Angler by Barton Gellman

Author:Barton Gellman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group USA, Inc.
Published: 2008-01-28T16:00:00+00:00

Losses were not always permanent for the vice president. Nor were they obvious, because Cheney cloaked them in loyal public support.

He stepped aside when Bush felt strongly, swallowing disagreements over the No Child Left Behind Act, the expansion of Medicare drug benefits, and Bush’s middle-of-the-road position on affirmative action. (Cheney had joined Ted Olson, the solicitor general, in urging opposition in principle to any race-based preference.) The vice president considered it absurd that the government should pay the unemployed a bonus for finding work, a notion Bush endorsed. He advised against a bailout for Argentina’s defaulting central bank, but Bush backed a plan proposed by European allies.

When the president made tactical decisions, though, or when Cheney thought his own preferences better served Bush’s principles, he sometimes circled back. In trade negotiations, Karl Rove proposed a deal with Congress: Bush would support a tariff on steel imports if Congress gave him special authority to negotiate new trade agreements. Free-trade purists like Glenn Hubbard hated the steel tariff, but when Bush accepted Rove’s advice, even Hubbard did not know Cheney was on his side.

Instead of grousing about the tariff, Cheney asked his staff to research options to roll it back. Once Bush got what he wanted from Congress, Cheney arranged a repeal for the steel tariff, fifteen months before it was due to expire.

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