Iran And The Other, More Dangerous Liar In The White House: Vice President Pence? DMT.NEWS
Article by WN.Com Correspondent Dallas Darling
On the morning of May 26, 2017, Vice President Mike Pence enjoined the graduating class at the US Naval Academy to “follow the chain of command without exception. Submit yourselves, as the saying goes, to the authorities that have been placed above you. Trust your superiors, trust your orders, and you’ll serve and lead well.” (1) But that is not the American way.
American officers are bound to obey only “lawful” orders, and the unthinking obedience recommended by the vice president is the mentality of authoritarian states, not rule-of-law societies. What’s more, the Supreme Court rejected forever the “I was just following orders” defense. Crimes of war can never be legalized, even when ordered by a superior.
The First Casualty
This wasn’t the first time that Pence had lied, or that he tried to lead people astray. Nor would it be the last in his war against truth. To be sure, his most recent lie promoted an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory linking the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to Iran and Gen. Qassem Soleimani. It is just one of many in which he’s had to defend the indefensible, or President Donald Trump.
Like others who work for Trump, Pence must accept that he serves the right to be embarrassed or denigrated at any moment for any reason, or for no reason at all, just impulsive whim. As vice president, he’s been obliged to deliver untruth after untruth on Trump’s behalf, to invent lies where only the truth existed. To try and invent fantasies where only reality remained.
On “Face the Nation,” he was asked if anybody in the Trump campaign had any contact with the Russians who were trying to meddle in the election. “Of course not.” he said, knowing full well this was a flagrant lie. Along with the president, Trump’s son, son-in-law, personal lawyers, and close associates (Michael Flynn, Carter Page, Rick Gates and Paul Manafort) had been in contact.
Another blatant lie is the quid pro quo at the heart of the Democrats’ impeachment case against Trump. After denying that he was completely unaware of the calls between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland implicated Pence, saying he too had been briefed on withholding military aid until Joseph and Hunter Biden were investigated.
Sondland in fact testified: “I mentioned to Vice President Pence before the meetings with Ukrainians that I had concerns that the delay in aid had come tied to the issue of investigations. I recall mentioning that before the Zelensky meeting.” Others backed Sondland’s claim, that he had met and briefed the vice president before traveling to Poland to meet with Zelensky. (2)
Onward Christian Supremacists
Although Pence was raised in a traditional Catholic family, he describes himself as a born-again, evangelical Catholic. Along with supporting two former far-right Speakers of the House, Paul Ryan and Newt Gingrich, he boasts of being a “principled conservative” and supporter of the Tea Party Movement, stating that he was “a Christian, conservative, and a Republican, in that order.”
At the start of the 2016 Republican presidential primaries, Pence initially endorsed Sen. Ted Cruz. This changed with Trump’s confrontational and paranoid style. Now, as Trump’s vice president, Pence had to defend the indefensible. When Trump’s 2005 conversation with Billy Bush surfaced, Pence publicly stated, “I do not condone his remarks and cannot defend them.”
Pence, however, continued to stand by Trump. Despite rumors of wanting to drop off the ticket or something worse, Pence still praised the president. Pence’s relationship Trump continues to be a rocky one. While Pence may not agree with all of Trump’s opinions or actions, he is choosing to stay along Trump’s side in order to advance his own position.
There is a strong Republican cohort that would like to see Pence as the President of the United States. Although they portray him as the reasonable adult in the room, a “counterbalance” to Trump and a bridge to the establishment, Pence is a Christian supremacist, a militant one at that. Consequently, Pence is a godsend to the Christian Right who want to see biblical values enacted.
The kind of biblical values they have in mind is an extremist Christian theocracy, with Pence as its main warrior. Not only was he behind the fight against LGBTQ rights, but, and like Trump, he was a main proponent of the wall, anti-immigration policies, and executive actions against Islamic countries to prevent Muslims from migrating to America.
