The Devil's Gouty Foot

Dick Cheney has been reported to be walking with a cane, and now has had to be checkedout for shortness of breath resulting from treatment for a "foot problem." It sounds like Dear Dickie is suffering from gout (yes, I'm exercising my Bill Frist option on long-range diagnosis). How perfect, how just like the aristocrats that once tyrannized France and England, so overfed on red meat and rich desserts that they reach a state of excessive uric acid in the bloodstream which manifests itself as pain in joints like the big toe. Overfilled with uric acid--how perfect is that? And even an old atheist like me begins to believe that Satan is real when I read Cheney's medical history.

McBride said the foot condition was not related to surgery last September to repair aneurysms behind both knees or the 64-year-old vice president's lengthy history of heart problems. He has had four heart attacks, quadruple bypass surgery, two artery-clearing angioplasties and an operation to implant a special pacemaker in his chest.

I mean, what's keeping this guy alive? Must be...Satan!

And what could a report of Dickie be without a quote from the Chimperor himself, who seems to be stuck in a groove when it comes to job assessments.

"The vice president's doing a great job on behalf of the American people," [Bush] said. "He's a very important member of the team."

Sounds like the end of the line for Dickie-poo, since the last time Chimpie gave such a ringing endorsement for an administration official, New Orleans was under water. Where's Brownie now?