Darth Cheney and the force

Trivia quickie: What do the Elvis Presley movie, “G.I. Blues,” and the classic Disney animated feature, “Pinocchio,” have in common?

You got it, Bunkie.  Puppets — on strings, which makes them marionettes. In the 1960 movie starring Elvis, in which he played a G.I. stationed in post-war Germany and made right after he got out of the for-real U.S. Army, there’s a sequence of Elvis on a date with his German girlfriend.  They stroll by a marionette show where he woos her with the song “Wooden Heart.” 

The chorus –

There’re no strings upon this love of mine
It was always you from the start
Treat me nice
Treat me good
Treat me like you really should
‘Cause I’m not made of wood
And I don’t have a wooden heart

Pinocchio, of course, was the wooden marionette brought to life by a fairy, who tells him in the 1940 film that he can get his wish of becoming a real boy if he proves himself “brave, truthful, and unselfish.” The puppet’s adventures in becoming a real boy include him singing the song “There Are No Strings on Me” in company with some marionettes that do have strings. A verse –

I’ve got no strings
So I have fun
I’m not tied up to anyone
They’ve got strings
But you can see
There are no strings on me.

Which brings to mind someone who apparently has had someone pulling his strings for the past eight or so years — George Bush. The string-puller? Well, Dick Cheney — aka “Darth Cheney.” And that’s what this post is about — Darth Cheney and the force he tragically brought to bear on the office of president, on national and foreign and fiscal policy, on the late Republican-controlled Congress, on the courts and justice, on our tradition of democratic self-rule, on truth and openness and accountability in government, ad nauseum.