Cheney’s death recalls sad complicity of media in his rush to endless war

 Cheney’s death recalls sad complicity of media in his rush to endless war

Dick Cheney lived or 22 years past his primary role ginning up, then launching the immoral, criminal Iraq war. Much is being written in his obituaries regarding his crimes against the countries and peoples he defiled and destroyed for decades before his Iraq war swansong in power.


But we should reflect that Cheney could not have committed his crimes on the world stage without a complicit American media. They handed him the microphone week after week following the 911 attacks to spew his lies of the need to invade first Afghanistan, then Iraq. He used the catchphrase “If you will” to entice his fawning hosts and the gullible public to believe his next statements were incontrovertible facts when they were monstrous lies promoting endless war.


One hugely influential media figure called out the lies and paid a steep price. Highly rated talk show personality Phil Donahue dared to tell truth to Cheney’s lies. Ratings be damned, MSNBC fired him just a month before Cheney triggered the Iraq war. An internal memo put it bluntly stating Donahue “presented a difficult face” for NBC at a time when the rest of US media was in total support of a glorious war whose coverage would goose their profits.


Twenty-two years later Dick Cheney died but sycophantic US media lives on, ignoring without a peep of protest, US support of Israeli genocide, criminal attacks on several countries and obliterating
small, unarmed boats on the high seas.


Dick Cheney’s legacy to America and the world a sorrowful one indeed.


Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL