Exit Interviews Reveal Bush-Cheney Differences

George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are displaying strikingly different attitudes toward their time in power as its end looms, the New York Times reports. Bush is reflective, acknowledging regrets and speaking graciously of his successor. Cheney, meanwhile, is defiant to the end, defending policies like waterboarding and letting slip scathing comments about the incoming administration.

The difference, associates say, stems from the pair’s clash over second-term foreign policy, and the different paths the two will be taking after January. Cheney aims to be a leading conservative foreign-policy hawk, while Bush is trying to shape his legacy—and hasn’t ruled out serving the new administration in some way. “I will be happy to do it, particularly if I agree with the mission,” Bush told an interviewer. (More Bush administration stories.)