Cheney Likely to Stay

Cheney Likely to Stay

Paul Weyrich
Wednesday, July 14, 2004

The chorus has begun. The usual suspects are calling for President George W. Bush to replace Vice President Dick Cheney on the ticket for the 2004 elections. The latest to join the chorus is the once-conservative-now-liberal former New York Senator Al D’Amato. It is not just the usual liberals who are singing this song. Staunch conservatives, who have declined to be quoted, feel very strongly that keeping Cheney on the ticket is a big mistake. They have told me that the Halliburton rap against the Veep, no matter how unfair, gives Bush’s opposition too much ammunition.

First let me suggest, based on my knowledge of the President, that it is extremely unlikely that Cheney will be asked to leave the ticket. President Bush is, if anything, loyal. He has worked more closely with his Vice President than perhaps any President has in modern history.

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Cheney has had some health problems, so it is always possible that he would have to leave the ticket at the insistence of his doctors. Absent that remote possibility, I don’t see a way in the world that Cheney will go. Yes, he has high negatives. So did Spiro Agnew by 1972. That didn’t prevent President Nixon from achieving a near-record landslide victory. Dan Quayle also had high negatives going into the 1988 elections. It didn’t prevent George Herbert Walker Bush from winning a convincing victory.

Voters do give a passing glace at the Vice Presidential nominee, wondering if he could be President if that became necessary. In that respect Cheney appears to be more prepared than Senator John Edwards.

Yet, people rise to the occasion. Looking at Harry Truman before FDR died in 1945, almost no one would have judged him to be qualified to be President. He was the product of the Pendergast political machine in Kansas City. Truman was undistinguished in the U.S. Senate. He was chosen because the Vice President during FDR’s third term, Henry Wallace, had gone so far left that Democrat polls were worried that he could become a negative issue in the 1944 campaign. Truman was loyal and would not make trouble, but the idea that Truman would today be viewed as one of the best Presidents of the 20th Century would have left political observers in the middle of World War II shaking their heads.

Anyway, I think it is nearly useless to discuss at any length what will happen if Cheney has to be replaced except to make this point: The assumption is that if Cheney, a conservative, is to be replaced, then he must be replaced by a liberal. With a notable few exceptions, people are saying that his replacement should be Colin Powell, Rudi Giuliani or some other “moderate.” I’ve got news for those commentators. That would be a prescription for defeat. Pro-life and pro-family voters, who are not now and never have been wedded to the Republican Party, would desert that ticket in droves. If that strategy were chosen, the Vice Presidential nominee would have an effect, but it would be a very negative effect.

If the Vice President must be replaced, then it should be by a pro-life, pro-family candidate. In 2000, we know that Governor George Bush might have chosen Senator John Ashcroft as his running mate if Ashcroft were not running for re-election in a State where it was not possible to run for both Senator and Vice President at the same time. Instead, he chose Ashcroft (after he was defeated as Senator by a dead man), as his Attorney General. Unfortunately, Ashcroft has become such a lightening rod with such high negatives that he should not be considered for number two this time.

However, if we have to go down this road, Senator Rick Santorum, (R-PA), is a very attractive candidate from a battleground State. Bush has just made his 30th trip to Pennsylvania since becoming President. The polling shows the race neck-and-neck. The selection of Santorum might well enable Bush to carry Pennsylvania.

There are other attractive possibilities. Senator Jim Talent, (R-MO), is from another battleground State. Governor Bill Owens of Colorado is one of the most accomplished conservative politicians in the country. He not only has a good pro-family record but is an excellent economic conservative as well. Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty is another very attractive figure who would add much to a national ticket. There are many other attractive figures both in Congress and among the Governors (over half of whom are Republican) who could make an effective run with President Bush.

To put a liberal on the ticket would mean certain death. To put a pro-life, pro-family conservative on the ticket would at least afford Bush a chance to be re-elected.

I wish to be absolutely clear: I do not advocate the replacement of Cheney even if with a conservative. Unless Cheney himself had to step down for reasons of health, replacing him would be an admission that the critics of the Vice President were right. They are not. As far as I have been able to ascertain, there is no merit to the charges that liberals have made against the Veep. So why cave in to those charges? It would show incredible weakness.

I’m losing no sleep over this issue. I think there is only a 10,000-to-1 chance that Bush will replace Cheney. I think there is only a 1,000-to-1 chance that Cheney will have to step down because of his health.

In that very unlikely eventuality, what President Bush does with that opportunity will very likely determine if this will remain a competitive election or it will be a landslide for Kerry-Edwards.

Paul M. Weyrich is Chairman and CEO of the Free Congress Foundation.