In honor of Dick Cheney's recent cheerleading for torture, I refer you to some interesting reading on the subject:

• Bob Cesca makes a compelling argument that Cheney wants everyone to focus on the rights and wrongs of torture so nobody will bother going the next step to the reasons why he and Bush were so much in favor of it: namely, to get detainees to "prove" a connection between Iraq and al Qaida as a justification for invading Iraq.
• Paul Begala does a fine job of blowing Cheney's whole "we kept America safe" fantasy out of the water.
• Former State Department Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson does more of the same.
• Reese Schonfeld refreshes our memories on a few inconvenient facts Bush and Cheney would like us to forget about.
• I get the feeling that Jeffrey Feldman dislikes Dick Cheney. He has his reasons.

And the hits just keep on coming:

• Cheney's speech contained omissions, misstatements
• The Cheney Fallacy
• Cheney, the CIA and Torture: Asking the Wrong Questions

Cheney is excellent at diverting attention from the important stuff. Just read Barton Gellman's book Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency for countless examples. He's apparently at it again. Let's hope the American public is up to the task of paying attention to what really matters.