so important for us when we do identify the kind of threat that we see emerging now in Iraq, when we do see the capabilities of that regime and the way Saddam Hussein has operated over the years that we have to give serious consideration to how we’re going to address it before he can launch an attack, not wait until after he’s launched an attack."
"Armey is a very angry man at this point," Gellman told Stewart. "He was against the war. ... He was actually weeping in the well of the House when he cast his vote."
In his book, Gellman quotes Armey as saying, "Had I known or believed then what I believe now, I would have publicly opposed [the war] resolution right to the bitter end, and I believe I might have stopped it from happening."
"I deserved better than to be bullshitted by the vice president," Armey told Gellman.
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----- Labels: cheney, iraq
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