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Son of Nixon
In Part II of the Farewell Chronicles, Nixon aide John Dean plans the retirement of Dick Cheney—and details the veep's similarities with his former boss.
I would love to write a biography of Dick Cheney’s vice presidential years to better understand and then explain how he all but single-handedly—without being impeached or imprisoned or seriously threatened with either—rebuilt the “Imperial Presidency” (picking up where Reagan & Company left off). In doing so, Cheney revived “stonewalling” as the lingua franca of presidential communications, pushed government secrecy and unaccountability to unprecedented new levels, shamed Americans throughout the world as torturers while compounding our problems with terrorism, richly serviced his oil patch cronies, and made the once toothless Office of the Vice President a threat to Constitutional government.
To understand Richard Nixon, as I believe I do, is to appreciate that Cheney has carried Nixon’s political DNA into contemporary Republican politics and governing.
For me, Cheney is the last of a dying breed of former Nixon aides and apologists who do not believe that the disgraced president set the standard for what should not be done, rather that he provided a “to do” list legacy. To understand Richard Nixon, as I believe I do, is to appreciate that Cheney has carried Nixon’s political DNA into contemporary Republican politics and governing. Chris Wallace of Fox News Sunday closed the case on Cheney’s Nixonian nature when he asked the vice president during a recent exit interview a question that produced the eeriest of echoes for anyone who has seen the Frost/Nixon film, or recalls the actual interviews from decades earlier. Nixon told David Frost, “Well, when the president does it that means that it is not illegal.” Thirty-one years later, Wallace asked Cheney, “If the President, during war, decides to do something to protect the country, is it legal?” Without blinking, Cheney replied, “General proposition, I'd say yes.”
Like Nixon, Cheney operates best shrouded with secrecy. Cheney plays the enigma well. Unlike Nixon, however, who had intellectual heft, remarkable political acumen and a carefully developed world vision, Cheney has a small-bore mind along with a world-class Rolodex. At heart Cheney is and always has been the consummate “staff man”—an implementer of the ideas of others but neither an original nor analytical thinker. He started in Washington as a staff person and simply never grew beyond that role. As vice president, he was Bush’s super-head of staff, and when not doing Bush’s bidding, he was devoted to implementing Nixon’s vision of the presidency—a vision Cheney says he has held since Watergate.
Notwithstanding my interest, I will not write a Cheney biography. My book editor correctly points out the serious problem confronting any Cheney biographer. All Cheney’s important records have surely vanished. In September 2008, Cheney told the federal judge presiding in a lawsuit to force him to comply with the Presidential Records Act that as vice president he was not part of the Executive Branch (because the Senate pays his salary as their presiding officer), so he would decide as he saw fit what he would do with his papers. Fortunately, the court did not buy this nonsense and instructed him to comply with the law. But that instruction only covers the last few months of his tenure. There have been photos of trucks from the “Mid-Atlantic Shredding Services” coming and going to and from Cheney’s official residence at the Naval Observatory for years, so it is almost certain the good stuff is gone. In short, only Cheney can say what Cheney knew and did and why.
For years Cheney said he would never write about his government service. But, of late, he has hinted otherwise. “We’ll see,” he recently told ABC News. According to New York Times reporter Sheryl Stolberg, Cheney’s daughter Liz is pushing her father to write a book, and with his consent, she has been tracking down his pre-vice presidential papers. His other daughter, Mary, told Stolberg, “Whenever you get my dad to tell stories, you always learn something new.” This is true because Cheney never talks about his work. Apparently this is a Wyoming guy thing, Stolberg reported. What may have changed Cheney’s mind is that he is still fuming, according to Stolberg, over the way he was portrayed by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald in the perjury and obstruction of justice trial of his friend and former chief of staff Scooter Libby. Cheney, it will be recalled, was depicted as the evil orchestrator of the scheme to discredit Iraq war critics, including those about whom Libby lied. Additional information about Cheney’s role has been slowly leaking, suggesting that, in fact, Libby lied to protect Cheney. When Chris Wallace asked about Fitzgerald, Cheney icily responded, “I am going to pass on that.”
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God, Cheney is such a dick.
Awesome first paragraph that absolutely capsulated Cheney's role in history. If you grant the license of grouping him in the twentieth century despite his career peaking in the beginning of the twenty-first and there was an unbiased list of the top 20 most dangerous and destructive individuals in the world in the twentieth century, he would easily make the list. I don't want to say he "evil" because the world is so subjective and laced with bias, and you'd have to really understand intent to properly assign it, but I fear he fit it. Eisenhower, one of our greatest generals ever, warned us upon retiring from the Presidency to fear the influence of the U.S. industrial-military complex. Cheney is the anti-Ike, the ultimate champion not of U.S. interests but the self-interests of a privileged minority that wants to rule the world and he's absolutely devoid of any morality or ethic in the accomplishment of this goal. He believes might is right, not only in terms of the U.S. relationship to the world but in the leadership of a ruling class within the U.S. over the rest of the peasants. His is essentially a political sociopath. Whether than makes him "evil" is open to interpretation. But that he will be seen in hindsight as one of the most destructive figures in U.S. is unquestionable. He will be one of the few names in history that survives his lifetime in infamy despite having not actually been in the supposedly leadership position, like Boss Tweed. He will be the most famous VP not to become president ever, but not for good reasons.
