Liz Cheney: The most dangerous woman in America
Let me get this out of the way quickly: I wouldn’t buy Liz Cheney’s book with her money.
Lately, the once budding, sturdy, blonde star of the Republican Party is out on a rigorous victory tour selling her political courage (but mostly her book), to the American public (but mostly Democrats), while being interviewed by every fawning TV toothy alive.
She is heroically sounding the alarm and telling people things they are already wildly aware of: Donald Trump is a rotten, evil son of a bitch, who means to destroy our country. On Sunday it was 60 Minutes … on Monday it was the Rachel Maddow Show … today, tomorrow and next week it will be everywhere else.
It’s the Christmas shopping season, and there’s never been a better time to get that special liberal in your life a certain book ...
Cheney, who was one of two Republicans to join the bipartisan January 6 Committee looking into Trump’s attack on America, somehow, and implausibly, underestimated just how vile her party had become.
The committee’s work was impressive, but seemed to have virtually no impact on Republicans, which have done nothing but make it crystal clear just how much they want our Democracy ended.
Surely, a seasoned politician from the Conservative bastion of Wyoming had the pulse of her deteriorating party and knew this would be the outcome. Or maybe, just maybe … there were political advantages and monetary profits to “bravely” standing alone.
The truth is, things are so bad in this country right now, and most specifically in the abominable, anti-American Republican Party, that when one of its grotesque members does just the bare minimum and calls it out for what it is, it is somehow seen as heroic.
By standing against a repulsive, racist man, who brags about grabbing women by their private parts, writes love letters to dictators, defends Putin relentlessly, and calls our military “suckers and losers,” Cheney gets a queen’s treatment.
Except let’s look at the record, because it turns out all that isn’t what really upset her.
Hell, all that overt, disgusting bilge was all well and good with Liz when she was voting with the orange nightmare an incredible 93 percent of the time during his ugly term in office.
It was all so really, really great with Liz that in the wake of Trump’s State of the Union in 2019, she made a point of heading a news conference the very next day in which she called Trump’s speech “tremendous” and that he “laid out a path forward in terms of where we need to go on a range of issues” before eagerly and morbidly saying this:
“I want to make sure every American understands what today’s DemocratParty stands for with respect to babies, and with respect to the murder of babies. We have seen now in states across the country the introduction of legislation that would enable the killing of babies. This is not about abortion, this is about killing babies after they are born. And it is the face of pure evil…”
Killing babies after they are born? Don’t ever go telling me Liz Cheney has any kind of a moral compass.
Oh, and that was the very speech that Speaker Nancy Pelosi shredded to bits on the House floor, just in case you are looking for a true American hero.
No, it turns out, the breaking point for Liz Cheney was the attack on America on January 6, 2021, and the ensuing bloody coup. I guess all that was a bridge too far for the entire wretched Cheney empire, which was built in large part on the dead bodies of our soldiers in Iraq, thanks to daddy Dick’s, taxpayer-subsidized Halliburton.
It is estimated the Cheney family made $44 million exploiting Dick’s on-again, off-again, private-sector, public-sector relationship with the government during the first Gulf War, and then again when he was the Vice President of the United States during the second War in Iraq that he helped start based on lies.
And any story about Dick is not replete without mentioning the hunting trip where he shot his friend in the face.
The point is, Liz is a ruthless politician who comes from rancid, Republican stock.
And still it somehow gets worse with her, because no kidding, as I am typing this, Cheney has announced she is considering a third party presidential bid in 2024.
She said this to The Washington Post this morning:
“Several years ago, I would not have contemplated a third-party run. I happen to think democracy is at risk at home, obviously, as a result of Donald Trump’s continued grip on the Republican Party, and I think democracy is at risk internationally as well.”
This might just be the most Cheney thing ever, because if Liz is even half the patriot she thinks she is, she fully knows that this will only help the man she alleges to hate so much.
She knows her candidacy will only peel away the rare Republican never-Trumper, and potentially a thin slice of Democratic moderates who would otherwise vote for Joe Biden.
Liz Cheney is very dangerous, and is in all this for herself.
If she can make a few more dollars selling books? All the better.
You’ve been warned.
D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. Follow @EarlofEnough and on his website.