Cheney's real enemy isn't Obama. It's Bush.

In Cheney’s opinion, clearly, the Bush administration lost its nerve in the second term. (When, not coincidentally, Cheney’s nemesis, Condoleezza Rice, became secretary of State, and shifted power over foreign policy away from the White House). In 2003, the Bush administration abandoned waterboarding. In 2006, it closed the “black sites” around the world where detainees were held beyond the reach of any law. Throughout Bush’s second term, his administration released prisoners from Guantanamo Bay. And in Bush’s final days in office, according to David Sanger of the New York Times, he refused Israeli pleas for help in taking military action against Iran.

It’s almost as if there have been three presidencies since 9/11: 1) The Cheney administration (2001-2003 or 2004), in which the vice president—aided by his old friend Donald Rumsfeld, and his key aides Scooter Libby and David Addington—got Bush to pursue a war on terror largely outside the law. 2) The Bush administration (2004-2009), in which Bush, aided by Rice, Robert Gates, chief of staff Joshua Bolton, and the rulings of the supreme court, reign in Cheney and some of his policies. And 3) the Obama administration, which tries to bring Bush’s second term policies even more under the rule of law…

But Bush, and the other people who reined Cheney in, aren’t talking. Cheney is—and the congressional Republicans are parroting his words. As a result, the Congressional GOP is now considerably more extreme than the Bush administration. The Bush administration oversaw hundreds of civilian trials of terrorists; today’s Republicans want to defund such trials. The Bush administration stopped waterboarding; Congressional Republicans defend the practice. The Bush administration read shoebomber Richard Reid his Miranda rights; Congressional Republicans find the practice despicable. Bush said he hoped to close Guantanamo Bay; Congressional Republicans practically consider it a national treasure.