February 28, 2003
Barlow, Cheney reactions

My entry on Barlow's essay regarding Cheney elicited some strong reactions that deserve a reading. Here are two of them.

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I am not impressed by John Perry Barlows logic whether it is concerning his bad driving habits or his justification(?) of Dick Cheney.

So Dick didn't really want to start Armegeddon and he really doesn't want to fight Iraq. Its all only a "bluff".

Am I supposed to be comforted by this? I'm not. As any decent poker player will tell you a bluff only works if you are willing to live with the concequences if the other card players don't buy it. A few dollars lost in a card game is a reasonable risk, but nuclear holocast or a war that risks the lives of tens or hundreds of thousands is a bad risk.

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Cheney is a co-founder of the Project for the New American Century, along with Rumsfeld and several other architects of the Bush administration's current policies. The PNAC's reports (e.g. "Rebuilding America's Defenses") explicitly call for the US to fight wars in order to demonstrate its military might, with the goal of US hegemony over the world (Barlow got this part sort of right). This doesn't jibe with Barlow's theory that Cheney et al are just bluffing and really aren't interested in war - they've made it quite clear that they want it. Unless their reports were also part of some elaborate bluff, which would be odd considering they weren't part of the government when they wrote them.

As for Cheney being a "man of principle" and "indifferent to greed", I can only assume Barlow is basing this on his personal interactions with the man. The public record paints a very different picture. As CEO of Halliburton, Cheney played accounting tricks to hide liabilities in order to maintain the stock price, then sold $18 million in stock just before it tanked, and finally received a $20 million retirement package he wasn't entitled to. All of this while cutting tens of millions in employee retirement benefits. What motivation other than greed would explain this?

There's a lot of other tripe in here as well. For one the assertion that the Soviet Union "capitulated" in the face of US nuclear superiority and perceived irrationality, when in fact it simply collapsed economically. For another the notion that there was ever a "symmetrical balance of power" between the US and USSR. While it's true that each could annihilate the other completely, in economic and conventional military terms it was never close.

In any case we'll see how this all plays out very soon. Even though I don't think it's Cheney's motivation, I think the scenarios Barlow mentions (coup or exile for Saddam) are probably the best that can be hoped for at this point. At least the Iraqis will be spared from barrages of cruise missiles and who knows what else.

Posted by Dave at February 28, 2003 09:19 AM