David Addington said he could not talk about discussions about interrogation techniques during a House hearing.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — A Democratic lawmaker's comment that he was "glad" that a top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney could be identified by al Qaeda has sparked outrage among Republicans at the White House and on Capitol Hill.

During a contentious House hearing on harsh interrogation techniques for terror suspects Thursday, Rep. Bill Delahunt, D-Massachusetts, was pressing David Addington, the vice president's chief of staff, about meetings he attended while serving as Cheney's chief counsel.

Delahunt asked repeatedly whether the topic of waterboarding, a controversial interrogation technique that simulates drowning, ever came up.

Addington replied that he could not discuss that because "al Qaeda may watch C-SPAN."

"Right," Delahunt responded. "Well, I'm sure they are watching, and I'm glad they finally have the chance to see you, Mr. Addington."

"Yeah, I'm sure you're pleased," Addington shot back.

"Given your penchant for being unobtrusive," Delahunt said about Addington's ability to stay behind the scenes.

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Vice President Cheney joked Monday about being Sen. Barack Obama's eighth cousin

(CNN) – Vice President Cheney’s appearance at the National Press Club took a decidedly lighter tone Monday afternoon when he was asked about his distant relationship to Sen. Barack Obama, who leads in the delegate count for the Democratic presidential nomination.

“It’s true. We are, in fact, distantly related,” the Vice President said. “We haven’t talked about a family reunion. I have no objections. I’m not sure Sen. Obama is up for it, at least not before November. He’d probably be fearful I might whisper in his ear and change his whole view of the Middle East,” Cheney added.

“His mother and my grandmother have a common ancestor, descended from Maryland about eight generations back. So, we are, in fact, cousins,” Cheney said of his relationship to the Democratic presidential hopeful.

For his part, Obama has made a point of joking about his relationship to Cheney in stump speeches since Cheney’s wife revealed the relationship last fall. In November of last year, Obama referred to his relationship to the Vice President and likened Cheney to the proverbial “black sheep in the family, a crazy uncle in the attic.”

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Asked what he thought of former White House spokesman Scott McClellan's new tell-all book, Vice-President Cheney said Monday he agreed with former senator Bob Dole, who called McClellan a "miserable creature."

"I thought Bob Dole got it about right," Cheney said, without further comment, drawing scattered gasps, chuckles and applause from an audience at the National Press Club.

"I haven't read Scott McClellan's book. I don't plan to read Scott McClellan's book any time soon," Cheney had said a moment before, enunciating the words "Scott McClellan's book" slowly and carefully both times.

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Listen to Cheney’s remarks Wednesday night.

(CNN)– Vice President Dick Cheney tells a room full of journalists at the annual correspondents dinner that his feelings toward the media drove him to confession with the pope .

CNN’s John King reports on Vice President Cheney and McCain’s trip to Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) — Vice President Dick Cheney arrived in Baghdad on Monday on an unannounced visit, the Iraqi prime minister's office said.

Cheney plans to meet with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the prime minister's office said. Cheney also plans to meet with Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker, aides said.

Also on the vice president's schedule are Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and President Jalal Talabani, as well as Iraq's vice presidents and other key political leaders.

Cheney began a trip to the Middle East on Sunday with an official itinerary that listed stops in Oman, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Israel and the West Bank, according to the White House.

Related: Watch Vice President Cheney's remarks from Baghdad

WASHINGTON (CNN) — He's often considered the most powerful Vice President in history, but in a lighter moment during a speech in North Carolina Thursday Dick Cheney noted the position often isn't given much respect.

"Before the Constitution was written, some, including Benjamin Franklin, believed the Vice Presidency was entirely unnecessary," he said. "He said that if the office were to be created, anyone who served as Vice President should be addressed as "Your Superfluous Excellency."

"That's a lot better than some of the things I've been called," Cheney added to laughter.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Vice President Dick Cheney warned Congress Wednesday that a "day of reckoning" is near if it doesn't soon pass a bill to replace an expiring law that expanded the government's ability to conduct warrantless surveillance of suspected terrorists.

In a speech before the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, Cheney called on lawmakers to make permanent the temporary changes that helped close a gap in the intelligence community's ability to gather information important to national security.

Last August, Congress hurriedly passed the Protect America Act (PAA) after the Director of National Intelligence told the lawmakers that technology changes had hampered the ability to collect intelligence against terrorists. The law expires February 1.

The vice president also pushed Congress to give immunity to telecommunications companies who assist the government in the warrantless eavesdropping on terrorists believed to be overseas even if those calls should involve conversations with people in the United States.

