Hersh: Cheney âLeft A Stay Behindâ In Obamaâs Government, Can âStill Control Policy Up To A Pointâ in an interview on NPRâs Fresh Air yesterday, host Terry Gross asked investigative journalist Seymour Hersh if, as he continues to investigate the Bush administration, âmore peopleâ were âcoming forwardâ to talk to him now that âthe president and vice president are no longer in power.â Hersh replied that though âa lot of people that had told me in the last year of Bush, âcall me next, next February,â not many people had talked to him. He implied that they were still scared of Cheney. âAre you saying that you think Vice President Cheney is still having a chilling effect on people who might otherwise be coming forward,â asked Gross. âIâll make it worse,â answered Hersh, adding that he believes Cheney âput people backâ in government to âstay behindâ in order to âtell him whatâs going onâ and perhaps even âdo sabotageâ: HERSH: Iâll make it worse. I think heâs put people left. Heâs put people back. They call it a stay behind. Itâs sort of an intelligence term of art. When you leave a country and, you know, youâve driven out the, you know, youâve lost the war. You leave people behind. Itâs a stay behind that you can continue to contacts with, to do sabotage, whatever you want to do. Cheneyâs left a stay behind. Heâs got people in a lot of agencies that still tell him whatâs going on. Particularly in defense, obviously. Also in the NSA, thereâs still people that talk to him. He still knows whatâs going on. Can he still control policy up to a point? Probably up to a point, a minor point. But heâs still there. Heâs still a presence. Listen here: <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/3cjFhyUqCrA&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/3cjFhyUqCrA&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> The idea that Cheney would seed the government with trusted contacts is not surprising. As Hersh noted in his talk with Gross, Cheney has âbeen around foreverâ and âunderstands bureaucracy much betterâ than almost anyone in government. In 2006, Robert Dreyfuss reported for The American Prospect that when Cheney helped staff the Bush administration in 2001, he put together a âcorps of hard-line acolytesâ that served âas his eyes and earsâ in the federal bureaucracy. Former officials called them âDick Cheneyâs spies.â Additionally, before leaving office, the Bush administration aggressively placed political appointees into permanent civil service positions as part of a process known as âburrowing.â Some of the burrowed former political appointees have close ties to Cheney, such as Jeffrey T. Salmon, who was a speechwriter for Cheney when he served as defense secretary. In July, he was named deputy director for resource management in the Energy Departmentâs Office of Science Transcript: GROSS: You investigated the Bush administration throughout the Bush administration. Always looking for ways that they may, might have been going beyond executive authority in taking on new powers. And now that the Bush administration is over, youâre still investigating what they did and where they might have violated the law. Is investigating that any different for you as a journalist post-Bush administration than it was during the Bush administration? Are more people coming forward now, now that the president and vice president are no longer in power? HERSH: You know, thatâs a great question because I did think, I had a lot of people that had told me in the last year of Bush, âcall me next, next February.â And, so far, even people who are out are still cherry because, you know, not so much Bush, but Cheney really isâ¦heâs really smart. In the article this week, in the New Yorker, thatâs coming out this week, I mention that at one point last fall, Mr. Miliband, the young foreign secretary of Britain, unilaterally, without telling the White House made a trip to Syria to see the president, Assad, and his intelligence chief, his MI6 chief went before him. And Bush-Cheney didnât know about it until actually was, they were actually there. And Cheney at a meeting â and I do have, I can tell you I do have access and have had and Iâve been careful of how I use it, to a lot of stuff from meetings in the White House â and at a meeting he railed on about perfidious Albion, you know, the old Shakespeare term for England and that was used during the Revolutionary war as a pejorative term for England. Perfidious Albion he said. He is, Cheney is really underestimated. Itâs easy to make a caricature of him. Heâs very very bright. And heâs also in person, a much more open-minded in the sense, Iâm talking about not politically. You could go and the most despaired people in the world go and have social evenings with him and his wife and talking about current, as long as you donât get into politics, movies and stuff like that. Itâs, heâs easy to make a caricature, but heâs much more formidable than people think. Got a rap clap memory. Understands bureaucracy much better, heâs been around forever, has had every job. GROSS: Are you saying that you think Vice President Cheney is still having a chilling effect on people who might otherwise be coming forward and revealing things to you about what happened in the Bush administration? HERSH: Iâll make it worse. I think heâs put people left. Heâs put people back. They call it a stay behind. Itâs sort of an intelligence term of art. When you leave a country and, you know, youâve driven out the, you know, youâve lost the war. You leave people behind. Itâs a stay behind that you can continue to contacts with, to do sabotage, whatever you want to do. Cheneyâs left a stay behind. Heâs got people in a lot of agencies that still tell him whatâs going on. Particularly in defense, obviously. Also in the NSA, thereâs still people that talk to him. He still knows whatâs going on. Can he still control policy up to a point? Probably up to a point, a minor point. But heâs still there. Heâs still a presence. And again, because of the problems this administrationâs having filling jobs, a lot of people who served in the Bush Cheney government, particularly even in the White House people on most sophisticated staffs are still there. You simply canât get rid of everybody, you may not even want to. Some are professional people. But Cheney is, I would never call it admiration, but, you know, formidable, yeah, this guy. This guy is the real McCoy. http://thinkprogress.org/2009/03/31/hersh-cheney-behind/
Hilarious. Sy Hersh can't get a story he likes so he blames Cheney. Everyone knows who burrowed. There is a list of them. Clinton left plenty of them as well. It's a tradition. All administrations do it. It's not unusual or improper that national security officials would stay in touch with Cheney. He was VP after all. Bureaucrats are allowed to talk to people, within limits. Basically Hersh is complaining that people won't leak to him but will talk to the former VP. As I said, hilarious.
I listened to that interview. The guy, hersch, is a punk. the entire interview was filled with him building himself up to be the most connected guy in the country. I wish I knew half of what he does but can't say. If it wasnt for those meddling republicans he'd have gotten away with it too.
The Shadowy Overlords that report secretly to Cheney will be the downfall of the Obama movement! You got it here first..