Cheney Demystified

Cheney's speech at AEI yesterday was very good. His role as the defender of the Bush admin is working out well. I was leery of Cheney's increased media appearances at first, mostly because Cheney remains an unpopular figure, and without a measured approach things could quickly worsen. I now believe, however, that more face time will actually help his image and legacy, and will make the debate (and history-writing) of the policies that so many detest from the Bush admin contentious but winnable.

The role of the VP is often a challenging position to master as it is largely devoid of real day-to-day responsibilities and is primarily symbolic. Cheney's PR difficulties originate in this tension: his detractors have accused him of having immense sway over President Bush, primarily in foreign policy (the analogy of Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader is one that has been used often - although obviously imperfect). These concerns are well-known, but are largely undocumented in any way. I invite readers to find legitimate sources that document Cheney's usurpation in any serious way of Bush's foreign policy (other than the 2 or so hours that Bush underwent surgery to remove polyps).

One of the points here is that the Bush presidency in many ways has been largely fictionalized by hyper-liberal cynics, and political opportunists, whose aspirations were to take advantage of an unprecedented and uneasy political climate (post-9/11 America) in order to advance their own careers (think Joe Biden, Kerry, Clinton and countless others: staunch Iraq War supporters at first, then completely and unequivocally denounced the War when it was unpopular, did not support surge because there was little public support, and ran in '04, '06 and '08 on an anti-war, Bush-admin-messed-it-all-up platform). Those people have done an immense disservice to the historical record. But fear not, history is not written by the stammering fools who utter every damned word in obedience to polls and numbers. It is written (if it is written well) by those who carefully examine the record, free of political fetishes and euphemisms, in a way that pays homage to fact and not self.

Bush and his admin had little success in defending themselves from the onslaught of criticism and mythologizing. Part of this I believe has to do with a public confidence drought that Bush suffered most severely in his second term, which I think stemmed from what many would have called Bush's "stupidity" or his "lack of intelligence." In actuality what people perceived as stupidity (as cruel and inconsiderate as that was) - his mispronunciation of words, and general inarticulateness - was probably dyslexia. Many people have made this point. How tragic that what was most likely someone's disability was turned into a justification for further distortion of fact and outright hatred of a man who was dealing with incredibly difficult and unprecedented circumstances. If there is something that makes me incredibly angry, it is when other people's disabilities are made fun of or are exploited for humor or for gain in some way (I still get furious when I think about Obama's late-night gaffe while on the Leno show - what a jackass).

Cheney-as-spokesman has the potential to offer up a serious critique of the Obama administration's hyped-up (and largely heretofore unseen) repudiation of Bush's "evil" and American-value-sacrificing anti-terror regime. I eagerly await the next round of Cheney v. Obama.