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McGovern is calling for Bush and Cheney to be impeached.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – George McGovern, the Democratic Party's 1972 nominee for president, is calling on Congress to impeach President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

And in an editorial in Sunday's Washington Post, McGovern writes the case for impeaching the current president is "far stronger" than the case made against former President Richard Nixon — the man who soundly defeated McGovern in the general election match up.

"Bush and Cheney are clearly guilty of numerous impeachable offenses," McGovern writes. "They have repeatedly violated the Constitution. They have transgressed national and international law. They have lied to the American people time after time.

"Their conduct and their barbaric policies have reduced our beloved country to a historic low in the eyes of people around the world," he continued.

McGovern, a former three-term senator who ran for president on a fiercely anti-war platform, also called the administration's policy in Iraq a "a murderous, illegal, nonsensical war" in violation of international law.

"This reckless disregard for life and property, as well as constitutional law, has been accompanied by the abuse of prisoners, including systematic torture, in direct violation of the Geneva Conventions of 1949," he added.

But McGovern acknowledged there is little bipartisan support for an impeachment effort, blaming "superficial partisanship" among Republicans, and a "a lack of courage and statesmanship on the part of too many Democratic politicians."

– CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney

Cheney is set to undergo a heart procedure Monday afternoon.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Vice President Dick Cheney will undergo a heart procedure Monday afternoon after doctors discovered an irregular heartbeat, his office announced.

Cheney was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation, an irregular heartbeat, when he visited his doctor Monday morning complaining of a lingering cough after a cold. It was then that the arrhythmia was diagnosed, the vice president's office reported.

Doctors described the procedure — intended to shock the heart back into normal rhythm — as routine, and said they expect the vice president to return to his residence Monday night.

The 66-year-old vice president has had a history of heart ailments — including four heart attacks dating back to 1978 — and was briefly hospitalized in January 2006 after suffering shortness of breath.

– CNN White House Correspondent Ed Henry

Watch former Ambassador Wilson's interview with John Roberts.

(CNN) — The revelation by a former White House spokesman that President Bush and Vice President Cheney were "involved" in the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson's identity shows how the White House "closed ranks" to protect themselves, her husband, Joe Wilson, said Wednesday.

The information — from an upcoming book by Scott McClellan — also shows how important it was to the administration to commute the sentence of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Wilson said on CNN's "American Morning."

"I think it now makes it very clear the extent to which the vice president was involved, which, of course, then makes it very clear how important to the vice president the commutation of Mr. Libby's sentence was," the former U.S. ambassador said.

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Rep. Dennis Kucinich would like to have the House debate impeaching Vice President Cheney.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The House voted Tuesday to stop Rep. Dennis Kucinich's, D-Ohio, effort to bring up a debate on impeaching Vice President Dick Cheney.

Kucinich, who is vying for the Democratic presidential nomination, has tried to bring up the issue on three separate occasions. The House voted 218-194 to send it to committee, effectively killing it.

On the House floor, Kucinich said Cheney "acted in a manner contrary to his trust as vice president." Kucinich also said Cheney harmed national security by openly threatening Iran.

"Vice President Richard B. Cheney by such conduct is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office," Kucinich said.

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino criticized Democrats in Congress for spending time on this debate rather than focusing on health care for children and veterans.

"This Congress has not sent a single appropriations bill to the president’s desk this year – a new record of failure," Perino said.

"Yet, they find time to spend an entire work period on futile votes to impeach the vice president or to pass contempt citations against the president’s chief of staff and former counsel. It is this behavior that leaves the American people shaking their head in wonder at this Congress,” Perino added.

–CNN Associate Producer Lauren Kornreich

Obama is sworn into the Senate by his eighth cousin, Vice President Cheney.

SPARTANBURG, South Carolina (CNN) – At a campaign event Saturday, Sen. Barack Obama called his distant cousin, Vice President Dick Cheney, "a crazy uncle in the attic."

Obama was referencing the recent revelation by the Vice President's wife, Lynne Cheney, that he and the Vice President are distantly related.

"For the first time in a long time, the name George Bush will not appear on the ballot," he told the crowd of about 500 people at Converse College in Spartanburg.

"The name Dick Cheney, my cousin, will not appear on the ballot," Obama said. "We had been trying to hide that cousin thing for a long time. Everybody's got a black sheep in the family. A crazy uncle in the attic."

Click here to see CNN's new political portal: CNNPolitics.com

– CNN South Carolina Producer Peter Hamby

President Bush suggested Wednesday the vice president is going as Darth Vader this Halloween.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Even Vice President Dick Cheney is dressing up for Halloween — according to President Bush.

