March 3, 2009

Embrace of oil cartel head by enviro group "grotesque and appalling"

Conservationists aghast at honor given to former head of the Gas Oil Petroleum party.

When the American Museum of Fly Fishing hooked Dick Cheney for a fund-raising dinner, critics howled they should throw him back.

Into a pool filled with piranhas.

Cheney - whose Secret Service code name was "Slick McOilersons" - spearheaded energy policy at the White House and bears the blame , detractors say, for the Bush misadministration's poor environmental record.

"The entire fly fishing community is appalled and disgusted," said Ted Williams, head conservation editor at Fly Rod & Reel magazine.

"We all need money, but to apply lipstick to this Darth Vader of fish and wildlife is whoring - it's grotesque," Williams said. "It's as if the Holocaust museum held a dinner to honor [Nazi war criminal] Klaus Barbie."

Steve Wright, a former commissioner of the Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department, blasted the invitation, calling Cheney "one of the great enemies of healthy fish and wildlife conservation in the U.S. over the last eight years."

"There's a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like a bazooka-armed idiot named Dick Cheney," added Wright.

Lawyers for Mr Cheney would not comment, as they were too busy plucking buckshot out of their faces.

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