Shooter’s Media Kit: It’s as American as Apple Pie

Photo source: NYT 041907

NBC News announced yesterday that it received a package mailed by the Virginia Tech shooter, who was identified Tuesday as Cho Seung-Hu. The package included a DVD with video clips, still photos, and a rambling written texts expressing Cho’s anger and alienation. All news reports yesterday added that the network promptly turned the materials over to the FBI, but none reported the obvious -- NBC made copies first and broadcast excerpts last night on the evening news. These images spread immediately around the world, memes feeding a global morbid fascination. The images are reproduced everywhere this morning, along with self-reflexive media hand-wringing about whether it is appropriate to look and spread the memes. I am doing just that now in publishing and commenting on this image of Cho grabbed from the New York Times. It is destined to become an iconic American image. It will be impossible to avoid, deny, suppress, or forget.

“You have vandalized my heart, raped my soul and torched my conscience,” the gunman said in one video clip. “Thanks to you, I die like Jesus Christ to inspire generations of the weak and the defenseless people.”

NBC News called Cho’s package a “multi-media manifesto.” No news organization called it for what it really is: a media kit. Cho mailed it between the times of the first and second shooting sprees on Monday. He clearly prepared it in advance. And he scored the kind of sweeping media coup that most PR guys only dream of. It’s the 21^st-century version of the American Dream.

Only POTUS and Stephen Spielberg consistently hit that kind of grand slam. Remember the September 2002 roll-out for the Iraq War? “We don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.” Now that was a media kit.

Tell It Like It Is

TRex at Firedoglake makes a case for soft-pedaling on Congress’s accountability zeal (“playing politics” is what Tony Baloney Snow calls it) in deference to bigger pay-offs from future pay-backs:

… let's say President John Edwards has just been sworn in and he decides it's time for a little payback. He picks up the phone and calls his people at the NSA and says, "I need to see all of Bill Donohue's cell-phone records, taxes, credit card transactions, and checking account records for the last ten years. Oh, and freeze his assets. I think he may be involved in terrorist activity."

See, if you throw in the T-word, all those provisions of the Patriot Act come into play. No need to go to a judge. No need for a subpoena. That stuff's for sissies. Let's just get his records, find the data we need (or not!), change his status to "Enemy Combatant", and off he goes to our secret interrogation facilities in Romania. Ta-daaaaaaah!

"But please!" Donohue would beg, "Let me speak to an attorney! Let me at least know what charges are being brought against me!"

Nope. Too bad, so sad, but all that went out the window when the Bush administration gutted habeas corpus.

Or say that President Hillary Clinton is tired of Tom DeLay's lip. So she decides to have his money-laundering trial moved to a military tribunal at the Detention Facility at Guantanamo Bay. No jury, no cameras, no witnesses, and the tribunal won't kick off until, oh, 2012, or whenever we get around to it. It would be perfect.

See? Life with a Democrat Unitary Executive could be great! President Kucinich could rule by decree just like Chimpy and Hugo Chavez! He could have Bush and Cheney imprisoned in an undisclosed location indefinitely! And wouldn't that be fun?

So, please, you Dirty Fucking Hippies, lay off on the challenges to Bush's god-like powers of the Imperial Presidency. He's only going to be around for a few more months, and then once he's gone, we'll be in charge. And what use will due process, checks and balances, and the Constitution be to us then?

Exactly. Those things will just be impediments to our unfettered ability to reward our friends and torment our enemies.

And we can't have that, now can we?

After Four Years, War Still Is Not The Answer

Mathew Brady . "Federal Dead on the Field of Battle of First Day, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania" 1863

This is the CIA Agent Exposed by Bush's Hacks

Photo souce: NYT 031607

Valerie Plame Wilson spoke publicly yesterday for the first time since her covert identity as a CIA agent was exposed by White House hacks in July 2003. She testified before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. She’s said to be writing a book about her outing. If she didn’t have a movie deal when she woke up yesterday, she does now

The committee’s web site has video of the complete hearing. I’m still looking for the Congressional Record transcript.

Yesterday’s NYT coverage played the story pretty straight. NPR had the juicy sound bites and whirr of paparazzi cameras. YouTube has video clips from the hearing, including Plame’s opening statement. Firedoglake live-blogged it extensively;see Enter “The Wife” for starters . And Dana Milbank wrote the movie review.