Shadow Presidency
Another thing Pence is known for is his influence on Trump to turn the Supreme Court and Federal courts into tribunals, where Christian conservative judges can strip away any remnants of secularism and humanism. To be sure, Pence and his Christian Right and conservative justices want nothing more than a God-led government that is pro-family, pro-life and pro capitalism.
And while Trump has flip-flopped on a variety of issues when it comes to foreign military interventions, Pence has been a reliable stalwart through his public life in the cause of Christian jihad, ground zero being the protection of Israel as God’s “Chosen People” against Iran. Like other Christian jihadists, he believes in an epoch and apocalyptic battle centered in the Middle East.
In fact, Pence was behind Mike Pompeo’s nomination to be the new Secretary of State. (3) Pompeo could act as a counterweight to intelligence gatherers in the CIA, specifically “fixing the facts” for a new world order that he and Christian supremacists like Pence wanted. In addition to a projected war with Iran, Pence and Pompeo also made sure to leave Congress out of the loop.
Another thing they did was to ensure the Agency and Intelligence Community would be turned into a war zone that would bring back torture and extrajudicial assassinations. Since neither could shake the Benghazi debacle, where four Americans were killed, they remained publicly hawkish on hot-button issues like surveillance, detentions, and interrogations as well.
Vice President Pence had a hand in many other nominations, such as Dan Coats as Director of National Intelligence and CIA Director Gina Haspel. (4) Haspel, who was centrally involved in the worst abuses of the CIA’s Bush-Era torture regime, was also instrumental in running a secret prison in Thailand. She also played a vital role in destroying any evidence of torture.
Vice President Mike Pence's claim that General Suleimani helped 10 of the men who would go on to carry out the Sept… https://t.co/jdC1cuupzN
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2284Buying His Time
Even though the 9/11 commission report found “no evidence that Iran or Hezbollah was aware of the planning for what later became the 9/11 attack,” and that 15 of the hijackers were Saudi Arabia nationalists, Pence still claimed that Soleimani had “assisted in the clandestine travel to Afghanistan of 10 of the 12 terrorists who carried out the September 11 terrorist attacks.”
Consequently, much of the mainstream news is misreporting that Pence is so desperate to cover Trump that he was just caught lying. No, he wasn’t caught. He is simply tweeting what he truly believes as a Christian supremacist who, like others, want to see a conservative Christian nation. And unlike Trump, who is his own worst enemy, Pence is a more polished and dangerous liar.
For now, Pence is buying his time, waiting patiently for Trump to either be impeached or resign. His war with Iran, and his utter hatred for abortion and gay people-unless they go to conversion therapy, is only a start. He supports making the Patriot Act permanent and doesn’t believe federal law enforcement agencies should have to get a FISA warrant to conduct domestic surveillance.
Above all, and according to “The Intercept,” Pence plans “to use all means necessary to confront and eliminate nuclear threats posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, including use of military force.” This stems from his deep belief that Iran’s “radical Islam” is exactly like that of the “evil empire of the Soviet Union,” and that it must be stopped at any cost.
What that cost is will be determined if or when he becomes President.
Dallas Darling (darling@wn.com)
(Dallas Darling is the author of Politics 501: An A-Z Reading on Conscientious Political Thought and Action, Some Nations Above God: 52 Weekly Reflections On Modern-Day Imperialism, Militarism, And Consumerism in the Context of John’s Apocalyptic Vision, and The Other Side Of Christianity: Reflections on Faith, Politics, Spirituality, History, and Peace. He is a correspondent for www.WN.com. You can read more of Dallas’ writings at www.beverlydarling.com and www.WN.com/dallasdarling.)
(1) Frum, David. Trumpocaracy: The Corruption of the American Republic. New York, New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 2018., p. 182.
(2) Ibid., p. 74.
(3) Hayden, Michael V. The Assault on Intelligence: American National Security in An Age Of Lies. New York, New York: Penguin Press, 2018., p. 91.
(4) Ibid., p. 93.
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