Speaking before a Grocery Manufacturers Association gathering Wednesday, Bush suggested his No. 2 is going as "Star Wars" nemesis Darth Vader this year — even though he's not wearing a costume.

"This morning I was with the vice president," Bush joked. "I was asking him what costume he was planning. He said, 'Well I'm already wearing it,' and then he mumbled something about the dark side of the force."

Cheney has often been likened to the infamous character, most recently by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton at a fundraiser in September.

"You can always tell when the Republicans are getting restless, because the Vice President’s motorcade pulls into the Capitol, and Darth Vader emerges," the New York senator said.

Cheney himself addressed the comparison earlier this month, telling the Institute for Near East Policy, "Most of you knew me long before anyone called me Darth Vader.”

"I've been asked if that nickname bothers me, and the answer is, no," Cheney added then. "After all, Darth Vader is one of the nicer things I've been called recently."

– CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney

Vice President Dick Cheney latest hunting trip sparked a new controversy.

UNION VALE, New York (AP) — Vice President Dick Cheney spent about eight hours hunting Monday at a secluded Hudson Valley gun club where well-heeled enthusiasts shoot ducks and pheasants.

It was Cheney's second visit to Clove Valley Rod & Gun Club in Dutchess County, about 70 miles north of New York City. The previous trip was in fall 2001.

Although a heavy police presence kept the media and curious local residents at a distance, Cheney's visit did stir up a bit of controversy when a New York Daily News photographer snapped a picture of a small Confederate flag hanging inside a garage on the hunt club property.

The photo was shown to New York City civil rights activist the Rev. Al Sharpton, who issued a statement demanding that the vice president "leave immediately, denounce the club and apologize for going to a club that represents lynching, hate and murder to black people."

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Watch Obama make light of his distant relation to Cheney Monday.

CONCORD, New Hampshire (CNN) – After filing for the New Hampshire primary Monday, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, addressed a large crowd at a rally outside the statehouse. There, he criticized the Bush administration, while highlighting genealogical ties to 'cousin,' Vice President Dick Cheney.

Last week, in an interview with MSNBC, Lynn Cheney said that her husband and Obama shared an ancestor from eight generations ago.

"Let's face it. All across America people are tired of George Bush. They are tired of this administration. They are tired of my 'cousin' Dick Cheney. We had been keeping this under raps. Everybody's got a black sheep in the family," Obama said.

–CNN New Hampshire producer Sareena Dalla

Obama is sworn into the Senate by his eighth cousin, Vice President Cheney.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – Go back far enough, the saying goes, and everyone's related.

But could it be possible that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and Vice President Dick Cheney share a common ancestor?

Cheney's wife Lynne says yes.

In an interview on MSNBC Tuesday afternoon, Mrs. Cheney said that in the course of researching her husband's genealogy for her new book, "Blue Skies, No Fences," she discovered that the two public figures share an ancestor eight generations ago.

"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."

Mrs. Cheney's spokeswoman Ginny Justice gave CNN's Ed Henry more details, saying the two unlikely relatives are related through a French Huguenot named Mareen Duvall. Cheney and Obama are both descendants of her.

According to Justice, the vice president is related to her through "the first" Richard Cheney, who came to America in the 1650's. His granddaughter married Samuel Duvall, son of Mareen Duvall.

But is blood thicker than the partisan waters of Washington? Apparently not.

Even though Obama is related to her husband, Mrs. Cheney said she is not supporting the Illinois Democrat's White House bid.

Reacting to the news, 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."

But Obama's family ties to the Bush administration don't stop with Cheney. According to an article in the Chicago Sun-Times last September, Obama is also an 11th cousin of the president himself. The two share a 17th century Massachusetts relative.

Click here to see CNN's new political portal: CNNPolitics.com

– CNN's Alexander Mooney and Lauren Kornreich

Clinton referred to Cheney as 'Darth Vader' Wednesday night.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – She has been sharply critical of Vice President Dick Cheney in the past, but Democratic Presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton took it up a notch Wednesday night, calling the president's No. 2 "Darth Vader."

The New York Democrat referred to Cheney as the infamous Star Wars villain at a New York fundraiser when she described his efforts to keep Republican senators behind the Iraq war.

"Vice President Cheney came up to see the Republicans yesterday," Clinton said at the fundraiser. "You can always tell when the Republicans are getting restless, because the Vice President’s motorcade pulls into the Capitol, and Darth Vader emerges."

The crowd erupted in laughter.

