The following are excerpts from an interview in GQ magazine with Senator Chuck Hagel: (Underlined portion are the GQ questions)

Do you wish you’d voted differently in October of 2002, when Congress had a chance to authorize or not authorize the invasion?
Have you read that resolution?

I have.
It’s not quite the way it’s been framed by a lot of people, as a resolution to go to war. That’s not quite what the resolution said.

It said, “to authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq.”
In the event that all other options failed. So it’s not as simple as “I voted for the war.” That wasn’t the resolution.

But there was a decision whether to grant the president that authority or not.
Exactly right. And if you recall, the White House had announced that they didn’t need that authority from Congress.

It’s incredible that you had to ask for that.
It is incredible. That’s what I said to Andy Card. Said it to Powell, said it to Rice. Might have even said it to the president. And finally, begrudgingly, they sent over a resolution for Congress to approve. Well, it was astounding. It said they could go anywhere in the region.

It wasn’t specific to Iraq?
Oh no. It said the whole region! They could go into Greece or anywhere. I mean, is Central Asia in the region? I suppose! Sure as hell it was clear they meant the whole Middle East. It was anything they wanted. It was literally anything. No boundaries. No restrictions.

They expected Congress to let them start a war anywhere they wanted in the Middle East?
Yes. Yes. Wide open. We had to rewrite it. Joe Biden, Dick Lugar, and I stripped the language that the White House had set up, and put our language in it.

Did he give you that assurance, that he would do the same thing as his father?
Yep. He said, “That’s what we’re going to do.” But the more I look back on this, the more I think that the administration knew there was some real hard question whether he really had any WMD. In January of 2003, if you recall, the inspectors at the IAEA, who knew more about what Saddam had than anybody, said, “Give us two more months before you go to war, because we don’t think there’s anything in there.” They were the only ones in Iraq. We hadn’t been in there. We didn’t know what the hell was in there. And the president wouldn’t do it! So to answer your question—Do I regret that vote? Yes, I do regret that vote.

http://men.style.com/gq/features/full?id=content_5326&pageNum=6

 

So, Senator Hagel is giving us the unvarnished truth.  And more and more truth will come out as times goes on. Dick Cheney will continue his war of lies, misleading statements and denial as evidenced by his appearance on CNN today. 

In an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, conducted a day after Bush delivered his State of the Union address, Cheney was asked to respond to some Republicans in Congress who "are now seriously questioning your credibility, because of the blunders and the failures."

To that, Cheney answered, "Wolf, Wolf, I simply don't accept the premise of your question. I just think it's hogwash."

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/01/24/cheney/index.html

This is the equivalent of putting his fingers in his ears, saying “NA-NA-NA, I can’t HEAR YOU!” Poor Dickie, he still thinks that the American people are buying his magic elixir.

And then there is this:  Wolf Blitzer asked the VP about his pregnant, unwed, lesbian daughter who is having a baby.  Old Dead-eye told Wolf the question was “out of line.”  Wow, what a frickin’ hypocrite.  He thinks the question is out of line, but when James Dobson and the other right-wingers want to stick their noses in everyone else’s business, including passing legislation to do just that, Dead-eye is quiet as a church mouse.

The house of cards is falling.  And Bush, Cheney and the rest are going to be the last to realize it.  People on both sides of the aisle are taking our country back.  The march may be too slow for some, but things are looking better.