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Cheney's Gonna Go

Patricia Foster

OpEdNews.Com

Dick Cheney was George Bush's biggest asset back in 2000. People reluctant to vote for Bush overcame their qualms about Bush's inexperience by comforting themselves with Cheney's résumé of governmental service.

Cheney had been secretary of defense in the George H.W. administration and White House chief of staff in the Ford administration. He also served as a U.S. representative from Wyoming .

While Bush's knowledge of foreign policy consisted of being able to order a burrito in fluent Spanish, Cheney had a solid background in foreign policy (albeit, as we now know, some very warped beliefs and ideologies regarding America 's relationship with the rest of the known world).

Cheney's record as a Washington insider soothed the nerves of Republican voters jittery about Bush's less-than-remarkable stints as the governor of Texas .

Being the head honcho of an ultra-successful multinational corporation like Halliburton, Cheney also soothed the corporate community's dithers over Bush's repeated failures as a businessman.

While Dubya might have been the likable dude average Republicans would like to invite over to watch a football game on the tube, Cheney was the brains and experience that gave solace to the GOP hierarchy.

Yes, the Bush-Cheney combo was a win/win (or, more correctly, "a steal/steal") ticket on the 2000 presidential ballot. Dubya was a charming doofus, and Cheney was the no-nonsense brain ready to prop up the doofus when he faltered.

But, oh, how things have changed in 2004. The doofus is still a doofus, but the brain has short-circuited.

Cheney has become a liability to the Republican ticket. His incestuous ties to Halliburton and Halliburton's ability to obtain billion-dollar government contracts, without bothering with that silly requisite of competitive bidding, are sending ripples of unease amongst Republicans. Add to that the repeated claims of Halliburton's overcharging and a more-than-likely investigation into the abuses of their gift-horse contracts in Iraq , and you have the beginnings of GOP nervous breakdowns.

Cheney's love affair with America's energy corporations, and his battle to keep the romance secret from the public's prying eyes, have taken on the distasteful aura of a menage a trois in progress behind the locked door of a fleabag motel room.

Complicate matters further by Cheney's penchant for zealously repeating false assertions justifying the war in Iraq that have already been disproved by numerous Senate, House and presidential commissions, and you have GOP handlers doubling their Thorazine dosages.

Oh, and throw in Cheney telling a U.S. senator to "go forth and fornicate with yourself" (paraphrasing necessary for a family newspaper) and you have the inescapable fact that Cheney has become a ball and chain around the neck of the GOP.

Cheney has to go. If Bush has a snowball's chance in Hades of winning a second term, it won't be with Cheney as vice.

We know the Bush administration is incapable of admitting errors or getting rid of incompetent deadwood among its ranks.

So, here is my prediction, and remember you read it first in The DeLand-Deltona Beacon: In the very near future, Cheney will have more heart problems (not really - just politically necessary medical complications). He will resign as vice, always a man willing to do what's best for his party and the military-industrial complex.

Dubya will, with gobs of feigned regret and nauseating praise for his ailing veep, accept Cheney's resignation and, in a matter of days, offer Sen. John McCain the dubious pleasure of being his running mate on the November ballot.

Now there's a Republican ticket to make Democrats shake in their boots.

We hope, McCain will respectfully decline Dubya's offer. Integrity doesn't dance well with ineptitude.

Whoever is on the ballot with Bush in November, you can bet it won't be Dick Cheney. The Republicans have all the liabilities they can handle at the moment. Nothing is more important to George Two than not following in George One's footsteps.

And nothing is more important to democracy in America than seeing that he does just that.

- Copyright 2004, Patricia J. Foster. All rights reserved. Contact Foster at timucua@webwizzards.com

Patricia J. Foster is an native Miamian transplanted to DeLand,  historically picturesque home of Stetson University and hot bed of former Democrats who mutinied to the Republican party when civil rights legislation drove them bonkers.  Old woman.  Staunch liberal Democrat very active in local politics - much to the chagrin of our mayor and commissioners.  Retired after 25 years in commercial waste hauling business in Miami -owned my own company.  Got into freelance writing op-eds by accident when editors would request pieces after reading my letter-to-editor submissions.  Have been published in Tallahassee Democrat, Ft.-Laud. Sun-Sentinel, Orlando Sentinel, Philadelphia Inquirer, Daytona Beach News Journal, Volusia Views Magazine (now out of business but, hopefully, not because of my work,) Northeast Corridor, etc.  Married to an Englishman and take care of elderly Mother.