book #5

Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency (Barton Gellman)

Pretty fantastic read. The wikipedia page strikes me as a pretty good guide to the main revelations and most interesting points in the book. Not a complete synopsis, but a good read of the highlights.

General feelings or observations that came to me while reading…
• Bush comes off as an almost sympathetic figure. Particularly in the early chapters, and really throughout, the vibe is that he's a sincere and well-meaning guy, and his flaw is not idiocy or cruelty, but a consistent neglect of the details, taken too easily by the allure of the Big Idea, and (repeatedly) not drawing enough sources before making a key decision.
• In fact, it becomes fascinating and vaguely surreal that the key players in this book- Yoo, Addington, Cheney, etc- are so devoted to the "Unitary Executive" theory, and yet the President they serve is barely the driving force of any of it. It's interesting that he seems so amiable and disinvested in a machine that is obsessed with his very supremacy. Almost like the child of an exceptionally intense stage mother.
• This book also helped clarify for me the whole John C. Yoo issue-I didn't quite understand how he fit into this picture, and why he is spoken of so contemptuously, but now I understand why- the memos he wrote at the Office of Legal Counsel (essentially the supreme court of the executive branch, the arbiter of policy/interpretive/judicial disputes) justified the use of torture, domestic spying, and other abuses of executive power.
• The examination of the interior shape of the administration, the bureaucratic institutions and who mattered, and how they mattered, is all pretty fascinating. It's very interesting watching Cheney install key allies at certain points, how he utilizes his various personnel resources. His influence really was borne of a mastery of the details, a true willingness to dig in the weeds.
• The card he writes to his grandkids is hilarious. Jesus.
• One line near the end that really struck me- and it's a truism, a point made by many of my favorite analysts, but nonetheless still powerful and tragic- "His best hope of vindication appeared to lie in a future no one could want, a future in which all his efforts failed."
• The book takes a pretty diplomatic, respectful view of Cheney. There's no hesitation to point out his dishonesty or his manipulation, but also the book doesn't assign any villainous ulterior motives to him. He clearly is interested in power, but Gellman (and his sources) take the opportunities they're given to assert that Cheney truly thought he was doing what was best, what was necessary for the country's safety. Overall, I found there was generally, perhaps not enough examination of his motives- we know these things he did, but why? What was his driving motivational force; the course that he stuck to so unyieldingly, what made it the course he believed in so deeply? That's the sort of insight that the book comes up a little short on; and almost certainly, of course, because Cheney himself wasn't interviewed. He's simply destined to be shrouded in a certain secrecy.