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The actual Bush Cheney co-presidency seems to enact in real-life a bizarre proposal from Ronald Reagan at the 1980 GOP convention. Reagan had secured the nomination and was casting about for a strong ticket for what was expected to be a close race (it actually was for most of the way, with the vote breaking for Reagan late in the campaign).
He came up with the idea of running with former president Gerald Ford. At that time, the public had considerably more confidence in Ford than Reagan. His defeat in 1976 had not been overwhelming and he remained both reasonably popular in the country and was considered less doctrinaire than Reagan.
Ford, naturally enough, was not content with the stock vice presidential role, having been president himself. To sweeten the pot, Reagan suggested a co-presidency, in which the two men would share the powers of the office. The discussions were batted around for a while, but both men seem to have agreed that it would be unworkable in practice, and that there really could be only one president.
Bush and Cheney seem to have thought differently. Reagan is often considered to have been something of a slacker in the sense that he delegated a lot and was often out of touch with what was happening. But he seems like a Lyndon Johnson when compared to Bush, whose latest misfeasance seems to be not knowing about the decision to award the ports contract to a UAE company, and who always seems to be either riding an excercise bike or a real bike or in schoolroom full of kids for a photo op when random emergencies occur in during normal business hours.
The results of the Bush-Cheney co-presidency, however, are not such that successors are likely to embrace a similar arrangement, or for that matter, simply be content to live in the Big House and fly around on the Big Plane while someone else calls all the shots. Look for the next VP to lose his Power of Classification, and who knows what other actual powers.
