Mitchell asked Lynne Cheney about Rangel's “son of a bitch” comment, but not about VP telling Leahy to “fuck” himself


During the 11 a.m. ET hour of the November 1 edition of MSNBC News Live, NBC chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell asked Lynne Cheney, wife of Vice President Dick Cheney, about Rep. Charles Rangel's (D-NY) recent comment that Vice President Cheney is a “son of a bitch.” Rangel was responding to an October 30 interview Fox News host Neil Cavuto conducted with the vice president, in which Cheney said that Rangel “doesn't understand how the economy works.” Lynne Cheney responded to Mitchell by saying that “television during this campaign season is getting so that, you know, I keep my grandchildren out of the room.”

But Mitchell failed to ask Cheney whether she has to keep her grandchildren out of the room when her husband interacts with Democratic public officials. During an annual Senate class photo-op inside the Senate chambers in June 2004, Vice President Cheney told Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) to “fuck yourself.”

From the November 1 edition of MSNBC News Live:

CHENEY: I thought, actually, you were going to ask me about Charlie Rangel.

MITCHELL: Charlie Rangel -- let's go there. Who ripped into -- I don't know what we can say.

CHENEY: Well, we don't want to, you know --

MITCHELL: He called him an S.O.B.

CHENEY: You know, television during this campaign season is getting so that, you know, I keep my grandchildren out of the room. But Charlie just loses it every once in a while, and it usually happens when Dick touches a nerve. And what Dick did was say the Democrats will raise your taxes, and Charlie Rangel, who stands in line to become head of the Ways and Means Committee, has said he doesn't see a single one of the Bush tax cuts that he likes very much. So, you know, the vice president was simply pointing out the situation, and I guess it just touched a nerve, so it happens.

MITCHELL: The Democrats have said that they are not going to raise taxes if they take over the House, and --

CHENEY: Well, if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you in San Francisco.