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Jesse Ventura wades into Cheney-Powell rumble
‘Give me a water board, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I’ll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders,’ says the former wrestler
Former pro-wrestler, actor and Minnesota governor Jesse 'The Body' Ventura has waded into the increasingly fractious civil war between moderates and the hard Right in the US Republican party with a scathing verbal body slam on ex-vice-president Dick Cheney.
It seems Ventura (pictured in the 1987 film Predator), who was the independent governor of Minnesota from 1999 to 2003, took exception to Cheney's criticism of fellow Republican Colin Powell in an interview on CBS on Sunday night. Cheney was defending the rabble-rousing talk-show host Rush Limbaugh after Colin Powell had earlier said Republicans ought to move to the centre, and suggested that Limbaugh diminishes the party with his divisive tirades.
"If I had to choose in terms of being a Republican, I would go with Rush Limbaugh, I think," Cheney said on Face the Nation. He continued, "I think, my take on it was Colin had already left the party. I didn't know he was still a Republican," before noting Powell had backed Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election.
‘Here’s a guy who got five deferments from Vietnam. Clearly, he’s a coward’
Ventura, who as an ex-Navy SEAL claims to have undergone the controversial torture procedure known as 'waterboarding' as part of his training, slapped down the "coward" Cheney for criticising a "war hero" like Powell and advocating the use of torture on suspected terrorists.
"I don't have a lot of respect for Dick Cheney," Ventura, told Larry King on CNN. "Here's a guy who got five deferments from the Vietnam War. Clearly, he's a coward... And now he is a chicken hawk. Now he is this big tough guy who wants this hardcore policy. And he's the guy that sanctioned all this torture by calling it enhanced interrogation.
"You look at Dick Cheney who ran and hid [from the Vietnam war draft]," Ventura said. "I have no respect for Dick Cheney. I have tremendous respect for General Powell."
Waterboarding, Ventura said, "is torture... It's drowning... I'll put it to you this way, you give me a water board, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I'll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders".
Last year at a rally for then Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, Ventura implied a possible future run at the US presidency when he told the audience: "If America proves itself worthy, in 2012 we'll give them a race they'll never forget!" Waterboarding Cheney could prove a real vote-winner. ·
