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Cheney: Wrong War, Wrong Time, Wrong Tactics
Wrong War. Wrong Time. Wrong Tactics. I think that’s emblazoned on the Cheney Family Coat of Arms. No one needs more evidence of that than the drama that has just played out in the House GOP Conference. But I come not to praise Caesar, but to bury her.
Liz Cheney may be a book-smart woman. But she and her supporters have been awfully stupid since January. Maybe that comes with believing that power is your birthright and not something to be earned from the people you are supposed to represent. Liz Perry – she’s been Mrs. Philip Perry for 28 years now – clings to her father’s name like a hereditary title. It is the source of her power. She was made the Chair of the House Republican Conference in January 2019 despite the fact that she had only been in the House for a single term. In her four years in the House, she has never proposed legislation that had been signed into law. So, the Cheney name is all she really has.
But who needs personal accomplishments? She went straight from college into a job at the State Department. (Who doesn’t?) Then came law school and a high-profile lobbying job with the “consulting” firm led by Richard Armitage. With her father’s election as Vice President, it was back to State. In other words, she took all the obvious career paths that most of her Wyoming constituents take.
And now, she has become a “hero” to the Left and the disgruntled establishment for fighting an internecine war with her party and her constituency. Because of her name recognition, she is one of those politicians who has never really had to engage in retail politics – climbing the greasy pole from local office to local office, working your way to state government, before trying the national stage – and all while building coalitions and creating political capital. Like so many others before her, the smartest person in the room also becomes the dumbest.
What Liz and her supporters cannot seem to come to grips with (or by nature they are oblivious to) are these basic facts:
- You may win future elections without Donald Trump but you will not win them without his supporters. His constituents are your constituents. A mainstay argument of the anti-Trump crowd is the former President’s “underperformance” compared to the GOP House and Senate candidates. Even if that’s true, the proportion of voters that supported both greatly outweighs the difference. And for someone like Cheney, she underperformed Trump by some 8,000 votes.
- Whether you’re a politician or a pundit, the near-universal response to the allegations of voter fraud in the 2020 election has been stupid. Not just stupid, but mind-numbing levels of stupid. A working democracy depends upon a mountain of faith that the process is on the up-and-up. If 40 percent of the American public believes the 2020 elections were fraudulent, that is not a Donald Trump problem. That is an existential problem for the Republic and therefore it is your problem. The proper response should have been, “We know that there are doubts and we are going to do everything we can to allay these fears.” Instead we got, “You people are stupid. Shut the hell* up and go away.” Unfortunately, that toothpaste can’t go back in the tube. Donald Trump may fade away but the result of the glee so many take in attacking his supporters will not.
- We all know the phrase, “The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations.” It’s mainly used as an argument on race relations and the “dumbing down” of standards. But it applies everywhere. How you treat people will eventually alter their trajectory. If you constantly accuse someone falsely of bad conduct, if you prosecute them for your own political gain, they will eventually take the attitude that they will live down to the accusations. I mean, if you’re going to do the time, why not actually do the crime? And so it is with January 6. There were six deaths surrounding the events of that day, five of them medically induced. The only unnatural death was that of Ashley Babbitt at the hands of a Capitol Hill Police officer. However, if the politicians and the pundits continue their accusations of “armed insurrection,” they will eventually get one. They may see it as an opportunity to finally “deal” with Trump supporters, but that is a beast that, once unleashed, may not be as easy to control as they think. The second American Civil War would not look like the first one. Forget Gettysburg, think Beirut. And Northern Ireland. And Syria. And this crusade SecDef Austin is waging against his own troops is the epitome of stupid. When the shooting starts, loyalty is not going to be decided by a uniform.
Originally, Liz Cheney moved to Wyoming to claim her hereditary title in the US Senate. Her plan in 2014 was to stab another Republican – incumbent Senator Mike Enzi – in the back. (Anyone sense a pattern here?) When it became obvious that she on course for an embarrassing spanking in the primary she backed off and settled for the state’s at-large House seat two years later. Now, she is reduced to being one ineffectual vote among the minority. Maybe Joe Biden will reward her loyalty with a return trip to the State Department as US Ambassador to Iraq.
