{"id":9761,"date":"2007-01-29T11:13:50","date_gmt":"2007-01-29T16:13:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/9761.html"},"modified":"2007-01-29T11:13:50","modified_gmt":"2007-01-29T16:13:50","slug":"im-vice-president-and-theyre-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/im-vice-president-and-theyre-not\/","title":{"rendered":"‘I’m vice president and they’re not’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the weekend, Maureen Dowd unloaded on Dick Cheney. “Delusional doesn’t begin to capture the profound, transcendental one-flew-over daftness of the man,” Dowd said<\/a>. “Has anyone in the history of the United States ever been so singularly wrong and misguided about such phenomenally important events and continued to insist he’s right in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary?” She went on to lament Cheney’s “exquisite kind of lunacy.”<\/p>\n

And, in an apparent effort to prove Dowd’s point, the Vice President sat down for a lengthy chat with Newsweek<\/a>. Let’s take a look at some of the highlights.<\/p>\n

Newsweek noted that support for the president’s escalation policy has been minimal from Republicans on the Hill, and asked Cheney whether he worried that “the party last lost the stomach for the fight.” The VP responded:<\/p>\n

“My sense of it is that what’s happened here now over the last few weeks is that the president has shored up his position with the speech he made a couple of weeks ago, specifically on Iraq. And I think the speech, frankly Tuesday night, the State of the Union address was one of his best. I think there’s been a very positive reaction of people who saw the speech. And I think to some extent that’s helped shore us up inside the party on the Hill.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That must be some bubble Cheney’s living in. Support for the president, the war, and the administration’s strategy in Iraq have all fallen<\/a> since Bush’s high-profile national addresses on the subject. “Shored up his position”? Unless the goal was to undermine support for the president and the war, Cheney has everything backwards. (And if I only had a nickel for every time I’ve had thought over the last six years….)
\n
\nNewsweek went on to note that Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) has been highly critical of the administration’s handling of the war. When Cheney dodged the question, Newsweek asked if the VP believed Hagel was “not helpful to the cause.” Cheney said:<\/p>\n

“Let’s say I believe firmly in Ronald Reagan’s 11th commandment: Thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow Republican. But it’s very hard sometimes to adhere to that where Chuck Hagel is involved.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It beats offering a substantive response to Hagel’s concerns, doesn’t it? In effect, Cheney said, “I could say a bunch of mean things, but I won’t because Hagel’s a Republican.” Here’s a wacky idea: how about responding to Hagel’s specific concerns? If Hagel’s wrong, why not explain why?<\/p>\n

Asked about the status of the war, on the ground in Iraq, Cheney said:<\/p>\n

“I think we have made significant progress.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There’s that line again; Cheney keeps using it<\/a>. Two weeks ago, Bush personally described recent events as a “slow failure,” and yet there’s the Vice President, bragging about the “significant progress.” If Cheney wants to be taken seriously, this isn’t the way to do it.<\/p>\n

Finally, towards the very end of the interview, Newsweek noted reactions to the administration’s Iraq policy from Gerald Ford, Colin Powell, Brent Scowcroft, and others. Newsweek said, “You wouldn’t be human if it didn’t have some reaction.” To which Cheney responded:<\/p>\n

“Well, I’m vice president and they’re not.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Sensible, reassuring maturity from our friend, Dick Cheney. Just what we’ve come to expect from a man of his stature and significance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the weekend, Maureen Dowd unloaded on Dick Cheney. “Delusional doesn’t begin to capture the profound, transcendental one-flew-over daftness of the man,” Dowd said. “Has anyone in the history of the United States ever been so singularly wrong and misguided about such phenomenally important events and continued to insist he’s right in the face of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9761\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}