"Cheney, Obama are 'cousins'

Anne Davies Herald Correspondent in Washington
October 17, 2007


THERE'S an old saying you can pick your friends but not your relatives.

But how must Democrat candidate and outspoken critic of the Iraq war, Barack Obama, feel about being related to its chief architect, Vice-President Dick Cheney?

The news that the two men share a distant ancestor took off in Washington after Mr Cheney's wife, Lynne casually dropped the bombshell into a chatty afternoon interview about her new book, Blue Skies, No Fences.

In an interview on Tuesday afternoon, Mrs. Cheney was asked about how she felt about Mrs Clinton as the first woman president. In what appeared to be a non sequitur, Mrs Cheney revealed that in the course of researching Mr Cheney's family tree, she had discovered a common ancestor eight generations ago.

"I thought I should admit this fact because perhaps it means I am not totally objective about Mrs Clinton," Mrs Cheney joked.

"Think about this," Mrs Cheney said. "This is such an amazing American story that one ancestor, a man that came to Maryland, could be responsible down the family line for lives that have taken such different and varied paths as Dick's and Barack Obama's."

Reacting to the news, Senator Obama's campaign spokesman Bill Burton told CNN's Dana Bash with tongue in cheek, "Obviously, Dick Cheney is sort of the black sheep of the family."

In fact Senator Obama enjoys blood ties to the two top figures in the administration: President Bush and Mr Cheney.

The Chicago Sun-Times broke the news in September that Senator Obama is also an 11th cousin of the president himself, but for some reason, it did not get picked up by the blogs in the way it did on Tuesday."