June 26, 2004

I Said It & I'm Glad

It was widely reported that the Vice President had a heated exchange on the Senate floor with Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, which ended with Mr. Cheney telling Mr. Leahy to "f- - - off" or "go f- - - yourself." For a minute there, William found himself looking at the Old Veep with a new affection. Although Sen. Leahy seems like an unlikely target for such language, this good old-fashioned Anglo-Saxon terminology is the first pronouncement from our Vice President in recent memory that was heartfelt, understandable, and made any sense at all. Remember, this is the same Dick Cheney who continued to insist we would find WMD in Iraq long after he should have known better.

The Vice President made his triumphant exit from the Senate Chamber after his exchange with Sen. Leahy, no doubt on his way to an anger management class.

While william initially found Vice President Cheney's senatorial outburst of profanity amusing, the Right Honorable Veep soon appeared on one of the news channels sounding anything but contrite or chagrined. Mr. Cheney, (following a long-standing tradition in the Bush administration), flatly refused to acknowledge error, and instead vigorously defended his childish outburst proclaiming that he "felt better" after his misbehavior, and was only uttering sentiments shared by many of his colleagues. One has little doubt that at least on those two points he showed some real sincerity.

Having gone down to the sea in ships with sailors for twenty years, there is no form of profanity that would likely surprise or offend William. Indeed, the image of the Vice President using seventh grade locker room language on the floor of the usually pompous US Senate is kind of endearing. What gives one pause is the realization that the very same Vice President is a heart beat away from having his finger on the nuclear trigger. This is the same Dick Cheney who on September 11, 2001, twice ordered the shoot-down of US commercial airliners at a time when NORAD was being told that one of the flights that had already crashed into the World Trade Center was still airborne and headed for Washington, DC. This Nation deserves a cooler head in control of a very itchy trigger finger.

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