Milbank noted that Plame’s platinum blonde hair revealed dark roots, always a telling detail in Washington politics. He built a riff around the number of times “passionately” popped out in the testimony. Sure, passion never hurt a movie deal, and Plame milked the media moment for everything it was worth. To do anything else would be Un-American.

NPR’s Andrea Seabrook was more charitable this morning. She understood that a big part of Valerie Plame’s allure stems from simple curiosity, finally, just to see her. She stayed out of the media spotlight for four years, letting her husband Joe Wilson do the talk shows. She famously appeared on a Vanity Fair cover wearing Jackie O sunglasses; otherwise, the public only got glimpses of her. The exaggeration-prone Washington gossip mill rumored that the elusive spy was “drop dead gorgeous,” Seabrook said. “This time the gossip mill got it right.”

Valerie Plame out-Oli-ied Oliver North in terms of stealing the show. All he had was a square jaw and Marine Corps dress blue. She’s a mix of 007 + blond bombshell.

It’s well-known that George Bush, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and their fellow-travelers would start a war or sell their grandmothers for political gain. In the Plame case, they exposed a CIA agent then tried to cover it up. In retrospect, they should have sacrificed grandma.

Valerie Plame Footnotes

Vanity Fair cover/source: Google cache

Valerie Plame - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia My guess is this is a highly contested, highly fungible page in the Wiki wars. The documentation and links (as of today) are extensive.
to Valerie_Plame CIA Scooter_Libby Bush politics Iraq 2dk_prep z07_3

Firedoglake - Firedoglake weblog » CIA Leak Case
FDL's blog coverage flows relentlessly like the Mighty Mississippi.
to Valerie_Plame CIA Scooter_Libby Bush politics 2dk_prep z07_3

What I Didn't Find in Africa - Joseph Wilson - NYT - 070603
The op-ed that started the Bush administration's retaliation against Wilson and his wife, a CIA agent outed by Cheney, Rove, Libby, et al.
to Bush politics cheney Iraq war_drums NYT 2dk_prep Valerie_Plame CIA

Mission To Niger - Robert Novak - Washington Post - 071403
The infamous newspaper column that exposed Valerie Plame's identity. Why wasn't Novak thrown in the slammer like Judith Miller?
to Valerie_Plame CIA Iraq Scooter_Libby Bush politics WaPo 2dk_prep z07_3

Vanity Fair's profile on Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame
Bootleg text from Jim Gilliam's blog - 011704.
to Valerie_Plame CIA 2dk_prep z07_3 ... saved by 1 other person ... just posted

Richard Armitage’s Role in Plame Case - Newsweek 082706
"Armitage's central role as the primary source on Plame is detailed for the first time in "Hubris," which recounts the leak case and the inside battles at the CIA and White House in the run-up to the war. The disclosures about Armitage, gleaned from inter
to politics media security Iraq Valerie_Plame Scooter_Libby CIA 2dk_prep z06_08

Exhibit 402: Dick Cheney on Media-Mongering

Government Exhibit 402 is a clipping of Joseph Wilson's New York Times op-ed piece, published July 6, 2003. Wilson's article challenges the administration's public characterization of intelligence about alleged Iraqi attempts to buy uranium in Africa. The clipping shows Vice President Cheney's handwritten notes: "Have they done this sort of thing before? Send an Amb. to answer a question? Do we ordinarily send people out pro bono to work for us? Or did his wife send him on a junket?" Wilson's wife is Valerie Plame, who worked for the CIA.

Download PDF: Exhibit 402: Cheney's Notes on Wilson's Op-Ed Article

Source: NPR/National Security Archive

Exhibit 412: Scooter Libby on Media-Mongering

Government Exhibit 412 is a printout of Maureen Dowd's New York Times column, National House of Waffles, published on July 13, 2003. Large sections have been blacked out by the prosecution. Tom Blanton of the National Security Archive at George Washington University says that's not for national security reasons, but to focus the jury's attention on the section at the bottom. The handwritten notes on the document are from Libby. He writes, "not us" and "not to us" in response to suggestions that the CIA had debunked the evidence suggesting Iraq was trying to obtain yellowcake uranium in Africa.