*Not the word I wanted to use.
Published in General
That’s for sure!
Don’t you know? Ted Cruz has just “bent the knee” or is “kissing the ring” or some such slanderous accusation. Nevers see themselves as taking principled stands. They just haven’t quite figured out what the principle is.
As Rep. Jim Jordan said, “You can’t have a conference chair who recites Democrat talking points.” Very true, so I guess they’ll replace her with a strong conservative . . . or not.
Ricochet is a conversation, not a cross-examination.
Until January 6, 2021, Liz Cheney was the third ranking Republican in the House and was a likely future Speaker of the House. Before the last election, Mitch McConnell invited her to run for the Senate, and she turned him down.
It is inappropriate to refer to Liz Cheney as Mrs. Perry. Many women keep their maiden names. She is entitled to do so, and is entitled to have you respect her choice.
Likely not. However, Liz Cheney was a Trump supporter in the 2016 and 2020 election and she opposed the first impeachment. It was Trump’s Big Lie and then the 1/6 riot that caused her to break with Trump. While I am a NT, as in Never Trumper, Liz Cheney and a bunch of other Republicans are NAT’s, or “Never Again Trumpers.”
What if she was Mrs Perry until she decided to run for office?
Your ratio of points thrown out versus what you are willing to actually debate and support in discussion is terrible. Nobody is even close.
You mean like Trump did? Trump never won a majority of all votes cast in the 2016 primaries.
I think this the most important point. What Liz Cheney is guilty of is Bad Politics. A lot of the GOP reps who voted her out don’t like Trump, don’t think the election was a fraud, and don’t want him to run in 2024. Cheney’s approach made that more difficult and that’s why she had to go. She is very similar in that regard to her father whose approach to Iraq and the WoT never took into consideration what was needed to keep the support of the American voter and thus contributed to a foreign policy disaster and a political one for the GOP.
I agree with those representatives who voted to oust her for those reasons. The post-Trump GOP needs to be more in the direction of Trump than the Romney/McConnell GOP, needs to retain the voters Trump brought in and bring back some of those he needlessly alienated. Can it be done? I don’t know, but Liz Cheney was an impediment to any chance of achieving that.
Who cares? It’s a stupid point.
I am a divorce lawyer. I have had cases where a husband insists that his wife keep his last name, and cases where a husband insists that she not keep his last name. The ruling is always the same. It is up to the wife what last name she wants to keep or be restored to. Period.
And you still haven’t responded. As you say, Ricochet is a conversation. That means two-way communication. You’re still only going one way.
For better or worse, I am an apostate, as I do not agree with the overwhelming majority of others at Ricochet. That tends to spark a bunch of people demanding that I answer this or that question. I decline to play “squirrel” and to run down each and every question. I am sorry if that disappoints you, but that is the way that it is.
Also, RufusRJones, I want to thank you for referring me to “Principles First.” I joined their “Rally for Liz” yesterday with 450 other people on a Zoom call. It was great!
You keep pretending these labels are in any way meaningful.
Cheney was a strong supporter of Trump and publicly defended him against the Russia collusion conspiracy, including denouncing the Mueller Report. She completely supported him on immigration and other issues. In those respects she is very different from Romney. Her big difference is on foreign policy. I assume what is going on is she really thinks the unless the GOP confronts Trump and deals with him it is doomed to failure. I think that is wrong and she does not understand the politics but it is the most likely explanation. It may also be that she could tolerate the man up to a certain point, but can no longer do so. Which is understandable given his post-election lunacy but is bad politics as a strategy.
Most of those he “alienated” should be aliens. Let them live on planet Democrat, it’s a little known but very toxic planet close to Uranus.
As much as anything else, I’ve discovered that it’s better to keep these allies away from the meetings. They can be quite subversive.
Trump – or Trumpism has enough voters. 2020 proved that convincingly.
