Cheney Makes Incest Joke About West Virginians

***UPDATE*** Akers reports that Cheney has now apologized for his West Virginia incest joke:

Vice President Dick Cheney has apologized through his spokeswoman for making an offhand joke during a speech at the National Press Club Monday stereotyping West Virginia as a state prone to incest.

Cheney spokeswoman Lea Anne McBride tells us, "The Vice President's offhand comment was not meant to hurt anyone. On reflection, he concluded that it was an inappropriate attempt at humor that he should not have made. The Vice President apologizes to the people of West Virginia for the inappropriate remark."

Mary Ann Akers of the Washington Post asks if West Virginia was just handed to the Democrats when Dick Cheney made an incest joke at West Virginians' expense:

Cheney was at the Press Club to congratulate this year's winners of the Gerald R. Ford Journalism Prize for Distinguished Reporting on the Presidency. During a question-and-answer session toward the end of the luncheon, someone asked the vice president about his wife Lynne Cheney's revelation on MSNBC last year that "Dick and Barack Obama are eighth cousins."

The questioner jokingly asked the vice president if he and Obama were going to have a family reunion, to which Cheney replied he would "have no objections" though he said he doubted Obama would want one - "certainly not before November."

Then came the offensive punch line. Cheney explained that during the course of researching his family lineage for Lynne's memoir "Blue Skies, No Fences" last year, he learned there were Cheneys on both his father's and his mother's side of the family. There was a Richard Cheney on his mother's side, the vice president said.

"So I had Cheneys on both sides of the family and we don't even live in West Virginia," Cheney quipped.

Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia was not amused:

"That a man who has ascended to the seat of Vice President of the United States would openly display such contempt and astounding ignorance toward his own countrymen is an insult to all Americans. Now that he or the Administration he represents no longer needs their vote, Mr. Cheney apparently feels that he is now free to mock and belittle the people of West Virginia. With his trademark arrogance, the Vice President even added 'You can say those things when you're not running for re-election.'"

"This pitiful comment is not entirely surprising when you consider the source. Vice President Cheney's words reflect the attitude of an administration and a party that says what they must to get elected and then turns their backs on those they promised to represent."

Comments

[saun8934]

02:47 PM on 06/06/2008

I actually thought the joke was quite hilarious! WV is full of racist people. Keep it coming Dick...

[Moshe]

01:44 PM on 06/06/2008

One of the more astounding aspects of the last 8 years, is how Bush, Cheney, Rove, and Co., can so clearly demonstrate absolute contempt for the working class fundamentalists that mindlessly support them, and yet still get these people to continue to mindlessly support them.

I know how they do it: After screwing these people economically (i.e., shipping their jobs over seas; driving up food and gas prices; holding down wages; passing laws that facilitate the stealing of their pensions; foreclosing on their homes; gutting bankruptcy laws for the people that most need the protections of these laws; denying them health care; convincing working class people's children to fight a war that is making the already wealthy filthy rich at tax payer expense and their own children would never consider fighting; etc.), when it comes time for an election, Rove and Co., dangle the cross, the flag, gay marriage, and 9/11 in front of these people to scare the p-ss out of them and get them to vote against their own interests, again and again.

I'm just amazed that it keeps working everytime.

Apparently they are very slow learners.

[JAMES GORMAN]

11:57 AM on 06/06/2008

INCEST NORMALLY EXPLAINS VIOLENT AND AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR--E.G. RICHARD III--
I TOOK SOLACE IN THAT AS AN EXPLANATION FOR THE VICE PRESIDENT'S LAWLESS REGARD
FOR OUR LIBERTY. NOW THAT IS GONE BUT WITH A VEILED APOLOGY--HE COULD NOT STEP
FORWARD AND SAY HE SAID IT--BUT THEN HE COULD NOT STEP FORWARD AND SAY HE
SHOT HIS BEST FRIEND. AND 25% OF OUR NATION STILL DO REGARD HIM AS AN ICON--
THAT IS FRIGHTENING. GORMAN 12

[Taaj]

11:10 AM on 06/06/2008

West Virginians, wake up. You will stay down and out along as you continue to let your prejudice drive how you vote. Rich, powerful and WHITE Americans only want to use, but have little care or concern for you. Stop being a pawn. Unfortunately the WVs, who need this message don't read the Huffpost. So the educated need to lead the downtrodden.

[Raymondf]

03:41 PM on 06/06/2008

I'm a West Virginian and Registered Non-Partisan, and am still voting for McCain. Wright, Pfleger, rezko, and Ayers is enough for me. I signed a petition to have Father Pfleger removed from the Catholic Church. This was on another site of course. West Virginia is a Democratic State, the Republican count is so small in this State, they hold their conventions in a phone booth.