Download PDF: Exhibit 412: Libby's Notes on Maureen Dowd Column

Source: NPR/National Security Archive

Scooter Is Guilty Encore 2: Material Evidence

Tom Blanton, executive director of the National Security Archive at George Washington University, did an interview on NPR yesterday. He discussed material evidence from the Scooter Libby trial that has been collected for the archive, hand-written notes and annotated news clippings that reveal something of the Bush administration’s hard-ball approach to managing the media. The NPR web page includes links to PDF downloads of some of the documents discussed and is the source of the images reproduced in the following posts

According to NPR, “A number of internal government documents were entered into evidence during Libby's trial that depict officials, including the vice president, directly engaged in shaping the media's coverage of the Bush administration and its drive to paint Iraq as a nuclear threat. [The documents] center around the response to President Bush's assertion in his 2003 State of the Union address to Congress that Iraq was actively seeking illicit purchases of refined uranium in Africa to supply a nuclear weapons program.”

Bush is proud of the fact that he doesn’t read newspapers – he reads people. The documents demonstrate how those people do the reading for him.

Scooter Is Guilty Encore: Free Fall for the Fall Guy

Here is Dana Milbank’s account of yesterday’s post-verdict scene:

The cloud over the White House grew darker a few minutes later, when juror Denis Collins, standing in front of the same microphone, spoke of the "tremendous amount of sympathy" jurors had for the man they convicted. "It was said a number of times, 'What are we doing with this guy here? Where's Rove, where's -- you know, where are these other guys?' " Collins said. "We're not saying that we didn't think Mr. Libby was guilty of the things we found him guilty of, but that it seemed like he was . . . the fall guy."

As a political matter, Libby's trial had long ago ceased to be about one man's guilt or innocence. Witnesses made it plain that at least three other administration officials had joined Libby in leaking the identity of undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame, including top Bush strategist Karl Rove and former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer (whom jurors dubbed "Slick Willie"). Libby's conviction, and Collins's "fall guy" remark, only increased the determination of congressional Democrats to spread the blame throughout the White House.

Howard Kurtz’s column muses on how the Libby trial tarnished the Fourth Estate:

I know the details of this case have gotten mind-numbing and most of America isn't following it. But I think the essentials are quite clear: Dick Cheney's top aide lied about a campaign to manipulate the media on the administration's since-discredited prewar intelligence about Iraq. Like so much in our politics these days, it comes back to the war.

The parade of high-profile Washington journalists who took the stand in the Lewis "Scooter" Libby perjury case were not on trial. But few would dispute that the proceedings, which ended with Libby's conviction on four of five counts yesterday, gave their profession a black eye.

When Vice President Cheney's chief of staff and other top administration officials wanted to neutralize a critic by disclosing his wife's role at the CIA, they turned to some of the capital's most prominent chroniclers, who -- under longstanding local custom -- promised the leakers anonymity.

Scooter Is Guilty (And He’s Not the Only One)

Here’s the NYT on the verdicrt:

“The jury rejected Mr. Libby’s claims of memory lapses as it convicted him of obstruction of justice, giving false statements to the F.B.I. and perjuring himself, charges embodied in four of the five counts of the indictment… Mr. Libby appeared composed as the verdict was read. He was then taken to be photographed and fingerprinted as a convicted felon.”

Here’s Firedoglake on the verdict:

“Libby was stoic and Mrs. Libby daubed her eyes as the verdict was read. Nobody on the prosecution showed much emotion but Zeidenberg held his head in his hands. Libby himself was seated between Wells and Jeffress. He did not move.

“Afterwards Mrs. Libby came up and hugged Jeffress profusely, then Wells, saying "love you, love you" with much emotion. Then all the rest of the defense team. She didn't hug Scooter however, or hold his hand, or even make eye contact.”

Here’s the NYT on Firedoglake:

Even the Web-savvy may ask, Fire dog what? A collective of liberal bloggers, fueled by online donations and a fanatical devotion to the intricacies of the Libby case, Firedoglake has offered intensive trial coverage, using some six contributors in rotation. They include a former prosecutor, a current defense lawyer, a Ph.D. business consultant and a movie producer, all of whom lodge at a Washington apartment rented for the duration of the trial.

All day long during the trial, one Firedoglake blogger is on duty to beam to the Web from the courthouse media room a rough, real-time transcript of the testimony. With no audio or video feed permitted, the Firedoglake “live blog” has offered the fullest, fastest public report available. Many mainstream journalists use it to check on the trial.

