I forgot to mention that this short piece is from today's L.A. TIMES.
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From: PEN-L list on behalf of Devine, James
Sent: Fri 7/2/2004 7:45 AM
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Subject: [PEN-L] the f word
COMMENTARY
VP Is Just Following Bleeping Tradition
Take that, you hogshead of feculence!
By Henry Beard
Vice President Dick Cheney recently took a lot of heat after he used an
epithet in a spirited exchange with Sen. Pat Leahy on the Senate floor, but the
reaction was excessive. The occupants of the second-highest office in the land have
been known for their salty language since the earliest days of the republic.
Not long after being sworn in as the nation's first vice president, John Adams
set the tone by responding to a senator's critical remark on the Treaty With the
Wyandot by telling his fellow Federalist to "ftuff it, you miferable, ftinking, ftupid
F.O.B." The irascible patriot's running mate in the 1796 election, the normally
genteel and refined Thomas Jefferson, continued the tradition of colorful invective by
responding to campaign criticism from Caesar Rodney by suggesting to the eminent
statesman from Delaware that he "put it in that intimate nether locality where the
sun, for all its refulgent luminosity, is not wont to shine."
But it was left to America's most controversial vice president, Aaron Burr, to
move the discourse up â or down â a notch, to the level it now occupies. In a
colloquy with Alexander Hamilton, which may have precipitated their fateful duel, Burr
responded to an accusation of bias from Hamilton by calling the distinguished New
Yorker "a hogshead of feculence in a four-peck firkin." Hamilton's riposte is said to
have infuriated Burr.
"Sir," said the eloquent congressman, addressing the vice president on the
floor of the Senate, "it is my duty to inform you that I am composed of an elastic and
rubbery substance, whilst you are constituted of a most mucilaginous glue; and those
very imprecations which you see fit to hurl so intemperately at my person, rebound
from my resilient anatomy and adhere indissolubly to you."
"Indeed, sir?" said the flustered Burr. "Well, I give you leave to buss my
luscious crupper." To which Hamilton said, "Sir, I have it on impeccable authority
that your mother is shod in boots more suited to the pedal extremities of an Hessian
mercenary." Considering the fact that their next and final exchange involved flintlock
pistols at 20 paces, it should come as a relief that the only thing our current vice
president is shooting off is his mouth.
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Henry Beard is the author of "The Dick Cheney Code," a political parody that
will be published during the Republican convention
