What The Cheney Did He Just Say?

ThinkProgress is reporting that during a speech to Wyoming High School Vice President Dick Cheney "Lies To High Schoolers About Debunked Iraq/al Qaeda Connection" and also claimed that the United States was making significant progress in Iraq.

Yup. You guessed it, the VP is coming to a high school near you soon to lie to your children personally...

Never mind that all indicators show that ground is being lost in Iraq and that according to a new military assessment less than one third of Baghdad neighborhoods are under control three months into the so called "surge".

The Vice President also brings up Abu Musab al- Zarqawi and follows with the baseless claim that during fighting in Afganistan Zarqawi was wounded and fled into Baghdad for medical treatment, no one ever bothered to ask why Zarqawi would travel across borders and miles to seek medical treatment when there were cities much closer.

The Bush Administration has used the "Zarqawi was treated by Saddam" card as one of their lies in attempting to connect Iraq to al-Qaeda, claiming that Zarqawi had lost a leg in Afghanistan and traveled to Baghdad to get medical treatment and a prosthetic leg, possibly a gift from Saddam himself...

But let's examine this debunked claim a moment. Zarqawi would have had to have made it over the Afghanistan border into Iran without being detected, then he would have had to sneak across Iran and make it across the Iraqi border undetected. Seems like quite a feat for a supposedly injured man who should have been bleeding all over the place.

Again, no one asks how a bleeding and injured man, supposedly missing a leg makes it all the way to Baghdad from Afghanistan.

Look at it this way; in miles - (let's not even discuss the difficulties of navigating the harsh mountainous terrain in Afghanistan and Iran and desert conditions in Iran and Iraq)) this would be about the equivalent of going from Kansas to Washington D.C to get medical treatment and going directly over the Appalachians to do it. Do you think you could make it with one missing leg, in which the bleeding must be profuse? Didn't think so.

But what does it matter? We know know Zarqawi never sought medical treatment in Baghdad and it is unlikely he was ever injured in Afghanistan. Why? Because almost a year ago we killed Zarqawi, and the man had both his legs.

Going back even further we see that prior to the Iraq War, Zarqawi and Bin Laden were competitors not allies. This helps prove the United States preemptive war in Iraq has not diminished terrorism, but helped unite some extremist groups who used to be opposed to each other.

But hey, that doesn't stop the Vice President from strolling into a local high school of young, impressionable teens and filling their heads with fairy tales, now does it?

IN FACT

As Think Progress Reports :

"The implication that Zarqawi helped justify the war was thoroughly debunked last year by the Senate Intelligence Committee, then chaired by Bush loyalist Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS.)

It found:

Saddam Hussein attempted, unsuccessfully, to locate and capture al-Zarqawi and…the regime did not have a relationship with, harbor, or turn a blind eye toward Zarqawi. [p. 109]"

Dick Cheney proves that there are some people who will refuse to deal in the the truth and insist on dolling out lies even when contradictory evidence has been stapled to their foreheads repeatedly.

Sorry Dick, but history will never vindicate your lies, in fact history may be a crueler judge than we.