Jon Stewart: When Dick Cheney smiles, an angel gets water-boarded

David Edwards and Muriel Kane

Published: Thursday August 2, 2007





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"Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld were both on television last night, answering questions," said Jon Stewart on Wednesday's Daily Show, comparing the rarity of the event to "a giant squid having sex with Bigfoot as the ghost of Jim Morrison claps giddily."

"Rummy's been gone a long time. Does he remember the dance?" asked Stewart, showing a clip of Rumsfeld's testimony concerning the friendly fire death of Pat Tillman.

"I was not intimately knowledgeable," said Rumsfeld. "I don't recall. ... I'm not aware. ... I was not involved. ... I have a vague recollection. ... I don't understand the question."

"He's been gone a while but he jumps right back in," said Stewart appreciatively. "It's like raping a bicycle."

"Obviously Cheney's a little more on top of his game than Rumsfeld," Stewart went on. "He's going to skip right to the 'nothing to regret' part."

"Don't you ever say, 'Maybe I'm wrong?'" Larry King asked Cheney in an hour-long interview broadcast on Tuesday. "No," Cheney replied flatly. "You would still go into Iraq?" "Yes, sir." "Although there were mistakes?" "Oh, sure. There are always things in war that happen that nobody anticipated."

"Maybe what we're dealing with isn't so much a man in denial of reality as a happy optimist," said Stewart, leading into a clip of King asking, "Does it bother you that the Iraqi parliament is taking August off?" and Cheney responding, "That's better than taking two months off."

Stewart finally showed King asking "Would you make an overt move on Iran?" Cheney replied, "For what reason?" and grinned broadly.

"Every time Dick Cheney smiles like that, an angel gets water-boarded," commented Stewart.

The following video is from Comedy Central's The Daily Show, broadcast on August 1.





