Wednesday, June 27, 2007

SUNDAY {vbar} Dick Cheney, code-named "Angler" by the Secret Service, is the most powerful vice president in U.S. history -- a master of bureaucracy and detail who exerts most of his influence out of public view.

MONDAY {vbar} Convinced that the "war on terror" required "robust interrogations" to extract information from captured suspects,

Cheney pressed the Bush administration to carve out exceptions to the Geneva Conventions and adopt a novel distinction between permitted "cruelty" and forbidden "torture."

TUESDAY {vbar} Working behind the scenes, Cheney has made himself the dominant voice on tax and spending policy, outmaneuvering rivals

for the president's ear and becoming the formal arbiter of Cabinet

budget appeals.

TODAY {vbar} Cheney has steered some of the Bush administration's

most important environmental decisions: easing air pollution controls, opening public parks to snowmobiles and diverting river water to farmers -- a move that caused the deaths of thousands of salmon.

washingtonpost.com {vbar} For narrated photo galleries, internal documents, key players and more go to www.washingtonpost.com/cheney.