Recount: A Magazine of Contemporary Politics

Dick and John

By Aaron Parsley | Oct 12, 2004 Print

“John, this is Dick.”

“Dick, this is John.”

They finally met. Isn’t it nice to bring together the forces of good and evil — John, the political Cabbage Patch doll, and Dick, a beady-eyed, hunched-over caricature of greed and power? Maybe a lifelong friendship will blossom between Dick and John, whose paths crossed so frequently, although, as Dick noted, they were never able to make each other’s acquaintance until their debate. This is all America can really hope for because, politically, Vice-Presidential debates are, like, so unimportant.

The two candidates came together in Cleveland, the country’s “biggest poor city,” according to Gwen Ifill, the moderator who asked tough questions, such as “What’s wrong with a little flip-flop every now and then?” Senator John Edwards needed to keep up the momentum coming out of the first Presidential debate, and Vice President Dick Cheney had to do serious damage control. It was his chance to let America know that he was in charge, not the gapped-out skipping record we heard from the week before.

Ifill also enforced the elaborate rules, decided upon by the candidates themselves. She was one tough PBS cookie, like when Cheney tried to get more than the allotted 30 seconds to respond to accusations of wrongdoing at Halliburton. (We can only assume he had a rather nuanced opinion on that issue.) But the candidates quickly felt the wrath of Ifill. “Well, that’s all you’ve got,” she snapped back as if to say, “Do I look like Condoleezza Rice to you? No? Well then don’t mess with me.”

It was a pitched 90-minute battle and both sides scored. As did Americans at home playing drinking games with words like “inconsistent,” “Halliburton” and “OBGYN.”

Cheney came on strong with a powerful and well-crafted statement that put to rest any notion that he ever suggested there was a connection between Iraq and 9/11 by saying: “I have not suggested there’s a connection between Iraq and 9/11.” Now, how could anyone argue with that?

Cheney also scored major points when asked to explain the President’s plan to secure Iraq’s first free elections in January. Cheney, the more experienced candidate, recalled a time when he was a young congressman observing the first democratic elections in El Salvador.

“Twenty years ago…a guerilla insurgency controlled roughly a third of the country, 75,000 people dead. And we held free elections,” he said, stealing his opponent’s sunny optimism. “The terrorists would come in and shoot up polling places, [but] as soon as they left the voters would come back and get in line and would not be denied their right to vote.”

Now that is democracy at work. And to think those Democrats complained about the election of 2000. What’s a butterfly ballot in Palm Beach County compared to flying bullets in El Salvador?

Undeterred, Edwards chided the administration for going it alone in Iraq, claiming that 90 percent of the cost of the war and 90 percent of the casualties are being incurred by the United States.

In response, Cheney laid out a new nuance to counter the Democrat’s claim. “The 90 percent figure is just dead wrong,” he said. According to Cheney, the situation in Iraq was not nearly as bad as Edwards said it was. If you factor in the thousands of dead Iraqi security forces as well as the dead allies, then the American dead make up a mere 50 percent of the total, Cheney said.

Dead wrong, indeed! Surely Americans felt much better now about the war in Iraq, knowing that there are all those additional dead people. And Edwards wasn’t even counting them! Way to go, Dick!

“The vice president has still not said anything…about the failure to have adequate troops,” Edwards answered back. “Remember Shock and Awe?”

“No,” we all sighed at home. “Unless you mean the look on the president’s face when he debated Sen. John Kerry. Then, yes, we remember.”

At times Edwards spoke in half-truths. He accused Cheney of voting against a holiday for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and against a resolution calling for the release of Nelson Mandela — without acknowledging the fact that Cheney does not like black people.

Cheney seemed to have all the right answers when he faced a tough question from the moderator about the administration’s failure to unite the country. Cheney called it “one of the disappointments of the last four years,” but he promised that Republicans would keep working to bring people together — like they did at their national convention when Democratic Senator Zell Miller delivered a compassionate keynote speech. It was a great oratory that warmed the heart like a Valentine from a Swift Boat Veteran for Truth. Miller, you recall, is the open-minded senator from Georgia who made a moving case for cooperation and non-partisanship — just before challenging Chris Matthews to a duel.

But the most touching moment of the debate came when the candidates spoke about gay marriage, a rather personal matter for Mr. Cheney. The vice president jumped at the chance to come up with a sentimental and personal response to show his softer side: a father and family man, if you will.

“Whether or not government should sanction or approve or give some sort of authorization, if you will, to these relationships,” he said without a hint of awkwardness, “traditionally, that’s been an issue for the states. States have regulated marriage, if you will.”

Edwards attacked and instantly destroyed his own likeable image. “I think the Vice President and his wife love their daughter,” he said. “And you can’t have anything but respect for the fact that they’re willing to talk about the fact that they have a gay daughter…there are millions of parents like that who love their children.”

Yeah, and there are millions of furious Evangelical Christians who just sent their children to bed, said a prayer and emailed Karl Rove.

For his closing statement, Edwards decided to twist the dagger. He looked into the camera and spoke directly to the American public. “When I was young and growing up, I remember coming down the steps into the kitchen early in the morning,” he said, reminding the people he was the son of a mill worker. “I would see the glow of the television. And I’d see my father sitting at a table. He wasn’t paying bills and he wasn’t doing paperwork…he was learning math on television.”

Um, did he just say his dad was learning math on television? Can he elaborate, please? I mean, was it algebra or long division? The voters want to know.

He continued without specifying, still mesmerized by the glow of the television — er, the American dream. “I grew up in the bright light of America, but that light is flickering today,” he said.

I guess what he meant was, if you don’t like what you see on television (like this debate) or in a presidential candidate, change the channel. Unless you’re learning math on TV or something.

As soon as the debate ended, young Edwards was out of his chair and on his feet. But Cheney, who had lobbied for the right to sit, took his time getting up, carefully positioned himself, and, using his upper body strength to rise, shook the Senator’s hand.

Soon their smiling families joined the candidates on stage, the Edwards clan on one side and the Cheney clan on the other. Even Mary Cheney, the Vice President’s lesbian daughter, showed up with her longtime partner, Heather Poe.

It was a happy moment for the nation.  The second and fourth most powerful families in America exchanged congratulations, and like everyone watching, said “Thank goodness that’s over with." 

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