Okay, so you knew this already, but I just found out: the Vice-President’s name is not CHAY-nee; it is CHEE-nee. I heard this from some wallpaper talking head on TV yesterday—maybe it was Chris Matthews—and sure enough, it’s easy to track down on the web; see e.g., link.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, there seems to be some latter day question about how to correctly pronounce your last name. How do you pronounce it? How do you want us to pronounce it?
CHENEY: How do I pronounce my last night [sic--name?] and how do I want you to pronounce it? Well, the family's always said Cheney with an "e" and that was especially true West growing up. I find, when I came East, that the tendency was to say Cheney with an "a". I'll respond to either. It really doesn't matter.
So, if it is old stuff, then why am I telling you now? Glad you asked. The point is, that I once had the same problem. When I was in the Army national guard, I had a captain who regularly mispronounced my name. He wasn’t a bad guy, actually, but he wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer and in any event, he controlled my life, at a time when and in a way that I emphatically did not want it to be controlled.
So I took my revenge on him. How? By not correcting him. Ha! I’ll show you! I’ll let you languish in ignorance! I’ll let you mispronounce my name!
Lame, you say? You bet it was lame, but at the moment, it seemed like the best I could do (actually, I committed a few more acts of passive aggressive nerdery, some more weird and funny, but I won’t clutter the record now).
Anyway, restated: in my case, at least, not correcting a mispronunciation was an act of contempt and rage.
And you, Mr. C?
Fn.: Old lawyer joke:
JUDGE: Young man, are you trying to show your contempt for this court?
LAWYER: No your honor, I’m trying to conceal it.
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