For Once, He's Correct

Former Vice President Dick Cheney praised the Obama administration Sunday for ordering the drone strike that killed Anwar al-Awlaki, calling it "a very good strike" and "justified."

But Cheney and his daughter Liz, who appeared together on CNN's "State of the Union" said President Barack Obama owes the Bush administration an apology.

They said the killing of an American citizen without due process calls into question the president's past criticisms of the Bush administration for using enhanced interrogation techniques.

"The thing I am waiting for is for the administration to go back and correct something they said two years ago, when they criticized us for quote overreacting to the events of 9/11," Dick Cheney said. "They in effect said we had walked away from our ideals, taking policy contrary to our ideals when we had enhanced interrogation techniques. They have clearly moved in the direction of taking robust action when they feel it is justified. In this case, it was. They need to go back and reconsider what the president said in Cairo."
~ from Cheney Praises Strike, But Seeks Apology ~

I really hate to agree with ANYTHING Dick Cheney has to say, but, in this case, he has a point. Both candidate and President Obama decried many of the extrajudicial measures adopted by the Bush administration, but he has ended up embracing and, sometimes, expanding upon them.

It places Obama in a position in which he really can't criticize his predecessor. It's bad form to call out someone else for engaging in the same basic behavior than you behave in.

I happen to disagree with both presidents on this issue. I think they both have set horrible precedents that will bear increasingly bad fruit in the future. I also think they have exposed a truth many of us knew all along -- people in power only pay lip service to upholding the Constitution. Our founding document ONLY is important when it favors what they want to/do not want to do anyway. When it gets in the way, they think nothing at all of casting it aside like a used Kleenex!

Obama owes Bush a big apology. However, he owes the American people an even bigger one!!