Not the point. What name did she use, legally/publicly, up until deciding to run for office in Wyoming? What name was – and perhaps still is – on her driver’s license? If it was Perry, then it would seem pretty clear that she started using her maiden name again in order to help politically, and perhaps to avoid a spotlight being shone on her Virginia residency up until that point.
This fits with what I see. Her stance on election fraud is not helpful on an issue that I consider number one – election security and integrity. I don’t know that the election was stolen but I would like to know that we could find that out if needed. But even better is to prevent the possibility.
At the risk of feeding the “it’s all about Gary” narrative, I’m going to respond to this because I believe that I’m in the top ten of questions/comments ignored. You’re casting yourself as something of a victim here, and framing the issue in a way that is most favorable to you.
But here’s the bottom line: when you post arguably inflammatory opinions–many of which have appeared here multiple times–expect to be questioned. If you are unwilling or unable to defend your positions in the face of appropriate questions, bow out. Of course, no one can respond to everyone, but your batting average is very low for someone who puts himself in a prominent place. If you can’t stand the heat . . . at least spare us the excuses.
Sometimes it feels like one person facing a mob. If 10 people challenge me, do I need to answer all 10? This is one thing I like about being in Court. Only one person can take me on at a time. After each question, I am able to answer without being peppered.
If memory serves, I once tried the experiment of answering each and every question thrown my way. It was mess. I was frankly mobbed and lost my temper which I try hard to not do.
There are also some of my “special friends” who will do their best to bait me. Sorry, I ain’t taking the bait no more from my “special friends.”
I appreciate that DJHill posted this piece and thus wants me to answer his questions. I generally avoid getting into each and every post that I see. However, I would think that when he posted about Liz Cheney, he really could not be surprised that I would have something to say about her.
Incidentally, I think that her responses were pitch perfect. I don’t see how I can improve on them. I am joining in her statements.
I see that this post has been elevated to the Main Feed. I will try to respond more fulsomely.
It makes me crazy.
I really don’t know and I really don’t care. I remember when Dennis DeConcini ran for the U.S. Senate and traded on his father’s name who had been a respected state supreme court justice. What I find funny is that if Liz Cheney were Edward Cheney, then no one would fault Edward Cheney for not taking his wife’s last name.
If his wife were more politically accomplished/known/powerful, he might, if he was going to run for office.
And if Liz Cheney/Perry/Cheney were going into investment banking etc, she might (still) use her husband’s name since he’s well-known in that field, rather than using her father’s name for politics.
Afternoon Gary,
Cheney is not a good team player.
https://thefederalist.com/2021/04/16/liz-cheney-was-a-primary-culprit-of-spreading-fake-news-on-russian-bounties-to-undermine-trump/
She is not even a person who puts her country before her ego.
Hmm. If I were EJ, I’d remove it from the Main Feed so that you aren’t given the wider audience.
Which is what anti-Trumpers say about Trump.
As does the martyr complex.
With all due respect, I tend to try to always give a fulsome answer to respectful people who ask respectful questions, such as Henry Racette, James Lileks, Doug Watt, and Jerry Giordano, and to engage in a deeper conversation with them. (Using your real name is a plus for me.) However, if someone has been disrespectful to me over and over again and has called me names, and won’t use their real names, I will often ignore them, and/or give a short answer.
I have tried to work things out with several of my special friends to see if we can get our relationship back on solid ground. Usually that doesn’t work, but when it does, I respond to them more fulsomely.
The biggest problem I have is that when I am being peppered with challenges and questions from a bunch of people all at once, I cannot respond to them all adequately. (To solve this problem, I suggest that you recruit your NAT and NT friends to join Ricochet to help spread the load! Dang, I miss The Gold Tooth!)
That is his prerogative. All he has to do is alter one word of his original post, and boom, it goes back to the Member Feed.
What this comes down to is, you aren’t going to support all of your arguments and everybody else is going to do whatever they feel like about it. It’s going to be that way until forever. lol