Liz Cheney: Dad's Torture Battle Like Gore's Cause

Perhaps all Dick Cheney has to do to convince America that waterboarding is okay is find a film crew to tape his power point presentations.    

Dick Cheney's daughter Liz took to the airwaves today to defend her dad's right to speak out in favor of "enhanced interrogations" for suspected terrorists. Her argument: no one told former Vice President Al Gore to shut up when he launched a crusade to save the planet.

During her appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Cheney reportedly asked the show's producer if she could stick around to debate Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson, whose column today called the former VP a "crazy old coot" who should "go back to Wyoming."

That's when Cheney pointed out her inconvenient truth.

"It seems like you want him to shut up because you disagree with what he’s saying," Cheney told Robinson. "I haven’t seen similar columns from you or frankly anybody else saying things like 'Al Gore should go back to Tennessee.'"

Since losing a run for the presidency in 2000, Gore has staked his legacy on combating global climate change by calling for individuals and governments to cut their carbon footprints.

"An Inconvenient Truth," a documentary of Gore's crusade -- which essentially follows him as he delivers power point presentations on the subject -- has been credited with causing a tipping point in making climate change a global priority.

Gore won an Oscar for the film in 2007 and was later awarded a Nobel Prize.

Meanwhile, former Vice President Cheney has made news since leaving office for saying on Sunday talk shows that President Obama's national security policies have made America less safe. Cheney has criticized Obama's decision to release some -- but not all -- memos that the Bush administration relied on to justify waterboarding and other harsh interrogations methods.

"I don't think we should just roll over when the new administration ... accuses us of committing torture, which we did not, or somehow violating the law, which we did not," Cheney told Fox News. "I think you need to stand up and respond to that, and that's what I've done."

On Tuesday, Liz Cheney eventually prompted Robinson to give some ground. 

"I don't think [Cheney] should shut up," Robinson said.

Robinson said the government should release all relevant so-called "torture" memos and an inspector general's report that examined the CIA's enhanced interrogation program.

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