This is a ring necked pheasant. A "hunting party" lead by US VP Dick Cheney shot 417 of them in Dakota the other day. You can tell a natural woodsman when you see one can't you and they don't look like Dick Cheney!

So how did they bag such a catch? Well they arrived in Cheney's chauffer driven limo, accompanied by several secret service vehicles at a private hunting facility where some sycophantic lacky handed them shotguns then released cage reared birds for them to shoot. Being cage reared these birds were unfit and stood little chance of escaping slaughter.

Obviously he was disappointed he didn't get to shoot someone in Iraq himself. This is a way he gets to do some shooting of things with no risk, afterall he had the secret service agents to protect him in case a pheasant turned on him. Sadly the young men and women he has packed off to Iraq and Afganistan don't have a similar chance of returning home unharmed.

To abandon the satire for a moment, The Green Man thinks it is pathetic that someone in as powerful a position as Dick Cheney feels he needs to slaughter caged birds to prove himself a big macho man. Dick, if you want to pretend that you are the "great white hunter", The Green Man suggests you pull on a backpack, grab a rifle and fishing rod and head out into the wilderness where your mental strength and resourcefulness can really be tested.

Read the press release from The Humane Society on the incident.