By #16: Dick Cheney
Lesson: You don’t have to be popular.
Dick Cheney left the Vice Presidency with one of the lowest favorable ratings in American history. Throughout the Bush presidency, though, Cheney never cared about and often scoffed at his low approval ratings. He wasn’t interested in making friends.
Cheney wanted to reshape the role of the executive branch in American government and in many ways, he was extremely successful, consolidating more and more power in the White House.
Many people didn’t like him or his methods, but he stuck single-mindedly to his goals. Even after he lost some of his influence in the later years of his term, the changes he had effected remained in place.
