Rock Hard Conservative
She’s a conservative, standing in the way of many of the programs I would like to see our Federal Government create. She’s led her Republicans, the party of “obstruction” for the past several years, and she helped them oppose liberal change. And she stood in line with the legislative agenda of the Trump Administration.
And she’s a Cheney, daughter of the former Vice President, and generally channels his views. Vice President Cheney was a “Neo-con”, pushing us into an unnecessary decade long war in Iraq and shifting the rationale that kept us in Afghanistan for over twenty years. He betrayed the morality of the United States, putting torture and perversion “in play” in American foreign policy. Remember Abu Gharib? It was a direct consequence of the decisions of Dick Cheney. And while Donald Trump damaged America’s standing in the world, Dick Cheney did even more. He began from a position of high moral standing, a nation suffering a surprise attack on 9-11. The world stood with us. And he blew it.
So in the end there’s not a lot about Liz Cheney that I like. But that doesn’t mean I don’t recognize courage when I see it. And I see it in Liz Cheney today.
Voters
I’ve spent several essays trying to understand why the Republican Party stands with Donald Trump, after the “Big Lie” and the Insurrection. In the end the conclusion is clear: Trump controls the Republican primary voter, and regardless of what the leaders of the Party “know in their hearts”, they can’t stand against their voters. Instead of saying “out loud” what they seem to constantly say behind closed doors, the pay public obeisance to Trump and the Trump lies.
As South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham openly said, he can see no way forward for the Republican Party except with Donald Trump. So Graham “cleaves” to him.
Liz Cheney does not. She reached the clear (and obvious) conclusion that Trump encouraged the Insurrection, and attempted to overthrow the Congress. It’s the same conclusion that most other Members of Congress, Democratic and Republican, reached that night when they returned to a battle-littered Capitol Building to certify the Electoral vote for Joe Biden. It is the same conclusion that Graham voiced that night on the Senate floor.
In the Wind
But unlike Graham, or House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, or a multitude of other Republican members, Liz Cheney didn’t “put her finger to the wind” to see what side to support. While the vast majority of her compatriots in the GOP “crab-walked” their positions over to support the former President, Cheney stuck to what she saw, and what she experienced.
In this day of rampant expediency, Liz Cheney is showing remarkable courage. She is standing by her beliefs, regardless of the political consequences. Today, it is likely she will be removed as the leader of the Republican Caucus in the House of Representatives. She will be replaced by Congressman Elsie Stefanik of New York. Unlike Cheney, Stefanik is much more moderate in her political views. But she made a decision two years ago, in the first impeachment trial of the then-President. She determined that her votes, and her financing, were dependent on supporting Trump. So from a candidate who in 2016 wouldn’t even name him, only calling him the “Republican nominee”, she became a full throated, Jim Jordan-like Trump apologist.
Stefanik knows which way the Republican winds are blowing. She altered her course, and her ideology, to fit the current model. She doesn’t stand for much, except being on the “winning side”. And for that – today she will be rewarded.
Pay the Price
Cheney stands for what she believes. And for that – today she will pay the price.
John F. Kennedy, a hero himself in World War II, wrote a book in the late 1950’s. It was about eight United States Senators who showed a different kind of courage, the courage to risk, and lose, their political careers for ideas they believed in. The book was about moral courage rather than physical courage, and Kennedy titled it Profiles in Courage. That title has become a watchword today, to contrast political expediency over political fortitude.
I don’t agree with Liz Cheney on almost every issue. But I know courage when I see it. And Liz Cheney is a “profile in courage” today.
