The vice president gave a very testy interview to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Tuesday afternoon. It ended badly. But my favorite part of the transcript, for sheer frankness, would have to be this bit:
WOLF BLITZER: Do you think Hillary Clinton would make a good President?
DICK CHENEY: No, I don’t.
BLITZER: Why?
CHENEY: Because she’s a Democrat.
The interview was POST State of the Union, and the cold bucket of plain talk delivered by Senator Webb. The context suggests that VP Cheney is still hopping mad, which means he got the message (even if he ignored it). I’m moving my Impeachment Clock to 6 minutes before midnight, and the Exploded Aorta Clock to 4 minutes before midnight.
The exchange Waldo reprints came before came before this chilly back-and-forth on Cheney’s grandkid-to-be:
Q We’re out of time, but a couple of issues I want to raise with you. Your daughter Mary, she’s pregnant. All of us are happy. She’s going to have a baby. You’re going to have another grandchild. Some of the — some critics, though, are suggesting, for example, a statement from someone representing Focus on the Family:
“Mary Cheney’s pregnancy raises the question of what’s best for children. Just because it’s possible to conceive a child outside of the relationship of a married mother and father, doesn’t mean it’s best for the child.”
Do you want to respond to that?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: No, I don’t.
Q She’s obviously a good daughter —
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I’m delighted — I’m delighted I’m about to have a sixth grandchild, Wolf, and obviously think the world of both of my daughters and all of my grandchildren. And I think, frankly, you’re out of line with that question.
Q I think all of us appreciate —
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I think you’re out of — I think you’re out of line with that question.
Q — your daughter. We like your daughters. Believe me, I’m very, very sympathetic to Liz and to Mary. I like them both. That was just a question that’s come up and it’s a responsible, fair question.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: I just fundamentally disagree with your perspective.
Q I want to congratulate you on having another grandchild. Let’s wind up on a soft note…..
Even though Andrew Sullivan disagrees, I think Joe & Jane Voter are very sympathetic to Cheney on this point and wish the press and other politicians would leave him alone on that score. If you look at the YouTube, you can practically see Blitzer squirming, wishing he hadn’t asked.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdiUXbb54qU&eurl=
Yeah, and it’s too bad Wolf Blitzer couldn’t be a better journalist. There were several occassions when he should have nailed Cheney, the inability to respond to his own friends backslapping his daughter being one of them. When Cheney said he “fundamentally doesn’t agree with the premise” that folks within his own party are starting to disagree with him was another.
Does anybody remember when Clint Eastwood was interviewed on 60 Minutes a few years ago? I think Steve Croft was the interviewer. Croft asked Eastwood a question relating to his children by women that were not married to Eastwood. No response. Just a steely Clint Eastwood stare that said “Don’t go there. I warn you. Don’t go there.” End of discussion.
I think Dick Cheney was doing his best Clint Eastwood impression. Of course, he’s no Clint Eastwood (who is?) and had to interrupt his own silence with his “you’re out of line” comment. Wolf Blitzer was knocked for a loop. He was clearly embarrassed and stammered about how “we like Mary”.
In short, I’d say that Cheney out-toughed Blitzer, this time. Although the story seems to be that, immediately after the interview, Cheney’s people went to Fox complaining that the media never bothered Chelsea Clinton and it was unfair that they were asking about Mary Cheney. Nothing “tough” about that; that’s just whining.
I do remember that. It was a serious Dirty Harry moment.
Can you believe that Clint Eastwood is a full 11 years older than Cheney? And he still looks like a major bad ass.
Cheney also does not blink. Colbert counts Pelosi’s 41 blinks to Cheney’s 1.
Not really in Pelosi’s defense, I find it odd that people keep bringing up her blinking. Or rather, that it get’s compared to Cheney’s lack of, while still comming out with her as the negative. I mean people aside, I’ll take a blinker any day to a cold stare. In the animal kingdom the first two creatures that pop into my mind when I think about never blinking are snakes and sharks. Neither make for attractive political animal totems.
Cheney blinked? I must have missed it.
Well, if we have to go down this road, I’m with the non-blinkers over the blinkers. So there we are.
I always admire audacity and guts. While I think that Dick Cheney has been pretty bad for America and is the architect of many policies that have proved completely disasterous, I whole-heartedly applaud his staring down of Wolf Blitzer. Blitzer tried to make things inappropriately personal and Cheney smacked him down. I like Cheney’s reaction every bit as much as I approve of Jim Webb’s recent encounter with Bush at the White House.
Dick Cheney is nearly as magnificent in his awkward brashness as Richard Nixon, a man whom I have never been able to help admiring even as he clearly never should have become President.
Normally, I would agree that a question of the sort Blitzer asked was inappropriate but I am not so sure it was in this instance. Cheney is part of an administration that has called for an amendment to the US Constitution that essentially says the relationship his daughter is engaged in is morally wrong. I am not sure it is unfair to ask him how can support that policy and condone what his own daughter is doing. If he supports a policy that makes a political issue of a personal matter, isn’t it fair to ask him about it? As a result of the Bush administration’s policy, the parents of gay children who believe their kids should have the same rights as straight kids have been forced to publicly defend their children’s lifestyles. Why does Cheney get a pass on issue that he has helped put in the political arena?
I have always suspected that Cheney is being the good soldier on the issue of gay marriage–he doesn’t necessarily agree with the Bush administration policy but does not publicly voice his disagreement. I can understand and even respect that practical approach on some issues but, as a father, I cannot conceive of how he can do it on what is so personal an issue for his family.
As Jon Stewart pointed out last night, Cheney’s outrage can only be premised on the belief that the public policy enacted by his administration does not apply to his family.
I think Blitzer fucked up by trying to provoke Cheney by asking a question about how his personal beliefs might contradict the realities of his daughter’s family. It would have been much more accurate, relevant and appropriate to ask a question about how Cheney’s policies as a major government figurehead clearly and directly contradict the realities of his daughter’s family.