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Dems creatures of habits. They love aiding and abetting our enemies. They leaked classified intell on wiretaps, Swift program, renditions, CIA EITs, and so forth. The only people who benefit are our enemies. They are quilty of treason. Since dems campaigned on transparency governing, shouldnt Americans have the right to know your plan for capturing Laden (their against killing him.) How about an investigation into the likely damage done to our national security by dems decision to war against CIA. We were lectured throughout 2007-2008 that what has now become Obamas anti-terror protocols e.g., warrantless wiretaps, renditions, Predator Drone executions, email intercepts, etc., were once all proof of Bush admin. trampling of the Constitution that had only empowered our enemies. Obama claimed that his admin had restored the rule of law. How about investigating whether or not Obama admin has shredded the Constitution and imperiled the rule of law.

Bourne is in big trouble

Barrystash, it is time you need to get a life and stop calling the Dems "Marxicrats." It is filthy, it is vile, it is also racist as you keep calling Barack Barry. Dick broke the law. Dick control most of the country more than Bush, nearly putting us in a Totalitarian Dictatorship. We need an investigation to throw the vile bastard out! You people make me sick!

Andy has a place in his heart for enforcing the LAW.Its time for prison,republican or Democrat,the law is the law.

How about probing how obama is trying to create a huge racial divide?

You mean Bush and Cheney had plans to kill top terrorists!?
WHY!!??

"I intend to make this investigation fair and thorough, and it is my goal that it will not become a distraction to the men and women of the CIA,"

That's because it's meant to be a distraction for the American people. Its meant to take the heat of off Speaker Pelosi and remind their far left and left of sane party members of Cheney again. Every one needs a boggy man to cover ones own behinds.

Too bad it is hurting the morale of the agency and putting American lives in danger because of it.

Who has checks over the govt. Oh right.... that would be the press.

Pardon me I think I just threw up in my mouth a little.

And you want these losers to have ANY part in running health care.
God help us all.

C.I.A. Morale is great, (but thats a secret).

Why would trouble for Dick Cheney have any effect on C.I.A. morale? Dick Cheney the INSTANT intelligence expert, (just add fertilizer), is who made the C.I.A. look like idiots for Iraq and for the failure to capture or kill Osama Bin Laden.

Dick Cheney is also the one who tightened down on whistle-blowers. So if you had a bad streak of integrity you either left the agency or you shut up and let it eat at your guts. Dick Cheney also has made it a lot easier to put C.I.A. employees under surveillance without oversight.

Panetta didn't find out for so long because the C.I.A employees had been intimidated by Dick Cheney for 8 years. Until they could poke his political corpse in the eye with a stick, they were not going to speak up. And as far as I can tell the National Security Act of 1947 doesn't have any teeth. The penalties appear to be administrative.

Terrorists all over the world LOVE our progressively liberal President and Congress. They need only sit back and watch us distroy ourselves..

Only morons investigate plans that was never actually put into action. Maybe these same morons want to investigate our massive nuclear strike plan that will wipe out the rest of the world if we're attack. I mean.., any laws broken there!??

If democrats used the logic of the Cheney defenders...then we should all believe that...........

Obama stopped world war 3 and 4 from breaking out...both would have already happened. We know we can't tell you WHAT he got that stopped them...just that it worked. Yea, really, he stopped them. Don't ask us to give you the facts of 'how' or 'what' or 'where' he learned it.........just trust us...since world war 3 and 4 haven't started, we all know for certain that he stopped them from starting.

Thank you Messiah Hussein, for not letting WWIII and WWIV start. You saved all our lives! Wish we knew how, but we don't...but we still know you did.

Have a nice day!

Did anyone expect anything different? The Dems needed to do something to keep the spotlight off of Pelosi!

Robin Williams did a skit in 2002 saying in a joke that Congress approved the secret plan to assainate Saddam Hussein. Wondering if Saddam knew. There isn't a member of Congress that can keep thier mouth shut on anything the CIA does. Why would Cheney brief the biggest leaks in DC about a non-operational plan. That's the sureest way for it to stay non-operational. Congress would hold a press conference and annouce what we're doing. Yeah, I trust Congress. NOT!!!

God bless you Maria – the voice of reason. Sorry to you other Dem's for bring up God. I will refrain next time.