"I’m not invited to their meetings and I don’t know what he says or does," she added. "But all the brave talk about bringing our troops home, and setting deadlines, and getting out by a certain date just dissipated."

The comments came during an informal talk on stage with former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack and retired Gen. Wesley Clark, both supporters of Clinton.

But this isn't the first time the vice president has been likened to Darth Vader. Cheney actually made the comparison himself in an interview with CNN's John King in June of 2006.

"I suppose people sometimes look at my demeanor and say, well, he's the Darth Vader of the administration," he said then.

– CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney

Watch Vice President Cheney's reaction to MoveOn.org's Petraeus 'betray us' ad.

KANSAS CITY, Missouri (CNN) — Vice President Dick Cheney on Monday waded into the week-old controversy over a newspaper advertisement that criticized the top U.S. commander in Iraq, using a speech at a Republican fund-raiser to call the ad "an outrage."

Republicans have blasted the full-page New York Times ad by the anti-war activist group MoveOn.org, which questioned whether Gen. David Petraeus was "cooking the books" in his report to Congress last week. GOP lawmakers have demanded that Democrats disavow the Sept. 11 ad, which was titled "General Petraeus or General Betray Us?" (Related video: Strategy Session: Was MoveOn out of line?)

"Like most Americans I admire the integrity and the candor that General Petraeus showed in his hearings before Congress," Cheney said during a fund-raiser for Missouri Republican congressman Sam Graves. "The attacks on him by MoveOn.org in ad space provided at subsidized rates in the New York Times last week were an outrage."

The Times said last week that MoveOn.org paid $65,000 for the page — the normal rate for an advocacy ad from a non-profit group, according to newspaper spokeswoman Catherine Mathis. The newspaper had no additional comment Monday.

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Clinton took issue with comments by Vice President Cheney.

(CNN) — Sen. Hillary Clinton Wednesday struck back at Vice President Dick Cheney, after he said that he supported Defense Department officials who chided the New York Democrat for requesting a withdrawal plan from Iraq.

In May, Clinton sent a letter to the Pentagon asking Defense Secretary Robert Gates to brief Congress on contingency plans for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq. Defense Undersecretary Eric Edelman responded in a letter to Clinton that public discussion of troop withdrawals "reinforces enemy propoganda." Defense Secretary Robert Gates sent a follow up letter to Clinton expressing resentment regret that "this important discussion went astray." Gates reaffirmed his belief in congressional oversight of government.

In an interview with CNN's Larry King Tuesday, Cheney said "I agreed with the letter Eric Edelman wrote. I thought it was a good letter."

Clinton fired back with a letter to Cheney, saying "Your comments agreeing with Under Secretary Edelman, not Secretary Gates, have left me wondering about the true position of the Administration," the Democratic presidential candidate said. "Therefore I am writing to President Bush asking that he set the record straight about the Administration's position regarding the role of Congress in oversight of the war."

Also on Wednesday, Clinton urged supporters to sign a letter from her calling for clarification on Bush administration Iraq policy. "Its time to find out exactly where the Bush administration stands on this issue," Clinton said. "I'm going to send a letter to President Bush, and I want your name to be on it," she said in an e-mail to supporters.

"I couldn't care less what Dick Cheney says about me," she said in her e-mail to supporters. "But when he plays politics with the lives of our troops, you had better be sure I'm going to respond."

Megan McGinn, Vice President Cheney's spokeswoman, said Cheney had nothing to add beyond his comments with King Tuesday night.

–CNN Political Desk Editor Jamie Crawford

Vice President Dick Cheney.

(CNN)–Vice President Dick Cheney told CNN's Lary King Tuesday his thoughts on the Senate investigation regarding the firings of U.S. Attorneys. "With respect to the U.S. Attorneys, there has been, I think, a bit of a witch hunt on Capitol Hill as they keep rolling over rocks hoping they can find something," he said. "But there really hasn't been anything that has come up to suggest that there was any wrongdoing of any kind."

When asked his thoughts on the man at the center of the controversy, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Cheney was equally resolute. "Al's a good man, a good friend, on a difficult assignment," he said.

"Are you troubled by what appears to have happened, the appearance of him not telling the truth?" King asked. "Well, I don't want to get into the specifics with respect to his testimony and the questions that were asked. I know Al on a personal and professional basis and I hold him in high regard," Cheney replied. The Vice president again re-stated his support for Gonzales.

Cheney also discussed with King his role as President of the Senate.

The full interview with Vice President Cheney can be seen on "Larry King Live" at 9:00pm eastern Tuesday on CNN.

–CNN Political Desk Editor Jamie Crawford