Posted on 08/29/2011 2:05:59 AM PDT by personalaccts
Powell Says Cheney Book Full of 'Cheap Shots' By Yochi J. Dreazen
Updated: August 28, 2011 | 12:13 p.m. August 28, 2011 | 12:10 p.m.
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell is lashing out at former Vice President Dick Cheney. A visibly angry Colin Powell used an appearance on CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday to blast former Vice President Dick Cheney for using “cheap shots” and “barbs” to drive up sales of his new memoir, which accuses Powell of trying to undermine President Bush during the run-up to the Iraq War and tacitly allowing his deputy to leak the name of a covert CIA agent.
Powell, who had a rocky tenure as Bush’s first secretary of State, said that the allegations in Cheney’s book were better suited to "supermarket tabloids" than the memoir of a former vice president of the United States. He said Cheney was using misleading anecdotes and unfounded personal attacks to “pump up” sales of the memoir, In My Time, which will be officially released on Tuesday. Multiple media outlets have published excerpts from the book in recent days.
“They are cheap shots,” Powell told CBS’ Bob Schieffer. “It’s not necessary to take these kinds of barbs.”
The new war of words between Cheney and Powell underscores the degree to which members of the Bush administration continue to publicly relitigate decisions taken years earlier. The two men have had a rocky relationship for decades. During the first Gulf War, then-Defense Secretary Cheney told colleagues that he felt then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Powell was intentionally upstaging him at press conferences and other public events. Those tensions carried over into their shared time in the Bush administration, where Powell and Cheney were on opposite sides of multiple debates, most notably over the Iraq War.
Cheney’s new book has harsh words for a number of his one-time colleagues, from former CIA Director George Tenet to Powell’s successor at the State Department, Condoleezza Rice -- whom he describes as “tearfully” admitting she had been wrong to urge Bush to apologize for wrongly alleging that Iraq had tried to obtain yellowcake uranium in Niger.
But the pugnacious former vice president reserves his toughest language for Powell. Cheney accuses Powell of effectively going behind Bush’s back by “criticizing administration policy to people outside the government” and says the former secretary of State stood by silently as his former deputy, Richard Armitage, leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame to conservative columnist Robert Novak. Novak’s subsequent column naming Plame triggered a public relations scandal and criminal probe which ultimately led to the conviction of Cheney’s former chief of staff, Scooter Libby.
In the book, Cheney writes that he tried to persuade Bush to fire Powell and says that Powell’s later resignation was “for the best.”
On CBS Sunday, Powell said Cheney’s assertion that he had privately expressed opposition to the Iraq War was “nonsense,” noting that he was the one who famously told Bush that “if you break it, you own it.” Powell pointed out that he had been the one to make a high-profile appearance before the United Nations Security Council to lay out what proved to be wholly unsubstantiated claims about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. And Powell on Sunday blasted Cheney for failing to properly prepare for the aftermath of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, which was marred by widespread looting and violence.
“Mr. Cheney and many of his colleagues did not prepare for what happened after the fall of Baghdad,” Powell said.
Powell said Cheney’s comments about Rice were “condescending” and said it was inappropriate for the former vice president to describe a high-ranking female official as crying.
“I think it’s a bit too far,” Powell said. “I think Dick overshot the runway with that kind of comment.”
Cheney had earlier told ABC as part of a pre-publication media blitz for his book that the memoir -- particularly in its comments about officials such as Powell and Rice -- would have “heads exploding all over Washington.” Powell dismissed those remarks sarcastically on the CBS show.
“I don’t see any heads lying on the streets,” he said.
If Powell was white, he never would have made Captain.
That’s what all political memoirs are: cheap shots. Powell’s such a titty baby.
Powell is best portrayed in the comedy “Mars Attacks.” No one will ever convince me the writers didn’t have him in mind.
Powell has always been a liberal racist. He convinced Bush 41 to withdraw from the Gulf War, which should have continued until Saddam Hussein was done, because Gen. Sharwtzkopf (sp?) (white guy) was the big shining star and Powell didn’t want him to get even more accolades for his strategies and tactics. ...Powell was a media whore and tried to claim all the credit for success. ....It was a MAJOR mistake to make him Scty. of State. ....Powell needs to move out and live in Hugo’s or Fidel’s Communist countries.
Wasn’t it Powell’s pal (Dick Armitage) that wound up causing Cheney’s aide (Scooter Libby) to go to prison over basically nothing? The Valerie Plume affair? I wonder why Powell didn’t nip it in the bud? Surely he had to know?
Libby has a wife and family. Their lives were destroyed too by you and your cowardice.
Just when I think my esteem for the guy who deliberately allowed an innocent man to go on trial and be convicted (Scooter Libby) could go no further, his whining manages to do it.
History will bear out Powell's cheap tricks and exonerate Libby, as is being done and will continue to.
Lies must be constantly repeated and refreshed with other lies to have any effect, while the truth stands forever on it's own merit.
Libby endured a vicious attack that he will never forget, but destroyed? I would pray not.
Scooter is on BUSH!
Once we found our the leaker was Armatige—Bush could have halted EVERYTHING that day, and the MSM couldn’t have done diddley.
It also would have gone far to rehab him to boot.
Absolutely! That movie was pure satire.
We have been led to believe he was just so smart, probably because he liked to call himself a Republican while he talked like a Democrat.
He also proved in 2008 that he was a racist. Either that or he's utterly vacuous. Maybe he's one of those two percent that think Obama is taking the country just where it needs to go.
Indeed, Bush is just as responsible and should have stopped it. However, Powell was small and cheap in the affair. Since he stopped being a general, Powell has been small and cheap on several occasions.
Looks like heads have already started exploding...
Powell is a weird guy. I read his autobiography after Desert Storm, and the only two things about it I can remember now are that:
1) He liked to purchase and restore old Volvos as a hobby, and
2) He was obsessed by President Reagan’s lack of creases in his shoes.
I agree completely.
“powell was always seen as an affirmative action general”
Tommy Franks
Give ‘em hell Cheney!
Did Bob Schieffer even ask Powell about Richard Armitage?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.