I wish they had assasinated Al-Quaeda members since their oath requires they protect the American People. The trouble with telling Congress what ideas are being kicked around is they will leak it to the press faster than a womens sewing circle passing gossip. Did not the New York Times put out that we were considering assasination fo terroristin 2002?

Let's get the whole truth out.....

We want to know how many Democrats and Republicans were involved....

We ALSO WANT TO KNOW if Speaker PELOSI knew about Water Boarding......release the memos and information that will either prove she was telling the truth or that she was telling us a lie.....let's get all the info out.

We do need a complete investigation. Can't wait to hear all about Cheney's program to kill al Qaeda terrorists. Scary.. Even the great Pretender Obama lets drones kill terrorists now.

Mr. Cheney is probably fly fishing on the Snake River laughing his a$$ off right now. Me too since I got a 5 bagger out of Haliburton during his reign.

To Moderator – Jen's comments are inappropriate. Accusing Cheney of killing Wellstone.

Do it Marxicrats. It is going to come back and bite you on the ass !

@ Commen sense rules

Name the crimes..........

@ phoenix86

I didn't write the law. How about reading it for yourself! If you did you'll realize that Cheney broke the law. It says it plain and clear.

Spend our money and try to investigate. You already have over 30 czars and wasting money. Bush/Cheney keps us safe. That is more important than anything else. Today there was explosion in Jakarta. Barack Obama has no guts/leadership to criticize Al Qaeda and his muslim friends. He wants to work with Indonesians. What is wrong with him. You don't have to go all over the world shaking hands for their goodwill, you have to act to protect our nation and other nations from terrorism. It is better you investigate on this explosion. You idiots.

phoenix86 – Actually you bought the Limbaugh/FOX News spin hook, line and sinker as it seems.
It doesn't matter what was Valerie Plame's position in the CIA, she was an agent in a foreign land and since her husband didn't believed in their lies that led the USA to the war in Iraq (and had prooofs to back his beliefs), they OUTED her. Like 'You spent years working for the country but we don't like your husband so... WORLD SHE'S A SPY!!!!!'
Very encouraging stuff for the OTHER guys and gals that are (no matter in which position of danger for themselves) out there to help us, don't you think?

Cheney kept the secret Al-Qaida assassination program from Pelosi because after the CIA told Pelosi about the yet-to-be-operationalized waterboarding techniques that they were planning, and Pelosi shrugged it off because the methods hadn't yet been operationalized, the CIA got the sense that Pelosi didn't want to be bothered with the details of other programs that had yet to be operationalized. Cheney agreed and told them to keep quite out of respect for Pelosi's time!

Apparently, the moderator has moved on from a fascination for Janet Reno to a fascination for Nancy Pelosi. Don't criticize Pelosi, it want be tolerated.

Rick in OP – unfortunately, our intelligence community is STILL recovering from the Church Commission.

This operation was still in the planning stages, folks. People were TALKING about it and seeing if it was feasible. My understanding of the law was to brief senior party leaders before an operation was enacted.
Are we going to start arresting people for TALKING? About ways to go after people who want to attack our country and have shown the lengths to which they'll go to do just that? For those that have forgotten – our embassy in Tehran, Beirut embassy attack, Beirut Marine barracks, hostages taken throughout the eighties, 93 attempt on WTC, attack on embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and the attack on the USS Cole, plus the one on our own soil – NYC, DC and Flight 93.
I just pray that we never have another attack like 9/11 because politicians didn't have the guts to go after Bin Laden and his people.

We're in a recession and the Dims want to waste more time and money investigating a program that was never even implemented.
Idiots.

Rick in OP – First, the 'damage' of the 70's happened when the USA found out how counterproductive was to desestablish governments all around the world just because a bunch of guys thought that it would be necessary for U.S. national security. Last year or the year before the Revolution that put Rehza Palevi in power in the country we call today Iran got it 50th anniversary, and the CIA acknowledged then that it paved the way for Khomeini and his pal to get in power in 1979... so you can see how much productive it was...
In order to prevent any abuse of power from the secret service they made laws back then (70's) that not only Dick Cheney is accused of have broke but also that this ILLEGAL operation was... fruitless. They might have or not killed some terrorists but not their main targets, the big ones and leaders of the pack (I don't call them humans), and wasted time and money that could be better used in the LEGAL operations that kept us safe.
And, New Yorker – If they did what they are being accused of, then they'll go to jail because IT WAS ILLEGAL. Stop the spin.

