The Halliburton Flip Flops of Dick Cheney

CHENEY THE FLIP FLOP KING

Cheney recently reminded America that, “These are not times for leaders who shift with the political winds, saying one thing one day and another, the next.”

FLIP....

"Government spends a lot of money, but it doesn't build factories .... The key to more jobs is not more government, but free enterprise" -- Dick Cheney

FLOP....

Halliburton took $7.8 billion in U.S. taxpayer assistance since 1992 to grow its company -- and that doesn't include money from the Pentagon.

FLIP....

“And one of the best ways to encourage stock ownership is to make sure that pension plans give workers better information, and treat them fairly.” -- Dick Cheney

FLOP....

While CEO of Halliburton, Dick Cheney took advantage of a legal loophole that robbed $25 million from the pensions of Halliburton's workers. Nine months later the company gave Cheney a $20 million pension. Experts call it "scandalous."

FLIP....

"And since I left Halliburton to become George Bush's vice president, I've severed all my ties with the company, gotten rid of all my financial interest. I have no financial interest in Halliburton of any kind and haven't had, now, for over three years." -- Dick Cheney

FLOP....

As vice president, Cheney continues to receive a salary of over $150,000 each year from Halliburton while maintaining 433,333 shares of unexercised stock options in the company.

FLIP....

"We are going after the terrorists wherever they plot and plan." -- Dick Cheney

FLOP....

"We'd be better off if we, in fact, backed off those sanctions [on Iran]," said Cheney when he was CEO for Halliburton. President Bush says Iran sponsors terrorism. Halliburton sales to Iran totalled $63 million in 2003.

FLIP....

"I have absolutely no influence of, involvement of, knowledge of in any way, shape or form of contracts led by the [Army] Corps of Engineers or anybody else in the Federal Government." -- Dick Cheney

FLOP....

Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, was briefed in October 2002 about a proposal to give contract work to Halliburton's KBR unit for extinguishing oil well fires in Iraq. Moreover, an internal Pentagon e-mail proves that a $7 billion no-bid contract awarded to Halliburton on March 8, 2003 was "coordinated" with Cheney's office. Pentagon officials admitted that Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith discussed the March 2003 Halliburton contract in advance with Cheney's office.

FLIP....

“I can tell you that the government had absolutely nothing to do with it,” Cheney said in answer to questions about his exorbitant personal wealth earned from Halliburton.

FLOP....

The value of Halliburton's government contracts increased by nearly 100 percent, from $1.2 billion to $2.3 billion, during Cheney's tenure as CEO. Guaranteed and direct loans from government lenders increased over one thousand percent, from $100 million to $1.5 billion.

FLIP....

"We [Halliburton] have not done any business in Iraq since U.N. sanctions were imposed on Iraq in 1990, and I had a standing policy that I wouldn't do that." -- Dick Cheney

FLOP....

Halliburton sold more than $73 million in oil production equipment and spare parts to Iraq from the first half of 1997 through the summer of 2000 -- while Cheney was chairman and CEO of the company.

FLIP....

"The cost of one attack on 9/11 was far greater than what we’re spending in Iraq." -- Dick Cheney

FLOP

The City of New York said the 9/11 attacks will cost the city between $83 billion to $95 billion. As of May 2004, the funds appropriated and requested for Iraq totalled $152 billion and are likely to approach $200 billion by the end of fiscal 2005.


Halliburton Watch.org

No Electronic Ballots in Florida?

'Catastrophic Success'?

President Bush takes plenty of flak for his less-than-eloquent locution, but impromptu fumblings aside, his latest campaign statement on Iraq is a calculated exercise in cognitive dissonance -- an astonishing attempt to whitewash the post-invasion debacle by indirectly "blaming" the U.S. military's victorious surge to Baghdad last year. On the eve of the Republican convention, Bush said that the daunting problems now plaguing the reconstruction are a result of a "catastrophic success," of, "being so successful so fast that an enemy that should have surrendered or been done in escaped and lived to fight another day."

Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards quickly released a statement exposing the audacity of Bush's message:

"President Bush now says his Iraq policy is a catastrophic success. He's half right. It was catastrophic to rush to war without a plan to win the peace. It was catastrophic to ignore the warnings of the military leadership about the risks of an unstable post-war Iraq. It was catastrophic to dismiss warnings of creating chaotic terrorists havens … And it was catastrophic to tell the American public that rebuilding Iraq would not burden the American taxpayers with a bill of $200 billion and rising.

"The most disturbing part of the president's statement is the suggestion that somehow our military is at fault for moving too fast before the enemy was 'done in.' Our troops fought magnificently in Iraq. Their efforts can only be described as an unqualified success. I didn't think 'shock and awe' was designed to move slowly.

"A Commander-in-Chief should never take our nation to war without a plan to win the peace. Real leadership means taking responsibility for your decisions good and bad. Our troops and our nation deserve better.

"In one sense, President Bush is right with his new campaign slogan 'catastrophic success.' His successful misleading of the American public is truly catastrophic."

-- Mark Follman

[09:07 PDT, Aug. 30, 2004]

Bush Says He Miscalculated Post-war Conditions in Iraq

Fri Aug 27,11:37 AM ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) - President George W. Bush (news - web sites) reportedly said he miscalculated post-war conditions in Iraq (news - web sites) and that the long insurgency was the product of a "swift victory."

In what The New York Times said was the US president's first acknowledgement on the issue, Bush said he made a "miscalculation of what the conditions would be" in postwar Iraq.

