A Heartbeat Away

November 23, 2000

At first, it wasn’t a heart attack. “Dick Cheney is healthy,” said George W. Bush. “He did not have a heart attack.”

Later it turned out to be a heart attack — but the docs called it “a very slight heart attack,” a little bitty, teensy-weensy sort of heart attack, a heart attack hardly worthy of the name. If you’re going to have a heart attack, this is definitely the kind to have — a mere dimpled chad of a heart attack, as it were. It shouldn’t even count. As Bill Clinton might say, it doesn’t rise to the level of a real heart attack.

But, coming at a time when the election results are still up in the air, Dick Cheney’s brush with you-know-what comes as unsettling news. Things are confused enough in Florida without the Grim Reaper putting in a surprise guest appearance. Just what we need right now.

If it had happened a month ago, needless to say, we wouldn’t be wondering who was going to be our next president. It would have tipped the election to the Gore-Lieberman ticket. Maybe they elect corpses in Missouri, but the rest of the country still prefers live specimens, or at least Gore.

It was Cheney’s fourth heart attack, which makes it even more unsettling. You have to wonder about George W. Bush’s judgment. In days of yore, candidates usually picked running mates who would were regarded as young apprentices for the top job. The presidential candidate was a man of years and distinction, but his running mate was often a young buck who could step in if the old guy keeled over in the Oval Office: Dick Nixon, Dan Quayle, and the guy who ran with Bob Dole immediately come to mind. The man who stands “a heartbeat away from the presidency,” as they say, isn’t supposed to be a creaky semi-invalid with one foot in the you-know-what.

There have been exceptions. John Kennedy chose as his running mate Lyndon Johnson, who had already had a heart attack but still proved fully capable, as president, of wrecking the nation. Then there was the strange case of Nelson Rockefeller, Gerald Ford’s vice president, who survived his brief term of office but, a few years later, expired of a heart attack while (ahem!) “editing a book” one night with a young woman. He was found wearing trousers but no socks.

In 1972 we saw a somewhat different case when it transpired that George McGovern’s running mate, Thomas Eagleton, had had shock therapy for depression. It wasn’t life-threatening, but it was enough to force Eagleton to resign from the ticket, and it reflected poorly on McGovern’s judgment.

Though this was Cheney’s fourth heart attack — his first occurred when he was 37, and he’s 59 now — everyone has done everything possible to reassure everyone that everything is just fine. He had bypass surgery after his third attack, in 1988, and he had “minor” surgery this time, during which he was fully conscious and after which he was able to do a live (no pun intended! honest!) interview with Larry King. By next weekend he’ll probably be photographed playing touch football with his kids.

But the Washington Post reports that Cheney’s heart is “far from normal.” It doesn’t pump out as much blood as your average ticker, a sign of “permanent muscle damage.” One cardiologist describes it as “moderately impaired.”

Let’s be honest. As a vice president, Cheney would be like a spare tire with a leak and worn treads.

I am specially qualified to speak on this issue, because I have been a vice presidential candidate myself. As a matter of fact, I believe I still am. Though I resigned from the ticket of the Constitution Party early this year, for technical reasons I remained on the ballot in some states. So until the results of this election are certified, I can’t be completely ruled out. (N.B.: I have not conceded defeat.)

In the meantime, I want to assure the nation that I have no history of heart trouble.

There remains one possibility nobody seems to have considered: that by the time the Florida mess is resolved, Bush, Gore, Cheney, and Lieberman will all be dead.

Joseph Sobran

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