WASHINGTON - As a vice presidential candidate, Dick Cheney would give George W. Bush an instant shot of gravitas and energize the Republican Party, while reassuring the public that Bush has a battle-tested No. 2 to deal with foreign and domestic problems, party activists and political analysts said yesterday.
''He's very thorough, very fair, always prepared, very stable. I think that's what people saw during the Persian Gulf War,'' said Becky Constantino, the Wyoming Republican Party chairwoman, referring to Cheney's time as defense secretary. ''There's just such a sense of security around Dick Cheney.''
But selecting Cheney, who also served six terms in the US House and was chief of staff for President Ford, could undercut Bush's appeal as a Washington outsider and reinforce speculation that his administration would recycle figures from the administration of his father, President Bush.
It also could raise questions of whether a 59-year-old running mate with a history of heart trouble enables the Texas governor to fulfill his chief criterion for a vice president: the ability to become president in a crisis.
In addition, Cheney was touched by the House banking scandal and criticized in 1991 for giving Pentagon briefings to GOP donors.
Cheney has been heading Bush's search for a running mate, but he was identified as a leading candidate Friday, when he switched his voter registration from Texas, where he has been running an oil and engineering firm, to Wyoming, his longtime home. The move would keep Electoral College voters in Texas from violating a prohibition against supporting presidential and vice presidential candidates from the same state.
Bush aides cautioned that picking Cheney is not guaranteed.
The governor is spending the weekend contemplating his choice at his ranch in Crawford, Texas. He and his wife, Laura, left the ranch yesterday to attend the funeral of Senator Paul Coverdell of Georgia, a Bush family friend who died Tuesday from a stroke.
Besides Cheney, speculation centers on Governor Frank Keating of Oklahoma; Senators Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, George Voinovich of Ohio, Fred Thompson and Bill Frist of Tennessee, and John McCain of Arizona; former Missouri senator John C. Danforth; as well as Governors George Pataki of New York and Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania and former Cabinet member Elizabeth Dole.
Bush often hails governors for their executive experience, while the senators would offer him experience in the ways of Washington. Dole could improve Bush's appeal to women, a traditionally Democratic bloc.
''The governor will decide shortly, and when he does, the plan is for he himself to make and announce the news. ... It could come as soon as Monday,'' Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer said yesterday.
Analysts and longtime Cheney friends said any negatives are far outweighed by the positives.
''He's got a wide variety of experience both in the executive branch of government and he's got a wide variety of experience in the legislative branch as well,'' said Tom Sansonetti, a Republican National Committee member from Cheyenne, Wyo., who has known Cheney since 1978.
Stuart Rothenberg, a Washington political analyst, added: ''The conservatives see him as conservative, the moderates see him as moderate. He's clearly distinguished and he'd generate excitement among the Republicans at their convention. The overall reaction from the media would be one that he could definitely be president if needed.''
On the stump, Bush has said repeatedly that America needs a fresh start from the moral and fund-raising problems that have plagued President Clinton and, by extension, the Democratic candidate, Vice President Al Gore.
Gore is said to be focusing his search for a No. 2 on Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, as well as Senators Bob Graham of Florida and Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, and former Senate majority leader George Mitchell of Maine.
While only five years older than Bush, Cheney is a political graybeard who would help the two-term governor on two fronts: experience in dealing with Congress, and reassurance for the public that Bush's lack of foreign affairs experience would not put the nation at risk.
Cheney was born in Lincoln, Neb., but raised in Wyoming, the son of a US soil-conservation official. He worked in the Nixon administration in the Office of Economic Opportunity and on the Cost of Living Council before becoming deputy assistant to President Ford. At 34, he became Ford's White House chief of staff.
Cheney was first elected to Congress in 1978. He was reelected five times and became House minority whip in 1988. While maintaining a conservative record - Cheney, like Bush, opposes abortion - he nonetheless appealed to moderates even as he strongly supported a conservative icon, President Reagan.
In 1989, President Bush appointed Cheney defense secretary after the Senate rejected his first choice, former Texas senator John G. Tower. It was in that post that Cheney gained his greatest fame, offering a cerebral image as the United States sent a half-million troops to fight Iraq after it invaded Kuwait in 1990.
Cheney was embarrassed in March 1992 when he was named among a number of former and current House members in the House banking scandal. He acknowledged overdrawing 21 checks in 1989-90 for amounts ranging from $12 to $1,945, but said the deficits were covered in no more than five days after his paycheck was deposited.
While defense secretary, Cheney was also criticized for giving Pentagon briefings to supporters who had donated $5,000 to the Republican National Committee.
Cheney's health has been questioned because he suffered mild heart attacks in 1978, 1984, and 1988. He underwent quadruple coronary bypass surgery in August 1988. During Cheney's confirmation hearings for defense secretary in 1989, his doctor called his recovery ''excellent'' and said there were no restrictions on his work or recreational activities.
Since 1995, Cheney has been chairman and chief executive officer of Halliburton Corp., a $9 billion engineering and construction conglomerate.
