From Keating's perspective, Cheney's moves were odd for other reasons as well. As head of the selection committee, Cheney was the intermediary between the prospective running mates and Bush. He had promised Keating that he'd get at least one more meeting with Bush before any decision was made; that didn't happen.

Nor was Keating aware that Cheney was a competitor. Bush spokeswoman Karen Hughes told reporters Tuesday that she "assumed" that Cheney was open with other candidates about the fact that, since July 3, Cheney was a leading choice in the process he was supervising. She assumed that, she said, since he had been so forthcoming about so many other issues with her boss. But such does not seem to be the case with those he was interviewing, at least with Keating.

As of last Thursday, Cheney had called Keating's office to find out where he could reached over the weekend, and no mention was made then -- or at any other time -- that Cheney himself was in the running. When media reports surfaced that Cheney might be a candidate, Keating and those around him assumed that the stories had been leaked by the Bush team to bump off front-page stories speculating about the willingness of Arizona Sen. John McCain to serve with Bush. Then on Friday, NBC News' Lisa Myers broke the news that Cheney had flown to Wyoming to change his voter registration from Dallas to Teton County -- thus avoiding a constitutional prohibition against state electors casting their ballots for a president and vice president from the same state. Keating then took the story seriously, the source says.

This story, and others from those close to other running-mate candidates, serve to paint a picture of a selection process that was coming apart at the seams. On Thursday, the Bush team reportedly had even asked former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander for financial and other background information. Since the request was coming so late in the process, this led many Republicans to suspect the entire vetting system was unhinging. How could it not be, with the vetter suddenly a top candidate?

In fact, as spokeswoman Hughes acknowledged today, Cheney wasn't vetted the way that the others were. While he went through and analyzed the political records of prospective running mates like Keating, Michigan Gov. John Engler, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, New York Gov. George Pataki and former Missouri Sen. John Danforth, it was Bush campaign manager Joe Allbaugh who did what Hughes called a "similar" review of Cheney.

More questionably, while Cheney analyzed and hashed over sensitive financial and personal records of his competitors for the job, it was Cheney and Bush -- who is not known for attention to details or a long attention span -- who did the same for him. Asked who vetted Cheney's financial records, Hughes replied, "Just as with other candidates, secretary Cheney is the one who handled that."

Hughes said that since Cheney is a former secretary of defense, he has already been through numerous FBI background checks and had received a high security clearance.

Recent Stories