Their disappointment began before Cheney’s recent hospitalization: influential conservatives were astonished at Powell’s tour of the Middle East. Powell announced the weakening of sanctions against Saddam, criticized Israel for its economic “siege” of the Palestinians, and kowtowed to global giants such as King Abdullah II of Jordan.

Michael Ledeen of the conservative American Enterprise Institute called Powell’s mission a fiasco in a Monday piece in the National Review Online. Robert Kagan and William Kristol of the Weekly Standard lambasted not only Powell’s trip, but also Bush’s foreign policy in general. “The Bush administration so far shows little sign of reversing Clinton’s feckless approach to Iraq,” they wrote.

Of course, all that occurred before Cheney’s most recent trip to George Washington University Hospital on March 5. One Washington-based foreign-policy expert calls Cheney’s heart episode “disheartening.”

“I guess it’s not good for the Cheney supporters,” says Daniel Pipes, the director of the Middle East Forum. “It doesn’t look like the kind of attention and brain power is there to develop a new policy in the Middle East. It doesn’t look like Cheney’s been involved there yet.”

But Powell critic Ledeen has not yet given up faith in the VP. “His taking care of himself doesn’t impinge on his energy or his effectiveness,” he says, adding that Powell’s allies would be wrong to use Cheney’s current, uh, condition to win the behind-the-scenes policy fight in the White House. “Nobody would dare do that.”

And another hawkish foreign-policy expert believes that Powell and his allies will dominate the administration and flame out, creating an opening for their more conservative rivals to come in and pick up the pieces. “Powell’s policies are rapidly leading to breakdown in the [Middle East] and in the Republican Party,” this expert says. “At one point Powell will hang himself and the night of the long knives is going to take place.”