Product Description

Dick Cheney is the most powerful yet most unpopular vice president in U.S. history. He has thrived alongside a president who from day one had little interest in policy and limited experience in the ways of Washington. Yet Cheney’s quiet, steady rise to prominence over a span of three decades occurred largely behind the scenes. Now veteran reporters Lou Dubose and Jake Bernstein reveal the disturbing truth about the man who has successfully co-opted executive control over the U.S. government, serving as the de facto “shadow president” of the most dominant White House in a generation.

Cheney has always been an astute politician. He survived the collapse of the Nixon presidency, finding a position of power in the administration of Gerald Ford. He was then elected to the House of Representatives, and later he earned a spot in the cabinet of the first Bush presidency. But when he became George W. Bush’s running mate, Cheney reached a new level of influence. From the engineering of his own selection as vice president to his support of policies allowing torture as a permissible weapon in the “war on terror,” Cheney has steered America consistently rightward. In Vice, Dubose and Bernstein uncover startling revelations, including

• the extraordinary intimidation of CIA officials by a vice president bent on obtaining intelligence to support a foregone conclusion: the invasion of Iraq

• details on Cheney’s secret energy task force, including his meeting with Enron chief Ken Lay months before Lay was indicted–and how Cheney went to court to erode the powers of Congress
• how Cheney helped to kill 2003 diplomatic overtures from Iran to discuss concessions on its nuclear program and policy toward Israel
• Cheney’s role in engineering multibillion-dollar military contracts in Iraq to benefit Halliburton, the company he once ran
• eyewitness reports from prominent Republican and conservative sources who go on record for the first time to tell the truth about how Dick Cheney has hijacked the American presidency

In the words of one of Cheney’s colleagues from the House: “Dick keeps his own counsel. He’s completely in control. He’s completely sure of himself in everything he does. It’s what got him to where he is today: the most powerful vice president to ever hold office. It’s also what’s bringing about his downfall.” In Vice, we get an unprecedented exposé of how Cheney operates and what his vice presidency will mean to America–now and in the future.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #472921 in Books
• Published on: 2006-10-17
• Released on: 2006-10-17
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 272 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Dubose and Bernstein show in this thorough, rollicking career biography that it's Cheney-not the more publicly criticized Donald Rumsfeld, Karl Rove, Condoleeza Rice or President Bush-who is chiefly responsible for the most unpopular aspects of the Bush regime: an imperial executive office and foreign policy; abandonment of democratic ideals (respect for government checks and balances, the Geneva Convention, the Bill of Rights and the Freedom of Information Act); and questionable corporate-government colusion (the secret energy task force, Halliburton's government contracts in Iraq). Tracing Cheney through three White House adminsitrations, six terms in the House of Representatives, and a tour as Halliburton CEO, the portrait that emerges from these pages is both alarming and compelling; like a J.R. Ewing, Cheney proves to be the kind of fascinating figure you love to hate. As obstacles to Cheney's will-Congress, the Constitution, foreign countries, the press, or other politicians-are sidestepped, ignored, or trammeled, Cheney emerges as a classic Machiavellian; in Cheney's case, it appears that the end which justifies the means is power, pure and simple. Against Cheney, idealistic liberals who believe that an appeal to democratic ideals, the Constitution, or basic decency will work with this administration emerge here as painfully naïve; unfortunately, this realization has only settled in after the damage was already done. Dubose and Bernstein present a sobering and darkly flattering expose of the reclusive power behind the throne, and a grim vision of what his legacy may be.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Dubose and Bernstein, journalists who have covered Texas politics with a particular eye on the career of President George W. Bush, examine the power and personality of the vice president. With a penchant for secrecy and disdain for Congress and the press, Cheney has managed to skirt all the rules that were meant to balance powers in the U.S. government, forever changing the power vested in the office of the vice president. Dubose and Bernstein detail Cheney's close ties to energy interests and how those ties influenced policy and led to efforts to circumvent congressional oversight. In what Dubose and Bernstein call a secrecy "befitting the Kremlin," Cheney maneuvered around sunshine laws and defied the media, Congress, and lawsuits to assert the administration's rights to secrecy in developing national policy on everything from energy to the war in Iraq. Dubose and Bernstein also ponder the implications of Cheney's actions for the future of the U.S. government. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author
Lou Dubose has covered Texas politics for twenty-five years. He is the co-author (with Molly Ivins) of two New York Times bestsellers, Shrub: The Short but Happy Political Life of George W. Bush and Bushwhacked: Life in George W. Bush’s America. In 2003 he wrote (with Texas Monthly writer Jan Reid) The Hammer: Tom DeLay, God, Money, and the Rise of the Republican Congress (released in paperback as The Hammer Comes Down: The Nasty, Brutish and Shortened Political Life of Tom DeLay). He has also written a political biography of Karl Rove. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife, Jeanne Goka.

