My last post was generally about the ratcheting-up of defensive rhetoric by the President in two recently-delivered speeches (on Veteran's Day and on a stopover in Alaska). Vice President Dick Cheney's speech last night, then, wasn't shocking given the new "strategy" to defend the war in Iraq. The "strategy" seems to be:

• Deny and decry the allegation of misleading America into war.
• Claim that a Congressional investigation cleared the Administration of manipulating intelligence - be sure not to mention that the investigation itself was about whether or not the Administration pressured intelligence analysts and agents to deliver specific content - the current allegations are about whether that intelligence was misused.
• Attack specifically the Democrats who voted for the Iraq war authorization.

Now that that recap is out of the way, I caught something a bit curious in Cheney's remarks at the Frontiers of Freedom Institute 2005 Ronald Reagan Gala last night. Read on.