There Goes Dick

America's great and good have gathered for the funerary rites of the nation's least beloved chimpanzee wrangler; or rather, some of them have. Whether from political prudence or genuine fellow feeling, or just from the natural human urge to be sure the bastard really is dead at last, Demoblicans and Republicrats lined up to be seen at the exequies of Dick Cheney, whose talents as political thug, profiteer and war criminal contributed so much to the destruction of Iraq and Afghanistan and the creation of modern Islamic terrorism, while incidentally inspiring the fawning connivance of the British political class. There were a few absences: like has-been Thatcherites shaking their heads at the excesses of the Farage Falange, ex-presidents Clinton and Obama contrived to be having their hair done, and the Trumpster, his head-tribble and their greasy little henchbeing were not even invited. Presumably it was feared lest their presence undermine the solemnity of an occasion featuring a eulogy by the chimpanzee himself, whose first presidential election was stolen for him and who therefore never had to resort to the undignified tactics of the current monarch.