Pelosi Blames Bush Administration For Current Conditions In Afghanistan

By Leah Valencia - University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) pointed her finger at the Bush administration Thursday, blaming it for the current conditions in Afghanistan.

“Our troops in Afghanistan are at risk because... the entire Bush administration looked the other way on Afghanistan, there was never a plan,” Pelosi said during her weekly press conference.

The Speaker said that during President Bush's time as Commander in Chief the Taliban gained strength because there was not a policy that indicated to the Afghan government that the U.S. would not tolerate corruption.

“We have missed opportunities over the years and made matters worse...for President Obama,” Pelosi said.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney accused President Barack Obama Wednesday night of being weak in his strategy for Afghanistan, saying that his indecision “hurt our allies and embolden our adversaries.”

"The White House must stop dithering while America's armed forces are in danger," Cheney said while making remarks at a function held by the Center for Security Policy.

Pelosi defended the current President, saying that he should take the appropriate time needed to make sound decisions.

“The President should not make a decision any sooner than he has the right information to do so,” she said. “Matters are so much worse because of the missed opportunities for seven and a half years, it is really tragic.”

Cheney's Daughter Criticizes Obama's Remarks Abroad

Liz Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs during the George W. Bush administration, criticized statements made by President Barack Obama during his recent diplomatic trip to the Middle East and Europe. Cheney accused Obama of attempting to appear neutral at the expense of U.S. interests. 

“I think an American president has to be America’s strongest defender...For him to set himself above the debate puts him in a situation of defending global interests at the same time he’s supposed to be defending American interests,” Cheney told The Talk Radio News Service following a speech at the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute’s Conservative Leadership Seminar Monday. “It’s not the best way to achieve our national security objectives.”

Cheney criticized Obama for what she said was an unfair comparison of the Holocaust to the status Palestinian people.

“I think many Americans would say there’s absolutely no way you can talk about a moral equivalence there,” said Cheney.

While Cheney does not believe that the trip itself endangered the U.S., she asserted that Obama’s current national security policies pose a substantial risk.

“I didn’t hear the President in his speech say that America is committed to making sure Iran will not have a nuclear weapon,” Cheney said.

Cheney has gained media attention in past weeks for defending her father’s public criticism of Obama and defending the use of enhanced interrogation techniques.

Cheney Won’t Budge On National Security

By Celia Canon- Talk Radio News Service

Former Vice President Dick Cheney reiterated his support for the Bush administration’s national security approach today during an address to the Gerald Ford Foundation's annual journalism awards ceremony at the National Press Club.

When questioned about President Barack Obama’s decision to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility by the end of the year, Cheney said that the administration had erred by ordering to discontinue use of the facility without a plan for the distribution of the prisoners.

“If you don’t have a place to hold these people, the only other solution is to kill them, and we don’t operate that way. We capture people in combat, we hold them as prisoners, we treat them as prisoners of war and are to be held till the end of the conflict,” Cheney said.

Since January, Obama has signed two presidential orders to close the facility within a year.

Cheney recently asked Obama to declassify the CIA’s interrogation documents related to water-boarding so as to prove that the Bush administration was not responsible for what is considered as the widespread condoning of torture by U.S. government officials under the Bush administration.

“[Obama] could with the stroke of a pen, declassify those documents that I’ve asked for,” Cheney said, adding,“The president has the authority to declassify whatever he wants, he is the ultimate classification authority of the federal government.”

When asked if he still believed there was a link between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida, “The fact that he was a state sponsor of terror, provided sanctuary and safe harbor and resources to terrorists is I think without question, a fact,” adding, “That’s not something I made up. That’s not something I thought of. That’s something the director of Central Intelligence was telling us,” Cheney answered.

Since leaving office in January, Cheney has emerged as a frequent critic of Obama’s national security policies. He accused Obama of making the U.S. less safe during a CNN appearance in March and then again during a speech to the American Enterprise Institute late May. He has also given numerous television interviews conveying the same theme.

The "de-inauguration" of Bush

Demonstrator outside of the White House holds up a sign to say good bye to Bush and Cheney.



by Suzia van Swol and Christina Lovato, University of New Mexico-Talk Radio News Service

The blame game: What’s causing high gas prices?

The role of market speculation and its effect on the dramatic increases in the price of oil was discussed by the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Oversight and and Investigations Subcommittee. Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) stated that the American economy will not be sustainable if high prices at the pump continue to climb.

Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) said a solution to inappropriate speculation would help to lower prices in the short term, contrasting this idea with calls to increase supply by drilling in the ANWR. Inslee said that these measures would affect future generations but have no immediate result now. Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) stated that speculation of future demand for oil has played a large role in oil’s price increase and that one can solve the issue of high prices by traveling to New York or Chicago.

Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) said the cost of oil can be attributed to low supply, not market speculation. Barton suggested opening the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and selling two million barrels each day. Barton said this would return oil prices to under $100 per barrel. He noted that the Bush administration opposes this strategy and that its success would rely on an act of Congress. Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.) said supply and demand principles, as well as deflation and market forces cannot be ignored.

Michael Masters of Masters Capital Management said that investment firms are good at making profits but ignore the long-term consequences of their decisions, naming the subprime mortgage crisis as an example. Inslee recalled being told by Vice President Dick Cheney that he did not understand economics when he presented Cheney with information concerning Enron, comparing that experience with what he views as the Bush administration’s refusal to acknowledge the effect of futures markets on oil.