Cheney's Katrina

by Mike Allen "Hey Mike, the siren is going off on the CheneyCam." Those were words that I had not heard since shortly after Christmas, when the former Vice President granted Politico an exclusive look into his views of Obama's failed leadership in the war on terror. I feared that I had been insufficiently transparent in my somewhat visible display of disagreement with certain of Mr. Cheney's harsher statements, but for this I accept no blame. I have the body language of a reporter, and Cheney has the eye's of an eagle. He could read me like a prospectus. I switched on the machine labeled CheneyCam. God, Windows 7 is slow. I feared the Veep would give up on me before I ever got to the welcome screen. Our damnable company policy called for powering everything off before leaving the office, and I had officially gone along like a docile sheep. Well, no more. A good reporter never risks a story over wasted time, and I vowed that from this day on, CheneyCam would stay on. The oddly asymmetrical face of Lynn Cheney stared back at me, a look of utter disgust beaming from her eyes. "You made me wait," she said, clipping every word. Oh yeah, I though, what if I had the day off or was out of the office, what about that? You'd really have to wait then, wouldn't you? Hoping that she couldn't read my mind, I modified that last thought to 'You'd really have to wait then, wouldn't you, bitch'. "You're such a nice reporter, always taking your dictation so earnestly," the Cheney-girl said, softening. "But you really shouldn't make me wait. Daddy always knows when you're in the office. And now, I have something important that I want to talk to you about." I grabbed my pad and pencil, a good reporter's most important tools "There is some dangerous talk going around town, Allen. Poisonous talk. Maybe you've heard it." I was all ears. "Certain liberal interests, in order to protect our socialist president and his hatred of American exceptionalism, are beginning to call the BP spill 'Cheney's Katrina'. Can you imagine? Not Obama's Katrina, which is the obvious parallel, not even Bush's Second Katrina, which would be the usual modus operandi, but Cheney's Katrina. Crazy talk. Listen to this... 'Cheney bows down to his Superior Being, the AntiChrist, the Corporation British Petroleum and receives for his labors a crude oil begrimed halo... Could it be so glorious? This great victory? The total victory of corporate will over mere, feeble, mortal humanity'. This is coming not just from the little pimples like the Daily Kos, it's beginning to resonate with columnists for the New York Times and Washington Post." "Wow, that was some prose," I replied. Well, you know those columnists, they're paid to create controversy. Just as long as the papers haven't been saying that in their editorials, you're probably okay. Now on the other hand, I think the point that they're making is that your father's secret deals with the oil companies may have led to some of the lax..." "Silence. Do you want me to..." "Hey Liz, you got the Politico guy on that computer thing, uh, the webcam yet?" Maddeningly, I would never have the choice of deciding whether or not I wished for Lynn Cheney to do whatever it was she had on her mind, for at that moment the huge and snarling face of her father replaced her, filling the screen. I could see his pores. "You don't have to sit so close to the camera, daddy. Remember what I told you, it's right there on the monitor." "Now listen, Allen, I've got something to say about the way Obama is handling this Gulf situation," said the giant Dick head. "I've been thinking about leadership and I've been thinking about modern history. Modern history is the proper context because of the things that our founding fathers didn't have - underwater oil wells and nukes. If they had, and a giant oil spill threatened the Chesapeake Bay, I have little doubt that Thomas Jefferson would have elected to nuke the leak. And if he wouldn't, screw him, what the hell did he know about the oil industry anyway. The thing is, our corporate giants are the new founding fathers, in a manner of speaking. All I'm saying is, who's your daddy?" "You are, daddy." "That's very nice, Liz. Allen, right now we've got a boy for our president, and he is not helping his daddy. Tony Hayward needs a little nuclear help and Obama is not giving it to him. Yesterday I was watching 'Forbes on FOX' and everyone of those distinguished panelist thought that nukes were the way to go. As Rick Karlgaard put it, "We might as well look at something with an 80 percent success rate according to the Russian." That man knows his modern history. The Russians have nuked oil spills five times, four of them successfully. If it doesn't work out, who cares? The gulf is ruined anyway, and I hate seafood." "The point is, that well is not just gushing oil, it's gushing money, and if our boy president isn't willing to use all available resources to stop it, I don't think British Petroleum owes this country another red penny." It was hard to argue with the old oilman's impeccable logic, and so I didn't. After all, the gulf was already ruined, and I don't like seafood either. Instead I chose to use my token question by asking the former Vice President how he dealt with the outrage he must feel over hearing this disaster being labeled as Cheney's Katrina. "Outrage?" he chuckled, before ending the conversation. "Hell, I thought I should have gotten credit for the first one."