United States of Amnesia? Cheney's DC Madam Problem

How soon we forget the blockbuster ABC News scoop that was - and then wasn't - much bigger and more explosive than Governor Spitzer's, because it alleged Dick Cheney was a client.

In fact, when the news broke, Bush's "AIDS Czar" Randall Tobias, a former Eli Lilly top exec, resigned in shame. He should have stalled a bit like Louisiana Senator David Vitter did - the story was going to be killed, according to Wayne Madsen who named the ABC employee that pulled the plug after White House pressure.

Madsen expanded on the story after ABC dropped it, to allege that convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff was a client, as well as a lawyer in Rudy Giuliani's firm.

Senator Vitter has admitted and apologized for his part in he scandal, but is still in office, likely to be subpoenaed in the Spring 2008 trial of Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey.

Perhaps more sinister than the prostitution allegations are the questions of complicity in a media wash-out by ABC, whose in-house staff was originally given call records directly by Madam Palfrey.

Also according to Madsen, the probe of the DC Madam reveals much more troubling questions, including the unsolved murder of a US attorney whose boss was later fired in Bush's DOJ purge, during investigation of the DC Madam case.