But the bloggers’ fun is almost over.

Scooter Libby photo credit: Larry Downing/Reuters

Keeping Up with the White House Book Club

First it was Camus. The NYT reported last August that President Bush was reading The Stranger on his month-long vacation at the ranch. Hmmm, wouldn’t it be better as a beach novel? It’s plausible, if far-fetched, to think he actually read it for an afternoon’s relaxation. As millions of college students know, it’s a mercifully thin book, almost a quick read. I figured the President’s favorite passage was the action climax where Meursaul guns down the Arab on the rocks. If he read Dick Cheney’s loaner copy, he might have gone right to the dog-eared page, skipping all the jail cell meditation about the meaning of existence.

Then it was A Savage War of Peace, the classic account of the French debacle in Algeria. In a 60 Minutes interview in January, the President claimed to be reading this tome, along with half the colonels in the Pentagon. Judging from the unremitting Bush debacle in Iraq, that claim sounds a little like jumping the shark. After that primetime plug, author Alistair Horne gave crusty interviews to Chris Lydon on Open Source and Maureen Dowd in the NYT (sorry, this one is behind the pay wall; Smirking Chimp has a bootleg).

Lydon asked what the historian’s advice would be for Tony Blair. “I don’t want to be excessively rude about my Prime Minister,” the octogenarian answered, “but I’d say he’s a man of small stature who is impressed by important people and likes going to the White House. His input, it seems to me, is absolutely nil, and he’s got nothing back.”

Dowd asked Horne what the president could learn from his book. ''The depressing problem of getting entangled in the Muslim world,'' he replied. ''Algeria was a thoroughly bloodthirsty war that ended horribly and cost the lives of about 20,000 Frenchmen and a million Algerians. There was a terrible civil war. De Gaulle ended up giving literally everything away and left without his pants.''

If Bush is reading Dick Cheney’s or Karl Rove’s loaner copy, Savage War’s insights about torture have probably been redacted with a black highlighter pen. Let’s hope he didn’t go straight to the heavily dog-eared chapter about the French Army’s plan to invade Paris from Algeria, the threatened right-wing coup that returned Charles de Gaulle to power in 1958. Reading history is a good thing, Mr. President, but don’t get any more wing-nut ideas about the grandeur of presidential power.

Now the White House Book Club is buzzing about King Leopold’s Ghost, a history of Belgium’s colonial misdeeds in the Congo. This week’s On the Media features an interview with author Adam Hochschild, who says Belgian King Leopold was a media spin-meister of “Karl Rovian proportions.” Haven’t read that one yet. I’ll never catch up.

Military Justice, or the Power of Kings before the Magna Carta?

MEDIA NOTES: Navy Lawyer Discusses Hamdan, Guantanamo NPR Talk of the Nation 021507

Before this one slips away, I need to document the interview with Navy lawyer Charles Swift on Talk of the Nation. Swift was the JAG (Judge Advocate General) appointed to defend Salim Ahmed Hamdan, one of the detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay. The Hamdan case became a legal limbo compared with Alice in Wonderland, Kafka, and Catch-22 before it ended up in the U.S. Supreme Court. Ultimately, the Court ruled that the President’s suspension of the writ of habeas corpus -- based on a claim that military justice was whatever the Commander in Chief said it was at the time -- was unconstitutional.

“That’s the power of kings before the Magna Carta,” Swift said on NPR. “I believe the Supreme Court had never cognizanced the Commander in Chief with that kind of power.”

The passion of Swift’s Constitutional arguments impressed me deeply. Listen to his defense of the rule of law as the foundation of American values (at 24:00-26:40 in the NPR stream): “If we’re going to have a trial where the outcome is pre-ordained, and we can’t trust the federal courts to have a fair trial, and we can’t trust a federally-appointed judge to protect the United States’ interests and national security, do we still have our values? What happened?”

Dead Generals Need TV Pundit Gigs, Too

Gen. George Patton explains how he’d use global warming to clean up the military quagmire in the Middle East.

If that’s too much blunt speech (no pun intended), check out the Gen.’s tap-dancing in this music video: General Patton vs. X-ecutioners. “Get up, punk, and shut your can.”

