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Lynne Cheney says she'll speak out on education in Bush-Cheney administration

PHILADELPHIA (CNN) -- Lynne Cheney said Sunday she plans to speak out on the issue of education if her husband wins the vice presidency in November.

Mrs. Cheney described herself as a "great fan" of the impact Texas Governor George W. Bush has had on education in his state. Her husband, former Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, is the presumed GOP presidential nominee's running mate.

Cheneys, Bushes
Lynne Cheney, shown here with her husband, Dick, and George W. and Laura Bush, plans to speak out on the issue of education if Bush wins in November.  

"It's a subject I know a lot about and I think I can be valuable out on the campaign trail," she said on ABC's "This Week."

As chairwoman of the National Endowment for the Humanities under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush from 1986 to 1993, and co-host of CNN "Crossfire Sunday" from 1995 to 1998, the former high school homecoming queen has a long history of being outspoken.

"I certainly don't have the impression that anybody wants to muzzle me," said Mrs. Cheney, now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think-tank.

Her style has been compared more to Hillary Rodham Clinton's than to that of Laura Bush, the wife of the Texas governor. But that doesn't mean she admires the first lady. The AEI recently quoted her as saying of Mrs. Clinton: "What really drives me crazy is when Hillary acts like the happy wife. Walking hand in hand off the helicopter together at critical moments. It's just so distressing to me."

In response to a question about that comment, Mrs. Cheney said Sunday: "That was made in the context of a forum where we were talking about manipulating political relations for personal gain," said Mrs. Cheney. "But it is certainly not a subject I plan to take up in the months ahead."

Mrs. Cheney said she believes in equal opportunity for women, but would not talk about whether she favors an increase in the minimum wage. President Clinton called for a $1 per hour increase in his State of the Union address in January 1999.

"This is beyond my pay grade," she said of the topic.

Mrs. Cheney, who has a doctorate in 19th-century British literature, has written three books. In the first, a 1988 novel she co-wrote called Body Politic, the narrator talks about the job of vice president -- "Under the Constitution, the only thing the job calls for is waiting: for the president to die or be impeached, waiting for the Senate to wind up in a tie vote so the vice president can break it."

"That's all the vice presidency is about -- waiting. Everything else is make-work."

In the novel, co-written with Victor Gold, the vice president dies of a heart attack at age 59. Mrs. Cheney's 59-year-old husband has had three heart attacks.

"OK, but there were a couple of differences here," she told ABC Sunday. "You remember, at age 59, he was doing things that he shouldn't have been doing. Things quite un-Dick Cheney-like." The character in the novel was engaged in an adulterous affair. And, she said the wife in the novel was "not an admirable character."

The book is out of print.