Rick OP,

Are you serious? You would actually condone ILLEGAL activity for the sake of a Republican Party?? Unbelievable, yet sadly unsurprising.

Congress has the responsibility to ensure proper oversight, which was surely lacking under Cheney's secret/illegal operations.

There were four senior republicans who were supposed to know about the program in addition to democrats. This was hidden from them as well. That is unless they were told about it in back rooms so the democrats wouldnt know.

Or perhaps its true that Cheney didnt trust anybody in congress regardless of which party they belonged to. Is it no wonder that in the last year congress told him to take a hike when he tried to push his way into their business?

How clueless can you people be? This is not about terrorism it is about Cheney's blatant disregard of our laws and the constitution. Suppose his plan was to assinate Tony Blair so he wouldn't tell the truth. How about if he killed Korea's leader and they linked it to us? We would be having WW III right now.Believe it or not all Americans are against terrorists and that includes Cheney's usurping of our rights. If you want your civil rights and privacy taken away keep supporting the GOP.

GI Joe,

Valerie Plame was never in a position with the CIA where she could be "outed". You bought the liberal spin without checking the facts.

We guess it's about time CIA got another head-to-toe overhaul, and encourage it to shed some of its archaic rules.

If a democrat had pulled this, the GOP would be screaming bloody murder about circumventing law. But since it's a Republican, it's ok. Sounds a little like.....Newt/Ensign/Sanford/Craig/etc. Hypocrisy, thy name is Republicans

Dutch,

Lucky for America that you are not an elected official. Anticipating doing anything is not a crime in America. You're boy Obama hasn't been in office long enough to implement Orwellian Thought Police. Just give him a little more time and continue your support of that type of criminalization.

@ Dutch.....Get over Bush and Cheney. Obama has broken many laws in six months. Why aren't you saying the same about him? Gerald Walpin.

@ New Yorker

Cheney is a patriot???? Same Cheney who took 5 deferrments and did not fight for his country when he had the opportunity! Same guy who put other kids in harsm way. You are an idiot!

Have you ever noticed the cities reported to be on the list of potential terrorist targets (New York, Boston, Chicago, Seattle) are all BLUE cities located in BLUE states. The sad irony is that the people who want Dick Cheney (and others) prosecuted may live in cities where attacks may have been prevented, and these very same people may be alive now only for actions that were taken to protect them.

Tonight on NatGeo Channel! Presidents in lock down! Join us as we go inside Leavenworth and get inside the heads of the notorious prison gang the Halliburton Homies started by former VP Dick Cheney!

Gee – the Dems might "leak" something --

Like they "outed" Valerie Plame

Oh......... wait ......... never mind.

i would like to meet someone who thinks killing al qaeda leaders is a bad idea. of course they would want to keep it from dems who would tell the new york times so they could warn the terrorists.

Apparently "Proud..." wouldn't abide by the law, either.
Typical republicon.

Throw him in prison! General population too!

Oh oh. I wouldn't fly if I were a Dem. They'll do you like they did Senator Wellstone. Probably a victim of Cheney's Executive Assasination Squad.

This is the latest attempt by the Democrats to dismantle the intelligence gathering capability of the United States. They are following the same playbook that Jimmy Carter did in the 1970’s…. and it took decades to repair the damage he did to the CIA.

@ New Yorker who said "No one did anything illegal"

My fellow NY brethren, Cheney BROKE THE LAW. The National Security Act is clear. The program that Cheney put togeher was ANTICIPATED to be implemented. Therefore, Congress must be informed. HE BROKE THE LAW.

Good for them!

I would also like them to investigate Speaker Pelosi's statement and let's find out once and for all if she knew that Water boarding was being used.

Let's get the whole truth out........

Good! Maybe the Cheneys will finally shut up for awhile.

Take all the GOP terrorists down. Our forefathers and the American people deserve redemption from these fools.

1) The plan was a great idea and should have been pursued with enthusiasm.
2) I wouldn't tell those traitorous democrats in congress anything that has national security implications either.

It figures; anything to try to get the focus off the presidents lame brain health care bill and other detrimental plans for this country. No one did anything illegal but we'll spend plenty of time and money trying to drum something up.
Cheney is a patriot; get off his back.

I can't wait to see what comes out of this.

A complete investigation needs to be done and a special prosecutor needs to be appointed. Dick Cheney broke the law. There's no getting around it. The National Security Act is very specific about informing to congress whether the progra was operational or not.