Quotes of the Day

Condoleezza Rice vigorously defended President Bush's record last week. But to defend Rice's record on foreign affairs, Vice President Dick Cheney gave an exclusive interview to TIME's John Dickerson. Highlights:

On whether Rice is being unfairly singled out in the criticism leveled by Richard Clarke, Bush's former counterterrorism chief:
To evaluate her performance only in that context [Clarke's charges]is a bum rap. It doesn't do justice at all to what she has contributed ... Evaluate the process and Condi's role in terms of whether the President has made the right decisions. There's no question he has made the right decisions. We will look back on this period of time as having been historic in terms of the use of American power in taking on our enemies and safeguarding the American people.

On Rice's performance as a broker for competing views on the Bush foreign policy team:
This is not a shy, retiring group, but that's good. The challenge for Condi and the task that she handles very well is to referee that group and that process and deliver to the President their best thinking and see to it that everyone gets an opportunity to be heard.

On whether the Bush White House had the right priorities before Sept. 11:
We had a number of things that we had to focus on. Certainly counterterrorism was one of them ... There were a lot of other issues. The ABM treaty was one of them. We had campaigned on a platform of missile defense ... [Vladimir] Putin was relatively new to the business, as was the President, and getting that relationship off to a good start was an important piece of business. China surfaced front and center early on ... You don't want to just walk in and just buy everything your predecessor left you ... You also have an obligation to get everybody to sit down and look at the key areas and ... decide we're going to continue down this path or we're going to make some fundamental changes.

On how the Bush White House viewed the Clinton team's approach to terrorism:
There was the sense that they hadn't handled it very well.

On Clarke:
He's taken advantage of the circumstances this week to promote himself and his book. I don't know the guy that well. I have had some dealings with him over the years, but judging based on what I've seen, I don't hold him in high regard.

On whether an apology for failing to prevent Sept. 11 is necessary:
Without question, we would have liked to be able to prevent that attack. Maybe we'll know after [the 9/11 commissioners] get through with all of their work. They'll come up with some ideas and recommendations about how that might have been done. It's hard at this point to see ... There are clearly some things that could have been done to be more effective. Whether or not there was a way to forecast what was going on here and head it off, I just don't know. Obviously, I think everybody feels bad about the loss of life. If you were at the White House that day, as many of us were, you know it's a moment you'll never forget.

• John Dickerson and Dick Cheney