[livingwagenow]

02:55 PM on 06/09/2008

I live in West Virginia, but have only lived in the state for less than a year. Your comment is an awful one and you should be ashamed of it. Have you learned nothing from Cheney's malfeasance and ignorance? You should like an uneducated radical who calls the leaders of this lost country fascists and pigs. You should get in touch with real political discourse and read Alinksy or something. Stop marginalizing your own people, because when you do that you just marginalize yourself.

Sincerely,
an avid WV Huffpost reader.

[ObamaEdwards]

10:30 AM on 06/06/2008

TOP STORY today: the Senate intelligence committee has concluded that Bush and Cheney LIED in order to take us into Iraq. READ: http://www.reuters.com/article/middleeastCrisis/idUSN05318923

[08politicaljunkie]

01:50 AM on 06/06/2008

I don't know about anyone else but I like knowing how they really feel.

Keep ol' Dick in front of the camera

[TLV]

09:44 AM on 06/06/2008

No kidding. Let them expose themselves for all they are - the scumbags! A little voters' remorse from the Republicans just might keep them from voting for McCain.

[saun8934]

02:44 PM on 06/06/2008

lololol!!!

[Mattjoe]

11:32 PM on 06/05/2008

That it takes something this menial to get people enraged about Dick - says a little something of how hoodwinked the electorate has been the past two terms (and would certainly continue to be) by a palpable Repug arrogance.

How about the $30M from Halliburton? 9/11? Katrina? No one blinked an eye – now as his power wanes – mainstream media gets the ‘green light’ to be critical of him? – please.

Comical.

The 9/11 suspects are only just starting to get theirs at Guantanamo. Milosevic and Sharon never faced the music, (death must have been eager) perhaps Cheney could end up in the queue at the Hague?

In any case, I’m afraid Dick’s laughter will be short-lived.

[blessedfrog]

01:47 PM on 06/06/2008

True Enough mattjoe - Cheney has waylayed abominable harm to the Republic by his 'service' as VP.

This comment is silly and not worth much outrage. IMHO

After all - the Obama-ites tried the same thing - to smear all West Virginians as unelightened apes during the dem primary there.

[texastornado]

11:15 PM on 06/05/2008

This guy looks like a German Nazi.

[Mavin1620]

11:05 PM on 06/05/2008

Cheney should be anointed the King of the Cheap Shots. Senator Byrd has his number, as does Senator Webb. Cheney things too well of himself and too poorly of everyone else. We have less than 200 days of this jerk, thank God.

[Dendera]

07:09 PM on 06/05/2008

I don't want to be the one to point this out, but... well, yes, I do actually:

If Sen. Obama made a comment like that, it'd be plastered all over the mainstream and Faux news... with captions... for several days. Cheney says it, and I have to find it by scrolling halfway down a subpage at HuffPo.

[simplyperfect]

07:05 PM on 06/05/2008

WoW...I wonder if those people who vote for Prez Bush and Cheney CLEARLY see that they really dont care anything about you and secertly laugh at you. They know and believe that "blue colar" are so eaisly manupilated. Lets learn from our mistakes Regan Dems.....They care nothing about you...they campagin on issues that are important to you such as the gays and guns. Those are not real issues.....I hope this year they will vote with their economic intrests rather than social issues such as the gays.

[PSD827]

06:22 PM on 06/05/2008

I'm not surprised...

Remember who we're talking about here:

This is a man who said during a campaign "F*** the Jews. They don't vote for us anyway," told Sen. Patrick Leahy to go f*** himself, "accidentally" shot his friend in the face while hunting, and whose only response to the fact that more than two-thirds of country does not approve of the Iraq War was "So?".

[darthmaul]

11:56 PM on 06/05/2008

Yeah, and the same guy that has questioned those that were against the Iraq wars patriotism, while getting 5 deferments so that he didn't have to serve in Nam. These guys are totally amoral.

[Bendersky]

05:41 PM on 06/05/2008

Good thing he didn't accuse them of being gun-toting, bitter rednecks, otherwise his statement might REALLY have been offensive.

[truthseeker7]

05:37 PM on 06/05/2008

The only thing that could possibly be worse than being under this adminstration would be having Dick Cheney for a father. Lynne had a choice, the poor kids didn't. Happy Fathers Day A##hole

[BardEric]

05:32 PM on 06/05/2008

And?!? Does anyone REALLY have enough respect left for Cheney to give his words enough weight to incite offense? Give the poor man a few more minutes of media attention before November where his political career will come to a screeching halt..Not like the man has a prayer of ever being nominated by his party to run for the oval office himeself..IGNORE him, he is about to go away:)!!