Open Letter to Dick Cheney

By Mark A. Goldman


Dear Mr. Cheney:

You said in a speech the other day that,

"The suggestion that's been made by some US senators that the President or any member of this Administration purposely misled the American people on prewar intelligence is one of the most dishonest and reprehensible charges ever aired in this city."

Well, Mr. Cheney, let me tell you that it's not only US Senators who are suggesting such a thing... I'm suggesting it too... suggesting that you are a liar and a deceiver and the prewar intelligence is only part of it.

I understand that you believe that a strong offense is the best defense, so your well written comments and demeanor were expected and are consistent with your usual methodology. But by now you must understand, that in the wake of your nefarious policies, too many innocent men, women, and children are now dead, limbless, blind, burned, tortured, or grieving for me to sympathize with your discomfort or forget what you did to them. It's not that I can't forgive you... it's just that justice and the safety of America's children come first. It serves no purpose for me to wait for you to admit to what you've done... I have to stand up now and say, enough is enough.

You deserve a fair trial--something you would deny to others, I'm sure--but there's no question that you deserve to be tried. I am not a member of Congress or an elected representative, but I have access to enough evidence to justify a warrant for your arrest. And I am not the only one with this evidence. My evidence are the pictures, the articles, the books, the reports, the published first hand accounts of the many ways that you lied and betrayed the innocent people of Afghanistan and Iraq, not to say anything of how you betrayed your own country and the world at large. I see it as treason, and the only thing that allows you to walk free is the fact that most Americans have not taken the time to discover information that is readily available to them... that, and the fact that too many members of Congress and the public are more loyal to their party than they are to the Constitution and the rule of law, while others are simply afraid of losing their jobs (and perhaps rightly so) if they spoke up and told the truth.

The greatest danger the American people face now are not terrorists, but the possibility that you and Bush will not be impeached. For every day, while the American people sleep--ignorant and unaware of your gross infidelity--the rest of the world is looking at the photographs of burned, disfigured, and dismembered children, and they are beginning to believe that it is not just you and your administration who did this to them, but also our elected representatives, and the American people at large... because so far, we have allowed you to keep doing it with impunity. And given the anger and hatred for the injustice that they've been made to suffer, one can easily imagine the retribution exploding onto American soil if you and your conspirators are not repudiated and removed from office very soon.

Our children and grandchildren don't deserve the danger you, Bush, your partners and your predecessors have put them in.

God help us if we have another terrorist attack, because if that happens most Americans might actually believe that you and our criminal president were right all along--that the terrorists hate us because we are free. They might not realize that it's you and Bush, others in your unworthy administration, and some of your predecessors that they hate... not because you are all free, but because you are all criminals.

Most of the American people have not yet read and seen what I've read and seen, so they don't know the truth about what's been done. But if we have another attack like 9/11, it will be because of your treason... and because of you--but not only you--the final nails in the coffin of our democracy could be hammered in, and the weeping that would follow could endure for a hundred years.