Unburdened

You have to understand, big Dick isn't exactly conversant with burdens.

Cheney denounced proposals for a quick U.S. withdrawal from Iraq as "a dangerous illusion" and shrugged off the failure to find weapons of mass destruction. "We never had the burden of proof," he said, adding that it had been up to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to prove to the world that he didn't have such weapons.

Correction, Dick. When you criss-cross the nation alleging that another country has weapons of mass destruction and is threatening our security, when you send American troops to invade another country based on allegations that you made, when more than 2,000 U.S. troops and countless Iraqis die because of allegations that you made, I'd say you have a substantial burden of proof.

Apparently Dick Cheney doesn't think the families of more than 2,000 dead Americans deserve an explanation. I could go off on an obscenity-laced tirade about Dick Cheney's apparent lack of human decency, but I'll let you draw your own conclusions. If you'd like, feel free to leave an obscentity-laced tirade in the comments section. It's the right thing to do, and you'll feel better.

In addition to basically telling everyone who wants answers about why we're in Iraq to go fuck off, big Dick hit a couple of the White House talking points today, softening his rhetoric somewhat as it relates to U.S. Rep. John Murtha, who is everything Dick Cheney and George Bush pretend to be.

Following President Bush's lead, Cheney praised the character of Rep. John Murtha even as he voiced strong disagreement with the Pennsylvania Democrat's proposal last week to pull out all U.S. troops.

"He's a good man, a Marine, a patriot — and he's taking a clear stand in an entirely legitimate discussion," Cheney told the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.

Funny, last week Dick called war opponents "reprehensible." I guess he meant those other war opponents. Opponents who, unlike John Murtha, can be publicly attacked by the administration with little fear of politcal fallout. Opponents like, you know, us.