He said the miscalculation was an unintended byproduct of a "swift victory," adding that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s forces quickly went into hiding in Iraqi cities where they mounted a rebellion far faster than the Americans had anticipated.

The daily said Bush refused to go into detail on what went wrong, saying that it was a task best left to historians.

Bush said his policies on Iraq -- where he fought a war despite strong international opposition -- were "flexible enough" to respond to the insurgency. He added that even now "we're adjusting to our conditions," in places like the holy city of Najaf, where US and Iraqi forces have been battling the militias of Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr for weeks.

On North Korea (news - web sites) and its alleged nuclear weapons ambitions, the daily said Bush took issue with his Democratic rival in the November 2 presidential election John Kerry (news - web sites), who argued that the US-led war in Iraq gave Pyongyang the opportunity to expand its nuclear capability.

"Showing none of the alarm about the North's growing arsenal that he once voiced regularly about Iraq," said the daily, Bush "opened his palms and shrugged" when asked about intelligence reports indicating that North Korea may now have the fuel to produce six or eight nuclear weapons.

Referring to North Korea and Iran, Bush said he would not set deadlines for countries to disarm. "I don't give timelines to dictators," Bush said speaking of North Korea's president, Kim Jong Il, and Iran's mullahs.

Bush said he would continue to put diplomatic pressure on Pyongyang through China, and on Iran through Europe, but gave no hint his patience was limited.

"I'm confident that over time this will work - I certainly hope it does," added the president.

He declined to compare North Korea to Iraq, saying that Iraq had defied the world community far longer that the other members of what he has termed "the axis of evil," which includes Iran.

Regarding the ongoing controversy over Vietnam veterans' television ads discrediting Kerry's war record, Bush repeated that Kerry "should be proud of his record," and that the ads were wrong to imply Kerry was hiding things: "No, I don't think he lied."

But he again refused to condemn the ads.

He said he had joined with his former rival, Senator John McCain, in a lawsuit to outlaw political interest groups known as 527's -- named after a section of the US tax code -- one of which is the anti-Kerry group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

Bush was interviewed during a campaign stop in New Mexico, and was joined by his close adviser Karen Hughes, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) and his press secretary Scott McClellan.

In a separate interview with USA Today daily on board the presidential airplane Air Force One, Bush expressed confidence he would win another term even if they disagree with his decision to go to war in Iraq.

"They've seen me make decisions, they've seen me under trying times, they've seen me weep, they've seen me laugh, they've seen me hug," he said.

"And they know who I am, and I believe they're comfortable with the fact that they know I'm not going to shift principles or shift positions based upon polls and focus groups."

Reminded about a comment his wife, Laura, made in a June interview to the effect that they would be "OK" even if they lost the election, Bush interrupted: "I have never said that ... because I am not going to come in second. We'll prevail.

"I don't think that way. I believe we're going to win."

Bush Suggests War on Terrorism Cannot Be Won

NBC ‘Today’ interview ignites controversy; aides move to clarify president's remarks

NBC, MSNBC and news services
Updated: 9:32 p.m. ET Aug. 30, 2004

President Bush ignited a Democratic inferno of criticism on Monday by suggesting the war on terrorism could not be won, forcing his aides to scramble to defend his remarks just as he had hoped to bask in convention accolades.

Bush sought to emphasize the economy but his comments on terrorism dominated national attention.

In an interview with Matt Lauer on NBC’s “Today” show, Bush vowed to stay the course in the war on terrorism, saying perseverance in the battle would make the world safer for future generations. But he suggested an all-out victory against terrorism might not be possible.

Asked, “Can we win?” Bush said, “I don’t think you can win it. But I think you can create conditions so that the — those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world.”

"I have a two-pronged strategy," he said. "On the one hand is to find them before they hurt us. ... The long-term strategy is to spread freedom and liberty."

He added later, “You cannot show weakness in this world today because the enemy will exploit that weakness. It will embolden them and make the world a more dangerous place.”

Edwards on the attack
Democrats, looking for ways to deflect the spotlight from Republicans as they opened their convention in New York, pounced.

“After months of listening to the Republicans base their campaign on their singular ability to win the war on terror, the president now says we can’t win the war on terrorism,” said Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards. “This is no time to declare defeat.”

“The war on terrorism is absolutely winnable,” Edwards said later on ABC’s “Nightline.”

White House spokesman Scott McClellan sought to clarify the president’s remarks, telling reporters, “He was talking about winning it in the conventional sense, ... about how this is a different kind of war and we face an unconventional enemy.”

“To suggest that the war on terror can’t be won is absolutely unacceptable,” said Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., the senior Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

“First George W. Bush said he miscalculated the war in Iraq, then he called it a catastrophic success and blamed the military,” said Allison Dobson, a spokeswoman for Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee. “Now he says we can’t win the war on terror. Is that what (White House political adviser) Karl Rove means when he calls for steady leadership?”

Economic plan discussed
Interviewed by Lauer for the "Today" show on Saturday while on the campaign trail in Ohio, the president was also asked if he felt most Americans would say they are better off today than four years ago. "I think over 50 percent will," he said, referring to what's needed to win re-election in November.

On the federal deficit, Bush was asked if he'd consider raising taxes if it isn't halved in a second term, as he envisions.

"There's no need to answer a hypothetical," he said, "because it is going to [be halved]. That's what we've got in place, and that's what we've got in mind. And I think raising taxes now would be a disaster."

Bush said the major difference between him and Kerry came down to a philosophy of governing.

"There's a philosophical difference, which is that if you look at my policies, they're all aimed at empowering people to make their own decisions," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5865710/