Cheney the Hutt Emerges

What does it take to get the least-seen official in the federal government to come out of his "undisclosed location"? I have a mental picture that Cheney's hiding place looks just like Jabba the Hutt's mountainside cave as seen in Return of the Jedi. I see a large, dark space carved out of a mountain filled with neo-cons (none of whom ever served in the military...like their leader) strutting around in their battle gear and armor (armor that should have been given to the real troops who needed it), loudly proclaiming how tough they are and how they will bring democracy to the next axis of evil...as soon as Halliburton's balance sheet needs an even larger injection of billions from the federal treasury. And sitting above it all is Cheney the Hutt, smiling as he nods off, while a team of cardiologists monitor his vital signs and a larger team of Wall Street analysts calibrate Cheney's vitals to their investment portfolios.
So what national crisis caused Cheney to rouse from his slumbers, order that his battlecruiser be made ready, and actually make an appearance on Capital Hill? Was the Rebel Alliance trying to amend the Patriot Act? Or were they trying to come up with a real solution to Social Security that would not involve shifting a Trillion Dollars from the US Treasury to Wall Street brokers for setting up "personal" accounts? No, worst of all, it was to thwart an attack from inside the Empire's own ranks. Three well-known "liberal" Senators, John McCain, Lindsey Grahan, and John Warner had the temerity to draft legislation that would no longer allow the military to hide prisoners from the Red Cross (a dastardly organization that apparently strikes fear in the heart of conservatives!), and would prohibit cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment of military detainees. Cheney can easily see how such crackpot legislation might lead to restoring, in some small way, the reputation of the US in the international community. It might also hamstring a military prison commander who wishes to create the next Abu Ghraib. But most importantly, it would create the first, tiny restriction on the imperial power presently held and used with great vigor by Cheney and his puppet to jail anyone, at any time, at any place with no requirement for ever bringing charges, or even acknowledging that a person is being detained. Certainly no reasonable person has a problem with enemy combatants who were captured on the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq being dealt with by the military and imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay. But is it reasonable for a US citizen to step off a plane at O'Hare and be whisked away to a brig and never be charged with a crime? Is Jose Padilla guilty of attending a terrorist training camp, planning to blow up Chicago apartment buildings and to plant a "dirty" bomb, or did he just make the mistake of visiting Afghanistan at the wrong time? We will never know unless he is charged with these crimes and convicted. To allow any President to have the unlimited power to secretly arrest, imprison, and forget about anyone he chooses is a recipe for abuse, and is a perfect example of why Lord Acton said over a century ago, "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."