Fogbow

Liz Cheney Has Only Herself to Blame
The representative from Wyoming is taking a stand against an authoritarian streak in the Republican Party that she helped cultivate.



As I have written in the past, the belief that the 2020 election was stolen, like the claim that former President Barack Obama was not born in America, is not amenable to fact-checking. The assertion of fraud is an ideological statement that political opposition to the Republican Party in general, and to Donald Trump in particular, is illegitimate. Even if Joe Biden got more votes, this logic holds, those votes should not count, because the people who cast them are not Real Americans the way Trump supporters are. To oppose Trump is to be The Enemy, and to be The Enemy is to surrender any claim to fundamental political rights.

Even a lifelong conservative Republican like Cheney becomes The Enemy if she is willing to uphold essential democratic rights—such as the opposition’s right to govern if it wins the most electoral votes—above the whims of King Trump. Cheney’s brave stand looks likely to cost her the leadership position she holds, and has left her isolated within the caucus, one of the few Republicans who have chosen their vow to the Constitution over their loyalty to the party. Yet the party’s rejection of the rule of law is also an extension of a political logic that Cheney herself has cultivated for years.

During the Obama administration, Cheney was a Fox News regular who, as was the fashion at the time, insisted that the president was secretly sympathetic to jihadists. She enthusiastically defended the use of torture, dismissed the constitutional right to due process as an inconvenience, and amplified the Obama-era campaign to portray American Muslims as a national-security threat.



This is the logic of the War on Terror, and also the logic of the party of Trump. As George W. Bush famously put it, “You are either with us or with the terrorists.” You are Real Americans or The Enemy. And if you are The Enemy, you have no rights. As Spencer Ackerman writes in his forthcoming book, Reign of Terror, the politics of endless war inevitably gives way to this authoritarian logic. Cheney now finds herself on the wrong side of a line she spent much of her political career enforcing. Her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, infamously announced that America might have to employ “the dark side” in its fight against al-Qaeda, forgetting the entire point of Star Wars, which is that the dark side ultimately consumes its adherents. Not until the mob ransacked the Capitol in January, it seems, did she begin to understand that millions of Americans believe the things their leaders tell them.



Unfortunately, Cheney and her allies won their earlier fight for the soul of the party. During the Obama era, the Republican Party became ever more hostile to the fundamental rights of religious and ethnic minorities, and ultimately chose Donald Trump, a man who attacked those rights as an existential threat to the nation, as its leader. Cheney’s courageous stand against the party of Trump is a stand against a party she helped build, a monster she helped create. The tragedy is not that she might suffer for her folly, but that American democracy will. Her latter-day epiphany is welcome, but it also comes far too late.

Swing-voter focus group: Ousting Cheney is a mistake
2 hours ago - Politics & Policy

As House Republicans meet to oust Rep. Liz Cheney from her leadership post for criticizing Donald Trump, swing voters in Axios' latest Engagious/Schlesinger focus groups hold a near-unanimous view that Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and his caucus are making a mistake.

The big picture: Nine of 14 voters said they could vote for a Republican for U.S. House or Senate races next year. All but one ruled out backing any candidate who clings to the former president's lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him. 13 of the 14 said Cheney (R-Wyo.) should not be removed and that it would be a mistake for House Republicans to go through with their plans.
These were the biggest takeaways from two back-to-back focus groups conducted Tuesday night, on the eve of an expected vote to purge Cheney from her No. 3 spot in the House GOP leadership. The two seven-member panels included women and men, from a mix of the most competitive swing states, who voted for Trump in 2016 but President Biden in 2020. While focus groups are not statistically significant samples like polls, the responses show how some voters in crucial states are thinking about issues that could shape next year's midterm elections.

What they're saying: These voters said they're turned off by House Republicans' perceived fealty to Trump and the idea that there's no tolerance for dissent or critical or independent thinking. "It seems like you need to conform to be a leader in the Republican Party," said Rosie F., 53, of Pennsylvania. "They're followers," said Jimmy S., 41, from Maricopa County, Arizona. "It's all about trying to please one person." Engagious president Rich Thau, who moderated the focus groups, said swing voters themselves tend to be non-conformists so "when they see a political party punishing a person like them, it rubs them the wrong way."

Between the lines: This remains largely an inside-the-Beltway drama. Just six of the 14 voters initially knew of Cheney by name, and only five knew she holds a leadership post. Only after details of the controversy and her public statements were outlined did most say that her expected removal would be wrong. Of note: While a couple of voters said they thought Cheney should run for president in 2024, none believed that she would stand a chance of winning the GOP's nomination.

Lani wrote: ↑Wed May 12, 2021 6:39 am Screenshot_2021-05-12 Lindy Li on Twitter.png

orlylicious wrote: ↑Wed May 12, 2021 8:01 am

Swing-voter focus group: Ousting Cheney is a mistake
2 hours ago - Politics & Policy

As House Republicans meet to oust Rep. Liz Cheney from her leadership post for criticizing Donald Trump, swing voters in Axios' latest Engagious/Schlesinger focus groups hold a near-unanimous view that Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and his caucus are making a mistake.

https://www.axios.com/cheney-republican ... 802aa.html

Reality Check wrote: ↑Wed May 12, 2021 8:47 am I don't think Republicans care what voters think. They believe that through voter suppression and gerrymandering that can retake the House in 2022 and they may be correct. When Trump won it showed that that racism, lies, and gaslighting are a winning combination for them. Until they get steamrolled in a national election they will not change.

Reality Check wrote: ↑Wed May 12, 2021 8:47 am
I don't think Republicans care what voters think. They believe that through voter suppression and gerrymandering that can retake the House in 2022 and they may be correct. When Trump won it showed that that racism, lies, and gaslighting are a winning combination for them. Until they get steamrolled in a national election they will not change.

Six months after Barack Obama's inauguration, a persistent and noisy legion of doubters won't let go of an already debunked claim — that he is actually a foreign-born, illegal president.

* * *

The issue also was raised by CNN's Larry King this week, in a conversation with Liz Cheney, a former State Department official and daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney.

"I think the Democrats have got more crazies than the Republicans do," Liz Cheney said. "But setting that aside, one of the reasons you see people so concerned about this ... people are uncomfortable with having for the first time ever, I think, a president who seems so reluctant to defend the nation overseas."

A fellow guest, Democratic strategist James Carville, suggested Cheney should have been more critical of those questioning Obama's citizenship.

"She refuses to say this is ludicrous because she wants these people to believe this," he said.

Atticus Finch wrote: ↑Wed May 12, 2021 12:39 pm Need to change title to Liz Cheney - former House Republican conference Chair.

Patagoniagirl wrote: ↑Wed May 12, 2021 2:25 pm Cheney is no hero. Being honest and decent used to be a platform in the Rwpublicans of my fathers day. That's no hero. It's just being decent and honest as most of us honest and decent people are. Her father and other Republicans fed this shit, as did Liz Chaney. I dont want to hear accolades for Cheney.

ALI ALEXANDER , [12.05.21 18:41]
Statement from Stop the Steal’s @AliAlexander on Liz Cheney

Liz Cheney and her family fancy themselves as American Oligarchs. They don’t believe in the republic. They believe themselves our betters. They keep Wyoming residences because they’d never be elected in a populated state. They love living in Washington DC and commanding our lives and starting wars where we die.

Their family business is an insurrection against the American republic. She has no place in politics, let alone the Republican Party.

F*ck. Liz. Cheney.

Quote me.