Cheney Hot Air Balloon Collides With Truth, Explodes

Special to The WitList
28 November 2005

NEW YORK -- A float in the shape of Dick Cheney crashed during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade last week, but no one was seriously hurt.

A last-minute addition to the 79th annual parade, the 515-pound polyurethane structure depicted the Vice President offering a one-fingered salute to administration critics. The float's appearance was designed to send a message to those who've alleged the White House deliberately misled the nation about the origins of the Iraq war.

However, the balloon began losing air when it snagged on a series of prickly facts suspended in its path. Borne aloft by a dangerously explosive mix of hydrogen and hyperbole, the float ignited when it was struck by revelations that the president knew Iraq had no ties to Al Qaeda within days of the 9/11 attacks, and that its 'evidence' of Iraq's biochemical weapons program came from a well-known pathological liar.

The flaming wreckage landed on a dwindling crowd of GOP supporters, who escaped without physical injury but were forced to abandon what scant credibility they may have had left.

"It was just like the Hindenburg," said one elderly bystander. "Oh, the inhumanity."

Even after being downed, the smoldering remains continued to move forward along the parade route, through sheer force of will.

A spokesman for the vice president denied there was anything wrong with the float, declaring such charges "shameful and corrupt." He also accused critics of attempting to rewrite the rules of aeronautics.