Rumsfeld and Cheney
W.J. Astore
Mark Danner has a probing article at TomDispatch.com on the career arc of Dick Cheney, the self-selected Vice President under George W. Bush. Cheney’s approach to history, an attitude he shared with Karl Rove and Donald Rumsfeld, was the idea he could make his own reality, independent of history. Previous precedents on waterboarding as torture? They don’t matter. The predictable civil war that resulted from our invasion of Iraq? Doesn’t matter. History is made by the big swinging dicks, no regrets, no apologies.
Even when the insurgency in Iraq was obvious to all, Cheney and Rumsfeld sought to deny that reality. Recall that Cheney said in 2005 that the insurgency was in its last throes even as it was beginning to peak. Recall that Rumsfeld said in July 2003 “I don’t do quagmires” even as he and the U.S. military were sinking into one in post-invasion Iraq.
History teaches humility, but Cheney and Rumsfeld were having none of that. History is a sovereign remedy to hubris, but Cheney and Rumsfeld were all about hubris. Faced with history’s uncertainty, as represented by favorite questions like “Yes, but” and “Are you sure,” Cheney and Rumsfeld hissed like vampires confronting garlic.
The end of history — in the sense of ignoring its lessons — came with Cheney and Rumsfeld.
And like Danner says in his article, we’re left today with the bloody mess these dicks created.
The Contrary Perspective 
President Obama would no doubt think it rude of me to lampoon his idol and mentor — or both of them — but the DFH Vietnam veteran in me simply can’t resist. Hence:
Reactionary R and R
Deputy Dubya went back to the ranch
He needed another vacation
He found it hard work spreading lies and deceit,
Starting wars, and bankrupting the nation
Sheriff Dick Cheney approved the request
Having few words for Dubya to mime
What with checks from his old firm arriving on cue
Just to count them took most of his time
“Let us think of the things you have done, little man!”
The Sheriff intoned solemnly;
“And the steely-eyed judgement you’ve shown in your job
Since I picked myself for your V.P.”
“You’ve announced to the world that you’ve thrown in the towel;
That in three years or more you’ll look back
To observe what some others with courage and sense
Did to clean up our mess in Iraq.”
“It doesn’t seem now like there’s much you can do
Not that there ever was, anyway;
So take some time off from your sleepwalking life
And enjoy what your dreams have to say.”
“I can take care of things,” Sheriff Cheney explained,
“Since I’ve already done the hard part.
Take another siesta – I mean, get some ‘rest’
And learn English: at least make a start.”
So it happened that Dubya returned to his roots
Making sure not to smirk or to twitch;
Taking care not to notice the dead soldier’s mom
Keeping vigil outside in the ditch
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2006
Michael.. The best satiric poem I have ever read.!Thank you. The unity of poetry with satire is truly deadly.
The more I read though, the more I see that all of these current players are just carrying out a long term strategy , initiated right after WW Ii ,into making our country into an authoritarian, militaristic state., and ultimately a proto fascist corporate state reaching for global dominance. We are within a stone’s throw of their reaching their goal in spite of the cartoonish characters your poem depicts. . Will the citizens of our country allow that to happen?
Any mention of Dubya, Dick, and Don: the Three Stooges of Apocalyptic Messianic Globalism — as a cynical cover for Crony-Corporate Crypto-Fascist Oligarchy — leads directly to a psychiatric assessment of Superpower Syndrome:
Or, as a young relative through marriage — a Taiwanese schoolteacher — said to me back in 2003: “It’s easy to rush into a trap. It’s not so easy to get out of one.” Some “superpower.” More like “stupid” power, as I most of the world now sees it.
Speaking of big dicks and the messes they leave behind for others to clean up, how about …
Statutory Religion
Zeus and Yahweh had a fling.
They liked that earthly female thing:
A little Greek, a little Jew,
They did it like the rabbits do.
In those days, no man’s law applied;
If gods desired it, mankind cried.
If old enough to stab, they bled;
If old enough to bleed, they bred.
So here we swirl around in pain,
With more blood pouring down the drain.
Upon the wheel mankind revolves,
While life in violence dissolves.
The Big Spook way up in the sky
Keeps screwing over you and I;
Our sisters and our daughters, too;
And wives in Utah (quite a few).
The Big Spook’s got an appetite;
It likes ’em small; It likes ’em tight;
It likes ’em big; It likes ’em wide;
It hasn’t got an ounce of pride.
No crime the Great Big Spook reproves.
The Spook will screw it if it moves.
If it can crawl or walk or run,
The Spook will screw it just for fun.
The Spook’s now got an inside track
For buggering those in Iraq,
For It has heard the nightly pleas
Of one dumb Texan on his knees.
Who wants so much to lead the troops,
But only in his panties poops.
The Spook, though, lets George have his way,
And gives him bullshit words to say.
“Bad” weddings George has bombed to mush;
“Safe” houses, too, his bombers crush,
To spread his own “democracy”:
In his case, schizoid lunacy.
The hearts and minds he’s failed to win
Of those who’ve paid so he could sin;
But still the Big Spook’s curse he stays,
As on the world the Big Dick sprays.
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright 2006
Gotta do something with all this left-over PTSD stuff …
Now that’s a poem.