Hail to the Bully in Chief

In the 24/7 news cycle, blogging about a Presidential news conference two days after the fact feels a little anachronistic, like striking flint to kindle flames to send smoke signals. When my son called me Wednesday morning to let me know the networks had gone live to the White House, I had only one sinking thought. The cruise missiles are inbound to Tehran. So the real news from the news conference was the fact that missiles hadn’t been launched… yet.

What sticks in my mind and gut isn’t the substance (what substance?) but the style of this spectacle. I keep hearing the President’s petulant, jeering tone as he taunted the White House press corps. The reporters showed some mettle, pressing Bush to explain why we should believe his intelligence about Iran after we were misled by his intelligence on Iraq. Bush deflected those questions, pushing back by singling out reporters for ridicule… while the cameras rolled. He sounded like an arrogant, condescending bully.

Is this anyway for the reputed leader of the free world to talk to fellow citizens? I felt ashamed.

I think that’s why the hectoring tone stayed with me. I need to purge it somehow, and that’s what blogs are for. If you didn’t hear it live, and you don’t have the stomach to listen to all 58 minutes of this On Point stream, just think back to some dreadful meeting in your career when you could have sold your grandmother for one executive “atta boy”. The boss from hell sets about to intimidate everyone sitting around the table by picking on one poor schnook. The boss deploys Weapons of Self-Esteem Destruction (WSEDs). Everyone else studies his/her shoelaces and prays not to be picked next. That’s what the President’s news conference sounded like.

Howard Kurtz suggested that Bush had felt upstaged by House Democrats and needed a little face time with the media. It worked. Most news outlets played it straight and gave Bush the tough-guy sound bites he wanted. The only account I read that captured the oily feel of the President’s performance came from Dana Milbank.

“Bush has always supported a faith-based initiative, but his recitation of beliefs in the East Room yesterday -- he listed no fewer than 18 principles he holds to be true -- sounded less like a question-and-answer session than a reading of the Nicene Creed,” Milbank wrote. “The only thing the president did not believe in was answering the questions he was asked.”

Here’s how Milbank reported one of the more surreal exchanges:

Late in the hour-long session, he turned to White House reporter Mike Allen, who had just started his sixth job in a decade, joining a Capitol Hill newspaper and Web site.

"Michael, who do you work for?" Bush needled.

"Mr. President, I work for Politico.com," Allen reported.

"Pardon me? Politico.com?"

"Yes, sir -- today," Allen quipped.

"You want a moment to explain to the American people exactly what -- "

Allen did not. "Thank you for the question," he demurred.

"Quit being so evasive," Bush said.

I was embarrassed for Mike Allen, though “Thanks for the question” was a game response that got a laugh. Politico.com presents a testimonial video clip of the exchange. Bush grinned, too, but seemed annoyed when his dominance was undermined for a moment.

The scene depicts what I’m sure is deliberate stagecraft. Bush knew Allen’s name was Mike but he said “Michael” like he was scolding a little boy caught with his pants down. He used every reporter’s first name like he was best buds with each of them – like he knew their kids, their extra-marital affairs, their IRS audits. Someone like Karl Rove or Tony “Baloney” Snow probably does have files on all that stuff. But Bush doesn’t know their names until it flashes in front of him on a teleprompter.

One more beef and I’ll let it go. I’ll try.

Bush announced sententiously that he would not comment on the ’08 Presidential campaign. "I will resist all temptation to become the Pundit in Chief." Then he chuckled at his own bon mot. He likes the (Fill in the Blank)-in-Chief moniker so much it’s becoming a fetish. Before the State of the Union Address his sycophantic speechwriters called him the Editor in Chief. Discussing the No Child Left Behind Act, he calls himself Educator in Chief. Every millionaire who ever wrote him a check calls him Fundraiser in Chief. Those three regrettable words in the Constitution (“Commander in Chief”) now lend legitimacy to a cult of personality. Listening to its display on Wednesday, I’d say it isn’t a healthy personality. Count how many times the President said “I” instead of “we.” Then add one more honorific title to his swelling bubble at the top of the organization chart. Narcissist in Chief.

Everyone Needs An Uncle Bucky

Who knew? Just when you figured Bush fatigue pointed to the dynasty’s demise, like the Bourbons and Hohenzollerns before them, it turns out W. has an Uncle Bucky. That explains everything.

