Vice President Dick Cheney spoke in Washington today at the Conservative Political Action Conference, the 35th annual assembly organized by the American Conservative Union. On the same day that Amnesty International called for an independent criminal investigation of interrogation techniques and only two days after CIA Director Michael Hayden admitted that his agency used waterboarding on three secret detainees, Cheney stated that “The United States is a country that takes human rights seriously… We do not torture,” and continued by saying that “The war on terror is, after all, more than a war of arms and a test of will. It is a war of ideals.”

Appealing to the “the heart and soul of the conservative community,” his label for the audience, Cheney defended the War in Iraq. Nearly five years after the invasion began and without having found any weapons of mass destruction, the Vice President asked, “And would I support those same decisions today? You’re damn right I would.”

These weren’t the only surprising words to come from the CPAC podium today. Mitt Romney took the stage to address the audience as scheduled, and basing his decision on his ideal to unify the country, the former governor of Massachusetts acquiesced, “Because I love America in this time of war, I feel I have to stand aside for our party and our country.” Romney’s choice to drop out of the race leaves only McCain and Huckabee in pursuit of the Republican presidential nomination.