Okay, it's not polite to speak ill of the very ill. Former Vice President Dick Cheney has apparently had another heart attack. Though it's been called "mild," this makes five for Cheney, which can't be good by any measure. That said, Cheney still makes the news for the things he does and says, particularly his criticisms of the Obama Administration's handling of national security.

Cheney contends that Obama has made the country less safe from terrorist attacks during the roughly 13 months since he has been in office.

Even retired four-star general and former Secretary of State Colin Powell has spoken out against his former boss, Cheney, basically saying the guy doesn't know what he's talking about.

And that's been the burning question surrounding many of Cheney's remarks.

What is he talking about and why does he break with tradition by targeting Obama, the sitting president, with so much harsh criticism?

You got me. But a new book by Ronald Asmus gives a glimpse of Cheney's strategic thinking during the final months of his term. In "A Little War that Shook the World," Asmus says Cheney pushed for a game of brinkmanship with Russia's Vladimir Putin.

As the South Ossetia war between Russia and Georgia was in full swing during the summer of 2008, Cheney advocated a military confrontation with Moscow.

The Russian army swiftly crushed the Georgians, who were pleading to become a member-state of NATO. The incident has had a lasting chill on NATO expansionism into Russia's former satellites. And Russia, no doubt, was acting to protect its oil and natural gas interests in the region.

But a confrontation on Russia's borders - the only country on earth with nearly as many nukes as the US - could have had an unpredictable outcome.

Considering that Cheney and former President George W. Bush already had US forces engaged in two wars that were not going well, Cheney's suggestion for an attack boggles the mind.