Mystery: Why did Cheney make himself VP and not Chief of Staff?

[HamdenRice]

This question just occurred to me, as I was reading one of the declassification threads relating to the Plame scandal.

On its face, the idea that the VP has the authority to declassify documents should be absurd. But so is all the power and influence wielded by this VP absurd. The job of the VP historically has been to do nothing at all, unless the president died in office. It was because FDR kept Truman so uninformed, and that the cabinet members were worried that Truman could not step into the middle of WWII and the Manhattan Project, that subsequent presidents began to keep VPs more informed and involve them in policy. But still, VP were largely ceremonial officials, attending funerals of foreign dignitaries and such.

The second most powerful person in the executive in the modern era has always been the Chief of Staff.

It is widely known that Cheney was in charge of selecting Bush's VP, and selected himself. But if his goal was to assume the power behind the throne, why did he select himself as VP, and not as chief of staff? Was it mere opportunism, since he was not asked to choose the chief of staff, but the VP, and only later decided to transform the VP's office? Or did he have as his plan all along to select himself as VP because he wanted to transform the office.

It's quite bizarre, isn't it, that the VP is so powerful when he really has almost no statutory or constitutional duties.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. Did you catch the earlier thread today about the ** order that gave

the Veep expanded powers?

[Kagemusha]

2. You should go with the "wanted to transform the office" option.

That seems more correct to me. He also wanted to use his position there to expand the power of the presidency far beyond its (to him) bastardized power as a result of unjust congressional action after Watergate.

[MadisonProgressive]

3. The only reason the COS is powerful

is because people have to go through him to be able to see the President. Plus, it's a grueling job. Uncka Dick doesn't have to go through the COS (I'm sure about that one!) and he doesn't really have to work if he doesn't want to either.

[emulatorloo]

4. See Blumenthal - "The Long March of Dick Cheney" if you get a chance

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/printer_112505N.shtml

The Long March of Dick Cheney
By Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday 24 November 2005

<snip>

For his entire career, he sought untrammeled power. The Bush presidency and 9/11 finally gave it to him - and he's not about to give it up.

The hallmark of the Dick Cheney administration is its illegitimacy. Its essential method is bypassing established lines of authority; its goal is the concentration of unaccountable presidential power. When it matters, the regular operations of the CIA, Defense Department and State Department have been sidelined.

Richard Nixon is the model, but with modifications. In the Nixon administration, the president was the prime mover, present at the creation of his own options, attentive to detail, and conscious of their consequences. In the Cheney administration, the president is volatile but passive, firm but malleable, presiding but absent. Once his complicity has been arranged, a closely held "cabal" - as Lawrence Wilkerson, once chief of staff to former Secretary of State Colin Powell, calls it - wields control.

Within the White House, the office of the vice president is the strategic center. The National Security Council has been demoted to enabler and implementer. Systems of off-line operations have been laid to evade professional analysis and a responsible chain of command. Those who attempt to fulfill their duties in the old ways have been humiliated when necessary, fired, retired early or shunted aside. In their place, acolytes and careerists indistinguishable from true believers in their eagerness have been elevated.

<snip>

[A Simple Game]

5. There was always the chance that the pick for the

number one spot wouldn't work out.