What A Difference Two Weeks Can Make

DICK CHENEY, on Larry King Live, Monday, May 30, 2005:

The insurgency in Iraq is "in the last throes," Vice President Dick Cheney says, and he predicts that the fighting will end before the Bush administration leaves office.

In a wide-ranging interview Monday on CNN's "Larry King Live," Cheney cited the recent push by Iraqi forces to crack down on insurgent activity in Baghdad and reports that the most-wanted terrorist leader, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, had been wounded.

The vice president said he expected the war would end during President Bush's second term, which ends in 2009.

"I think we may well have some kind of presence there over a period of time," Cheney said. "The level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline. I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency."

Dick Cheney, at the International Special Operations Forces Week conference, June 11, 2005:

Vice President Dick Cheney lauded and thanked international special operations soldiers for helping fight terrorism but warned them that their work is far from over.

“We have a long war ahead of us, and our enemies are waiting for us to let our guard down,” Cheney said, speaking Friday to more than 300 people at the closing of the International Special Operations Forces Week conference. “But we will not relent in this effort because we have the clearest possible understanding of what is at stake.”