Angler

(alterna-title: You Don't Know Dick)
(alterna-alterna-title: )

Seeing Dick Cheney yesterday in that wheelchair was a pretty powerful sight. He was impotent, the dark heart of the administration humbled at last. As I flew back to Philadelphia, I read the book Angler (after Cheney's secret service code name). It focuses most on the first Bush term, which in retrospect was the truly damaging one, the one when Cheney's influence was greatest.

The book opens with a recap of Bush's vice presidential selection process. Cheney, you recall, was in charge of the VP search. He sent out a questionnaire to various candidates that was excruciatingly detailed. (That I can understand - McCain '08 didn't do much VP vetting.) But what interested me was that Cheney never filled out that questionnaire. In fact much of the selection process seems to have been a sham. Bush conducted sham interviews with some contenders after he offered Cheney the job. In fact, the traits Cheney was looking for in a VP seemed to be traits that were strong in himself.

To be clear, the sending out of the questionnaires was not a sham - but the information Cheney received could be easily used for blackmail. That points to what I viewed as the underlying theme of the book: Cheney wanted to concentrate power, power that could be easily misused.

And I want to talk about that some more. I haven't even explained the Frank Keating story that occupies some of Chapter 1. It's revealing, but I'll pass over it for now. What I do know is that I am zonked out from translating Horace, and do not feel like knowing Dick. (Sorry.) But I'll help you know Dick a bit better over the course of the coming days. Another theme I'll introduce - I did a series on Senator Church earlier in the month. Cheney is the anti-Church, and I'll talk about that.