Texas Observer executive editor Jake Bernstein has chronicled stories from Washington, D.C., to the jungles of Central America. As a weekly reporter in Miami, he covered the 2000 Florida recount and the Elián González story. While working as a freelancer in Guatemala and El Salvador, he wrote about the destruction of the rain forest and the end of guerrilla insurgencies. In Texas, Bernstein’s work on Tom DeLay’s campaign-finance scandals has won multiple journalism awards. He lives in Austin.

Customer Reviews

Must read
Whether you believe Dick Cheney is trying to protect our country by "fighting terrorism" or is simply unhinged by hubris (and perhaps ill health), you need to read this book. Don't be swayed by terms like "Torture Presidency" or "Lady MacCheney". Yes, the book has bias, but its reporting is too thorough for dismissal as a partisan hack job.

Anecdotal evidence suggests his influence is banking. Yet he bestrides this administration like a Claude Raines villain in an old Warners adventure movie, a guardian-chamberlain dominating Dubya, the cocksure, brittle dauphin on the throne. Fellow reviewer Robert D. Steele says Cheney should be placed in irons, and presents persuasive evidence crystallizing the themes of the book.

Vice documents how Dick Cheney and his long-time counsel David Addinhgton have put into action an authoritarian "unitary executive" theory to give the president unwaarranted powers, and have arrogated these powers to the vice president's office, accountable to no one.

It's all here: torture, signing statements, shadow governance in "the dark side, if you will," as Cheney puts it, eavesdropping on the White House staff, the lies leading to the Iraq War, the wiretapping, the seeret energy task force, sweetheart Halliburton contracts, the failure - almost surely deliberate - to reconstitute Congress in prospective post-attack plans. The 25 questions for Dick Cheney at the end (page 225 or thereabouts) should be at the top of Congress's list when Cheney and Addington get their subpoenas.

At the the same time, the book raises as many questions as it answers, largely due to the authors' lack of access, a largely absent paper trail (a tip learned from Cheney's mentor Don Rumsfeld) and the secretive nature of this enigmatic American version of Yuri Andropov. (An aside: The handling of the Texas hunting accident and subsequent reassignment of all the Secret Service agents had touches of Kremlin black comedy).

The book raises, but cannot answer, Cheney's evident shift from an extreme, but pragmatic, right-wing Rpublican who said Saddam Hussein's downfall was not worth "very damn many" American lives, to the rigid, hell-bent-for-war authoritarian ideologue we see today. (Is it 9-11? Partly. The heart attacks? Perhaps. Cheney's onetime friends are baffled. But the authors can only raise the questions.)

So, if the final book has yet to be written, this one gives us a useful map. The surprise is that it has not received more notice; it is on par with - and in some ways superior to - the recent works of Suskind, Ricks, Isikoff, Woodward, Rich and Chandrasekaran, among others, who have tried to shed light on this administration's apparently endless dark corners.

Cheney, the Secret President
There is more to Cheney than meets the eye. The first part of the book gives an overview of his political life before becoming Vice President, which is necessary for the reader to understand how he operates. Cheney is very ambitious, secretive, and ruthless. He will do whatever it takes to gain power, despite his unpopularity. He has contempt for our democratic way of life, and regularly circumvents the US Constitution, whenever it gets in his way. After reading this book you will more fully understand how we got into the Iraqi mess, and wonder how much freedom Americans will have after Bush and Cheney are out of office. I was convinced Bush and Cheney should be impeached before I read this book, and this book reinforces my opinion.

23 Documented High Crimes That Should Put Cheney in Irons Immediately
EDITED 5 September 2007 to add ten links to other related books.

This book is vastly more detailed, and covers more high crimes and misdemeanors, than either State of Denial, which misunderstands Bush as being in charge, or Crossing the Rubicon, which focuses primarily on Cheney's role in first permitting 9-11, and then working assiduously to cover up his malicious malfeasance. See also Ron Susskind's book, "One Percent Doctrine," which crucifies Cheney, Rumseld, and Rice.

I take this book so seriously that I urge everyone to get the "Do It Yourself Impeachment" kit. He should be required to immediately resign or be impeached. He should not be allowed to serve another month in office.

