Maybe It’s Time Liz and Dick Cheney Registered Under FARA?
In my Salon piece last week, I noted that in their attack on Obama, Liz and Dick Cheney were talking about interests, but made it clear they were really presenting the interests of “capitals from the Persian Gulf to Israel.”
And we should note whose interests Cheney represents.
Clearly, his temper tantrum serves, in part, to distract from his own culpability.
But note who else’s views Cheney cites? He claims he heard “a constant refrain in capitals from the Persian Gulf to Israel,” complaining about Obama’s actions. He describes a senior official in an Arab capital laying out ISIS’ aspirations on a map. He portrays those same figures in the Middle East demanding, “Why is he abandoning your friends?” “Why is he doing deals with your enemies?”
Even while Cheney parrots the interests of Middle Eastern leaders and conflates their interests with America’s, he scoffs at Obama’s (belated) efforts to address a far more immediate risk for America, climate change.
They’re back at it:
“I think the notion that somehow the Iranians have any interests in common with us is outrageous,” [Liz] Cheney said Tuesday on Rush Limbaugh’s radio show, according to a transcript. “The fact that we might be working with the Iranians again just gives our allies — you know — they’re apoplectic.”
This whole “Alliance for a Stronger America” schtick seems to do nothing else but lobby for the use of American service members and weapons to serve the interests of our “friends” — presumably Saudi Arabia and Israel — in the Middle East.
If they want to advocate for risking US lives and treasure to serve the Saudis, that’s their prerogative. But the law — the Foreign Agents Registration Act — requires that “ persons acting as agents of foreign principals in a political or quasi-political capacity to make periodic public disclosure of their relationship with the foreign principal, as well as activities, receipts and disbursements in support of those activities.”
It’s probably time for the Cheney’s to disclose who they’re working for here. No matter how prominently they feature the word “America” in their organization name, they appear to be working for other governments. Given that they’re acting like agents of a foreign power, they probably should admit that formally.