Modified Limited Hang-Out on Cheney's Murder Inc.

David Kurtz makes an interesting observation regarding the Cheney assassination ring:

"So regardless of how you might feel about targeted assassinations, it's not at all clear why this particular program would be so radioactive -- compared to what the U.S. was, and still is, doing more or less openly -- that (1) Cheney would demand the CIA not brief Congress about it for eight years; (2) Panetta would cancel it immediately upon learning of it; and (3) Democrats would howl quite so loudly when finally informed.

Or to think about it another way, put yourself in the seat of a Democrat on one of the intel committees after 9/11. If you had any doubt about whether the intel agencies were targeting al Qaeda leaders, wouldn't you have demanded that they show you proof they were? And if you didn't have any doubt that they were, why are you complaining now about not being briefed?"

David is talking about this latest piece of information:

"WASHINGTON — Since 2001, the Central Intelligence Agency has developed plans to dispatch small teams overseas to kill senior Qaeda terrorists, according to current and former government officials.

The plans remained vague and were never carried out, the officials said, and Leon E. Panetta, the C.I.A. director, canceled the program last month."

So you have a program that was never activated being canceled? Interesting. We now also know that Dick Cheney told the agency to withhold information relating to this program from Congress - remember, a program that was never activated.

I noted yesterday that when a member of the Cheney clan points to an article it is very likely that they planted the story for the article (without the journalist being aware of it) to begin with. Why? Because they have done it before. The name Judith Miller ring a bell?

(More after the flip)

Limited Hang-Out

A limited hang-out is a form of misdirection usually relating to intel activities. The process involves admitting guilt for a smaller, less significant action/activity/crime/etc., thereby diverting attention away from the larger action/activity/crime/etc.

To help clarify this, I will provide an example.

A man gets arrested at customs for being in possession of a gun, which was being transported illegally. The customs agents, however, miss the man's second bag which contains a good deal of cocaine. That second bag is picked up by the man's associate without incident.

When questioned by authorities, the man could claim to not know how the gun got into his bag or simply not answer questions. Instead, the man quickly admits that the gun is his and that he was indeed transporting it illegally. By doing this, the man is leading the investigators to focus only on him.

Modified Limited Hang-Out

Is a similar type of deception or partial deception, but slightly different. Here is how the San Francisco Chronicle describes a modified limited hang-out:

"That was the game plan; that was the playbook. The White House would admit to only those things that were already known; it would give ground with great reluctance and retrench rapidly; it would above all things protect the guy at the top from any whisper of scandal."

I would go a step further to something I call it intelligence laundry. Here is an example of a modified limited hang-out - or intel laundry:

A former Vice President (really President) - we will call him Mr. Smith - gets wind that a reporter will soon be coming out with a book in which it is alleged that Smith ran a death squad, which operated in several countries, including our own. Smith knows that he will have to admit to some of this, because the reporter has managed to get some incriminating information. Smith decides that he will get ahead of this story by controlling it. Smith's version will be that he had initiated a program to assassinate ONLY the really bad guys plotting to kill us. But, he decided against activating the program because it was illegal and he was having second thoughts. In Smith's version of the story, it will be admitted that Smith did in fact mislead Congress and ordered others to do so, but ONLY because the program was never activated.

Smith will then have a few loyal pals still active in government launder this version of events by planting the story in the press. Smith won't comment for the story, but Smith's daughter will do the TV rounds and point to the article(s) and say see, it never operated and if it had it would have only gone after the really evil guys who tried to blow up America.

That is the reason the current version of Cheney's Murder Inc., makes no sense. Because it is not true.