For the sake of brevity, here is a list of impeachable offenses documented by this book:

1) Secret meetings in violation of the law to include exclusion of government experts
2) Refusal to honor demand from Congress for a list of participants
3) Lies to the public about Iraq, while holding maps of oil fields and already having in mind a US-only domination of those oilfields (he first focused on Iraqi oil while serving Secretary of Defense Brown)
4) Over-ruling of the Environmental Protection Agency on very important matters including its concern over Halliburton's reliance on hydraulic fracturing that uses chemicals that contaminate aquifers--Cheney personally ensured that the EPA's wording was replaced with Halliburton's wording.
5) Consistent and pervasive usurpation of Congressional authorities and consistent and maliciously deliberate avoidance of appropriate disclosure.
6) Fostered attacks on Sy Hersh, and considered authorizing a break-in on his home.
7) From the 1970's, see also Ron Susskind's One-Percent Doctrine, subverted the authority of the Vice President, Nelson Rockefeller, and teams with Justice Scalia (then an assistant attorney general) to increase executive privileges and push back reforms.
8) As a Congressman personally blew off Russian offer in 1983 for arms cuts, and subverted the authority of the President and the Secretary of State then serving.
9) As an extremist Republican, supported Ollie North and the White House in violating the Congressional prohibitions on aid to the Contras, and obstructed justice thereafter.
10) Page 78 has a lovely discussion of how Cheney and North were "in the zone" in deceiving the public and Congress during the televised hearings.
11) Adopted as his own the lunatic report by Khalizad (who is a very lazy scholar, see my review of his rotten RAND book on revolution) and Libby, on how the US as a superpower should be able to do ANYTHING.
12) Attempted to undermine due process and keep tactical nuclear weapons in the Army inventory.
13) Subverted the authority of the Secretary of State (Colin Powell) by allowing his daughter to overrule Ambassadors and meet privately with various heads of state.
13) Lied repeatedly to the public about his continuing financial equities with Halliburton, and was so involved in giving Halliburton up to 16 billion in no bid contracts.
14) Shut both foreign competitors and more cost-effective indigenous contracting solutions, severely harming the national security of the United States by fostering an environment of unproductive looting by Halliburton, Bechtel, and others.
15) Ignored his dual mandates on terrorism and intelligence. The book suggests that Bush was not briefed on Al Qaeda for the first eight months he was in office (the Vice President's priorities were energy and missile defense).
16) Personally impeded negotiations with North Korea after they proved amenable to diplomatic engagement.
17) Personally rejected Iranian overtures for negotiation conveyed by the Swiss in 2003
18) Personally reinforced Rumsfeld on use of torture, by-passing the President's more measured restrictions.
19) Conspired with Speaker Hastert to subordinate the House of Representatives, using a special office of his own (first time in history) so that Representatives could be brought to him rather than his calling on them.
20) Manipulated the President into numerous "signing statements" inconsistent with the will of Congress that ignored legislation then in force.
21) "Bureaucratically emasculated" the President (page 177--if the President has a friend that reads this review, PLEASE get the book and the review to the President--he really may have no idea his balls have been cut off)
22) Contemptuous and manipulative of the CIA, refusing to accept their best professional judgments based not only all source intelligence, but on a extraordinary effort by Charlie Allen in running line crossers into Iraq to document beyond a shadow of a doubt that there were no weapons of mass destruction there.
23) Lied repeatedly, over and over, to the public, to Congress, to the President, to foreign leaders, even after the lies were exposed he continued to repeat them.

The book does not discuss the 9-11 situation and emerging findings that place the Vice President at the center of our deliberately inept response.

Two gems apart from the impeachable offenses:

1) The search for a Vice President was a complete fraud, he was picked from day one, and made a fool of every serious candidate, while also personally leaking to destroy Keating just to ensure the only real rival would not be considered at the last minute.

2) The discussion of Joe Lieberman's refusal to confront Cheney with all that was known to be wrong with him was explained at the time as "taking the high moral road." I am not so sure. I speculate that Lieberman is actually a neo-con and has been playing the Democrats for fools while minding the interests of his Wall Street masters.

On page 147 the authors discuss how Cheney accused Clinton and Gore of "extend[ing] our military commitments while depleting our military power." Lovely. And now?

The authors conclude that Dick Cheney is "nakedly amoral." I agree.

One final scary note: in the many doomsday drills that Cheney participated in across his career and inclusive of his Vice Presidency, they always failed to reconstitute Congress.

Dick Cheney has done more damage and is a greater threat to our Republic and others, than Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein combined.

The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11
Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil
Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq
Debunking 9/11 Debunking: An Answer to Popular Mechanics and Other Defenders of the Official Conspiracy Theory
9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA, Fourth Edition
State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III
The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America
9/11 Mysteries Part 1: Demolitions
9/11: Press For Truth
9/11 - The Myth and the Reality
Aftermath: Unanswered Questions from 9/11

For those wondering why Congress failed to do its Article 1 job (hence all Members are impeachable for dereliction of duty as well):
Running on Empty: How the Democratic and Republican Parties Are Bankrupting Our Future and What Americans Can Do About It
The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America and How to Get It Back on Track (Institutions of American Democracy)
Breach of Trust: How Washington Turns Outsiders Into Insiders