I have this image of a petulent President complaining to Cheney: ‘But… But… But, you said it was gonna be easy! What about what you told me about Santa? And the Easter Bunny? snuffle They’re still real, right?’
Chris Matthews was talking about this on *Hardball * tonight, so there is some speculation to this effect. Short of Bush announcing, “I’m disappointed in Dick Cheney”, I doubt we will ever know for sure. There are good reasons to suspect it however. Cheney clings to talking points long after they have been thoroughly debunked (Saddam’s nukes, 9/11 link to Saddam), and the exemption of the CIA from anti-torture laws is really hard to spin into anything defensible.
There was an article today (I think it was on Drudge) talking about how Chaney is the most power VP in our history. It was a bit of an eye opener (if true) how much raw power the many actually controls…and how much he had to do with US foreign policy during the last 5 years. If I get out of this meeting sometime before midnight I’ll see if I can find the article if anyone is interested.
As far as the OP goes I’ve heard that there is some level of strain between Bush and Chaney lately, but nothing was solid as far as evidence goes. All rumor type things.
I think it was also well noticed among the pundits here that Bush let it be known that Cheney wasn’t at all involved in the Miers nomination, and that he had merely sent Andrew Card over to tell him shortly before the announcement. I didn’t catch it if there was any mention of Cheney and the Alito nomination in the same sentence anywhere until I just wrote this one.
I hear Bush got all up in Cheney’s shit during study hall. He was all like, “Dude. I know you set me up with the wrong answers on the MidEast test.” And Cheney was like, “STFU, bitch. You wouldn’t be on honor role without me.” Then Scalia was like, “Doods, chill. Handle this shit after school.” And Bush was like “No way! I’m tired of taking his fucking shit!” Then Mr. Rove came over all Nazi and shit and said, “All three of you, detention!” And Bush was like, “Fuck you, turd blossom!”
Is Sean Penn going to play Bush in the movie? That would be, like, so cool! Especially if he plays him like a cross between Jeff Spicoli and the coked-out lawyer he played in Carlito’s Way. “This is U.S. History, I see the globe right there.”
There have been rumors that the overall White House atmosphere has just been generally tense lately:
On the one hand, political “insider” gossip is worth pretty much nothing in terms of verifiable facts. On the other hand, if true, this would help explain why Cheney is either distancing himself or being kept at arm’s length.
(“Office pools speculate on how long senior aides will last”? As in, they’re betting on it? Dude, that is not a sign of good employee morale.)
I would guess there isn’t anything that’s come out of the VP’s office lately that Bush isn’t rightly pissed about. Cheney’s dragging the whole show down. Then again it’s Bush’s own fault for ceding so much power to Cheney in the first place.
Sounds to me like the Cheney camp is setting Bush up for a mental competence ouster. This will put him in coflict with the Bush Crime Family. Might be some exciting news coming out of the White House if this shit keeps up.