Done with being mad at Dick Cheney; now he's just pathetic

I reserve the right to change my mind, but I think I'm over being mad at Dick Cheney.   He's crossed the line, in my opinion, from being a crank and an unregenerate war criminal to being a pitiful old man, grasping at his lost days of glory that have left him on the dust heap of history.

The spectacle of him going on tv, or writing op-eds -- aided and abetted by daughter Liz, and joined also by wife Lynn in the latest appearance -- is beginning to just be pathetic.   it's like they're humoring an old coot who doesn't know when he's finished.

At an event today sponsored by Politico, with Lynn and Liz sitting nearby, Dick launched into his mantra:   The president is devastating the military by cutting defense spending, he insists.

"That [defense spending] ought to be our top priority for spending. Not food stamps, not highways or anything else. . . . Your No. 1 responsibility as president is to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. [Obama] is the commander-in-chief and he's absolutely devastating the United States military today.”

Protesters from the anti-war group Code Pink disrupted the event briefly with shouts of "Dick Cheney . . . war criminal !"  "You destroyed Iraq, you'll destroy this country!" and "Dick Cheney should be arrested!"

Lynn started laughing loudly, looking (to me) like a deranged harridan and Liz began chanting "Four more years!," trying to drown out the protesters.   What did she mean?  "Four more years"?   He's been out of office already for five years.   I think it just shows how desperate she must have felt.

Of course I have no basis for this except intuition and imagination, but here's what I think happened at home beforehand:  my fantasy reconstruction:

Liz:   I'm not doing this anymore, Mom.   It's your turn now to baby sit Dad when he goes on these televised rants.   Besides, he's ruining any possibility that I could ever have a political career.   Look what happened in Colorado.

Lynn:   Oh, all right.   But just this once.  We'll both go, and then we'll try to talk him out of doing any more of these interviews.

[after the event]

Liz (to Lynn):    See what I mean.  That was humiliating.  I'm not doing it any more.   YOU tell him.    I know it will kill him -- but he's becoming a humiliating parody of himself.   We can't let him do this to himself any more.

Who knows?    Have we moved from crankiness to beginning dementia?

Ralph

PS:   I don't know.   Maybe I'm attributing too much independent thinking to Liz.   At this event, she herself was also being interviewed, and she gave her own jaw-dropping answer.  When asked what the Republican party should do about climate change, her answer was simple:  "Nothing," she said.   Last year, she had declared that the climate science "is bogus."  So maybe she's just as deluded as her old man.