JMM on Dick Cheney:

You start to get the sense that just as Cheney committed his historic goof of launching off into Iraq while forgetting about dealing with al Qaida in Afghanistan and Pakistan he was doing something similar getting all wrapped up in the tough guy porn of torture that he remained ignorant of or just plain ignored the actual nuts and bolts of taking down or disabling terrorist organizations.

As a relatively lazy person who resents doing difficult things, this analysis makes me sympathetic to Cheney. If you gave me the choice of A.) making a sustained, disciplined intellectual investment in understanding the structure, motivation, cultural origins of, and systemic characteristics of terrorist organizations (organizations, remember, based in a culture I knew almost nothing about, which means I’d probably have to read even more books), or B.) pouring water up some guy’s nose … there’s no question what I’d do.

One option makes me feel tough, and the other is BORING and a lot of work.