The Dick Cheney You Don't Know

Howard Mortman reprints Kenneth Tomlinson's review of Stephen Hayes’s new book, Cheney: The Untold Story of America’s Most Powerful and Controversial Vice President:

[W]henever I think about the most powerful material in the book, I come back to Cheney’s early life. Like the time Cheney was twice nailed for drunk driving while working in transmission line construction in the mountains of Wyoming. Hayes writes:

The same month that he was arrested for a second time, Cheney’s friends and former classmates received their diplomas from Yale. As he sat in the jail cell in Rock Springs, the contrast struck him hard. For 18 years, Cheney had a carefree life marked by a series of seemingly effortless accomplishments. His admission to Yale, on a full scholarship, appeared to continue this promising trajectory.

Now almost four years after the excitement and anticipation of that first cross-country train trip to New Haven, Cheney found himself alone in jail, left to contemplate everything that had gone wrong. Even for someone who had been—and would be—known for his equanimity, it was another disturbing new low.

So how did Cheney emerge from these depths?

He experienced no rehab or AA. Fact is, he didn’t even stop drinking.

Seems his girlfriend who had just graduated early from the University of Colorado let him know she had no intension of spending her life with an electrical worker who was in trouble with the law. He knew Lynne Vincent was a woman of her word. So he simply straightened up and went to the University of Colorado let him know she had no intension of spending her life with an electrical worker who was in trouble with the law. He knew Lynne Vincent was a woman of her word. So he simply straightened up and went to the University of Wyoming (where he lived on tomato soup and rice) and got interested in political science.