I do not understand why Bush & Cheney were not impeached, nor charged with war crimes (to date)? Yet, everyone is all over Blagojevich who is a dirt bag, but has not had his day in court & pales next to Bush & Cheney. Where is the outrage? Why has Congress turned their backs? I do not understand. Do we not have a functioning government that includes a justice system?.
Dick Cheney is the perfect politician/political insider. First he associates his own goals and wants as a necessity for the nation and second he can easily deceive himself first, making it easier to con others and tell the most blatant lies with ease.
A man like Cheney isn't born, he's 'made', at some point the conscious decision must be made to eschew the path of statesman and follow that other road of career political hack.
Great article, John Dean's insights, as always, are most interesting.
He's a criminal and should be locked up with all the other common swine. But, the sad part is the snake will never pay for any of his crimes. He wins. He will retire with his millions, surround himself with people to tell him how great he is and will live out his years in a comfort very few americans will ever experience. If there is a better example of how this world is fundamentally unfair and how justice doesn't really apply to the rich and powerful, I don't know it.
If Cheney wrote a book who would read it? After all, Hitler is dead.
Cheney is a treasonous pig who should be dealt with accordingly.
Great read, John. I've loved watching you on Keith's show
this past year and hope to find more articles such as this
to feed my brain.
BTW - Reid and Pelosi are wimps of the first order. Allowing
BushCo to get away with so many unconstitutional acts
sends a hideous message to the country as a whole.
msdancer (11:20 am Jan 7),
As an outsider (Brit living in Sydney) I think I can tell you a big part of why there has been no impeachment of Bush or Chaney. It is because both sides perceive government in the US as fragile. Start banging at it with the hammer of impeachment and you don't know where the cracks will appear or the splinters fly. And also if you impeach then they might just do the same in their turn.
This is what I like to think of as my weak theory: circumstances may at times overpower it, like the Clinton mess. It is, I felt at the time, a large part of why Al Gore went quietly over the disputed Florida returns in the 2000 Presidential Election.
Hope this helps.
Cheney's farewell tour seems to have a single theme: there's nothing to see here. Move along. He's not really trying to revise history; he's arguing that what he and his co-conspirators did was not only acceptable, it was noble, and history will credit them.
He argues that the war will be won, recalling Hitler's comments to his general staff before invading Poland: "The victor will not be asked afterward whether he told the truth or not. In starting and waging war, it is not right that matters, but victory."
Your post explains where and how that outlook developed--call it Nixonian. I detect the scent of burn bags and over-heated shredders over the next couple of weeks.
As always, an insightful post.
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John, brilliant article. However, I don't believe that it bothers Mr. Cheney one bit that his approval rating is only 13%. This is a man who believes that his intellect is far above the common man. He believes that he knows the correct course for the country and that the best way to achieve it was to act unilaterally and covertly whenever possible.
The "war on terror" is certainly real, but also certainly a cover for something much larger. The overwhelming commitment of resources to a couple of countries posing very little real threat to us has much more to do with their nuclear neighbors and the location of large oil reserves than with hunting terrorists.
I am certain that he believes he will be vindicated by history, and that the rest of us plebes will someday respect him for asserting America's military might at the beginning of the "oil wars." However, with the destruction of so many historical records, we may never know enough about his motives to every fairly judge him as either a geopolitical visionary or a self-interested war monger.
i always get the hugest smile whenever i'm watching countdown and keith intros john dean. unmitigated joy.
This country is far less fragile than we give it credit for being. Cheney should be tried for war crimes because he approved the use of torture. Cheney should be tried for revealing the identity of a covert CIA operative. Cheney is tied directly to our lousy energy policy, the slimy antics of Halliburton in Iraq, and for misdemeanors we will never find out about. He is an evil, evil man with the blood of thousands on his hands.
FFF - G Bush's lawyer in white house after harriet left and cheney's friend of 30 years (FFF's daughter Alexa worked for Cheney) should also be noted in history as a lawyer who did everything he could to undermine the legal system. I worked with him before he went into govt and FFF was notorious for simply ignoring courts rules etc. The guy is a real empty suit he has only lived off the dole. What a piece of work both Cheney and FFF are - they think their sh$t don't stink but the nice part about the world today is long after they are gone their wiki profiles will be updated with the truth - and the truth will hurt descendants of both these families, whose lineage will never find work from any honest and honorable American. PERIOD
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