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Your and Cheney's arguments don't wash. The real question is how big a threat al Qaeda really is to the US. We still seem unwilling to admit that the success of the al Qaeda attack on the US was largely due to our negligence in protecting our homeland. We gave them visas to enter the country, we gave them drivers licenses, we allowed our flight schools to train them, we had no protections for crew and passengers aboard planes. We also had little surveillance of foreign threats and we refused to believe the information we did have due to stovepiping in government agencies that are supposed to protect us. The reason we have had no further attacks is because we have to a large extent corrected these deficiencies. So what is the current threat of a rag tag organization with little central coordination to our security? Their camps in Afghanistan had little to do with the success of the first operation. The key operators were educated dissidents living in Germany. We are expending billions on fighting a conventional war against a foe that has little real power to harm us if we are vigilant. And, in the process we are becoming the best recruiting tool for Islamic extremism that they could ask for. It's time to step back and reassess what the threat from Islamic fundamentalists really is and stop assuming we are facing an existential threat. We are not by all reasonable standards. Our politicians and diplomats need to think independently of the generals. Generals know how to fight wars. But, they are no better than civilians in assessing when wars need to be fought. Cheney couldn't even convince Bush of the value of the policies he is advocating. After the first term Bush moved away from what Cheney and Rumsfeld wanted to a position that is quite similar to Obama's position now. Cheney is still advocating the discredited neocon policies that were abandoned by the Bush administration. If he really thinks he can prevail with the policies he is proposing, let him run against Obama or scrounge up a younger candidate that supports his policies. What he is doing now is just further discrediting the Republican Party that was voted out in the last election, and obstructing any progress that is being made by the new administration. Face it, the Cheney/Limbaugh/Buchanan way is a big loser for the Republican Party. The base that supports those policies is shrinking, not growing. And, if the Republicans run on such policies in the next election they will lose even bigger next time.

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The Rep party shouldn't buy into "the Reps don't have a leader" We already have a leader (the POTUS) or the (TOTUS) (teleprompter). They just need to hold this administration's feet to the fire on issues and speak with one voice. In my opinion Bohenor (sp) and McConnell should have stepped down and let Cantor and Ryan take over b ecause they certainly did the Rep party no favors. Oh, and C Powell is NOT a voice for the party. He's just playing it both ways. Cheney schooled the administation and the MSM and they do not like it.