George H.W. Bush Slams ‘Iron-Ass’ Cheney, ‘Arrogant’ Rumsfeld in New Biography

George H.W. Bush is getting pretty candid with his thoughts on Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld when they were part of his son’s administration. A new biography of Bush 41 from Jon Meacham includes some not-so-kind quotes about both men over 9/11 and Iraq.

According to Fox News, Bush considered Cheney to be an “iron-ass” who “became very hard-line and very different from the Dick Cheney I knew and worked with.” (Cheney was Bush’s Defense Secretary.)

He thinks Cheney was allowed too much independence of the White House and was part of the group of people who “want to fight about everything, use force to get our way in the Middle East.”

As for Rumsfeld, Bush was a little harsher:

“I’ve never been that close to him anyway. There’s a lack of humility, a lack of seeing what the other guy thinks. He’s more kick ass and take names, take numbers. I think he paid a price for that. Rumsfeld was an arrogant fellow.”

For his part, Cheney dismissed the criticism in an interview with Fox News, saying he took the “iron-ass” comment as “a mark of pride.”

Watch Fox News’ report above.

[featured image via 360b/Shutterstock]

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Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac

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