

What was it about former State Department official Richard Haass that bugged former Vice President Dick Cheney? Haass, out with a new book, War of Necessity, War of Choice, says he was shocked to read in Angler, a book about Cheney, that the former veep ordered his phone calls tapped. An aide to both former President Bushes, Haass thinks the reason might have been that he wasn't hawkish enough while working with another moderate, former Secretary of State Colin Powell. "To me it was just indicative of how ideological the administration had become," Haass says. For example, he pushed for a dialogue with Iran, rejected by the Bush-Cheney team. "The idea that something like that would be seen as somehow beyond the pale—that in many ways encapsulated my fundamental difference with this administration." When asked directly what irked Cheney enough to spy on him, he shrugs: "Ask the former vice president."