The L.A. Times (020907) reports:

"President Bush's uncle William H.T. 'Bucky' Bush was among directors of a defense contractor who together reaped $6 million from what federal regulators say was an illegal five-year scheme by two company executives to manipulate the timing of stock option grants, court documents show. "The youngest brother of former President George H.W. Bush, he is the second Bush family member whose name has surfaced in stock options scandals this month."

Family-Value Bonus: W. also has a youngest brother, Marvin, who was named as a defendant in a civil suit charging that he made $2.2 million on back-dated stock options.

RMDs (Roadside Marketing Devices): Don’t Be Scared – Be Scared

Two stories about threatening roadside devices in today’s NYT deserve a little juxtaposition. Michael R. Gordon reports on Bush administration leaks (sounds like a war-drum marketing campaign to me) about a sophisticated type of roadside bomb used by Shiite militia in Iraq. “Mounting evidence” points to Iran as the source. Richard Siklos reports that the president of the Cartoon Network, a division of the Turner Broadcasting System, has resigned over the panic created by roadside electronic devices in Boston. It’s hard to know when to be scared. It’s hard to keep the bad guys straight without a scorecard. It’s even harder to know who’s marketing what. Maybe we need a preemptive war on terror aimed at electronics. Or roads.

The confluence of these stories reminds me of a sound bite about war and sacrifice that keeps popping up in the media like a marketing slogan: “The Army goes to Baghdad. America goes to Wal-Mart.”

UPDATE 021107: First we worried about WMDs (weapons of mass destruction). Then it was IEDs (improvised explosive devices). Now there’s this new thing, the EFP (explosively formed). Let’s call the new new thing RMD (roadside marketing device).

UPDATE 021707: Columbia Journalism Review ‘s Michael Massing criticizes and Michael R. Gordon defends the Feb. 10 NYT story in the this week’s On the Media.

A Security Euphemism for the Republic of Fear

It’s no secret that the angst about national security is a red herring wafted to cover up a multitude of sins. It’s as old as the Republic itself. Perhaps the coinage should bear the motto “Republic of Fear.”

It’s reasonable to expect fear-mongering from the President, the Vice President, the ruling party. But is it really a legitimate reason for limiting access to toilets on a commercial jetliner? I’m not talking about the 40-mile no-pee-on-the-plane zone around Washington, D.C. That might be reasonable, too.

I heard this yesterday on a Northwest flight from Detroit to Toronto. Once the plane reached cruising altitude and passengers were free to unfasten seatbelts and use facilities, the flight attendant announced diplomatically, “To assure security by limiting movement in the forward cabin, passengers are reminded that the lavatory at the front of the plane is reserved for first-class passengers.”

It’s one more example of what Bruce Schneier calls security theater. But hey, what’s wrong with a little class privilege when it comes to keeping America safe?

Boston Bomb Threat

So what was so scary, anyway? Thanks to Kingday (on flickr) for visualizing it.

Dick Cheney Confidential

MEDIA NOTES: Dick Cheney Confidential LeShow 012807

One of the funniest bits on LeShow veils the transparency of Vice Presidential leadership in the guise of hard-boiled Hollywood detective talk ala James Ellroy’s L.A. Confidential. Satirist Harry Shearer voices the Veep in sinister overtones echoing from the bottom of a bomb shelter (that “secure undisclosed location”), and the hack-zine-writer metaphors stretch tawdry out into ludicrous.

The January 28 edition of Dick Cheney Confidential recaps an eventful week when the Veep was assailed by both John McCain (who said W. listens too much to D.C.) and Wolf Blitzer (who asked D.C. a family-unfriendly question about his daughter). Those knee-jerk liberals better watch out or their kneecaps might get the VP ball-peen hammer treatment! You really should listen to the whole bit (this launches a RealPlayer stream from KCRW). Here are two nuggets:

JOHN McCAIN to D.C.: “Maybe you should make room in your regimen of medications for a small dose of political realism. You’re so radioactive right about now I wouldn’t be surprised if the Iranians tried to weaponize you.”

and

D.C. to WOLF BLITZER: “One thing our friend Mr. Blitzer can count on, next time I have a hunting accident, he’s not going to get the exclusive interview on it.”

Which gives me an opportunity to point you to the tableau of Dick Cheney’s hunting accident shown above. It was created by Minifig, a Lego artist in London who presents his/her oeuvre on Flickr. Brilliant, Minifig!