Josh Marshall’s reader from Wyoming said pretty much everything that needs saying about Liz Cheney’s stupid run for Senate in Wyoming, so over to him or her:
FWIW, I think Liz Cheney just made a fatal career move. Having lived in WY for 35 years, I do not believe that Liz can beat Enzi. I think this is going to cause all kinds of hard feelings in Wyoming because this kind of disrespect to a man who has done nothing to deserve being disrespected in this way will simply not sit well. It’s a very east coast kind of move (think Cory Booker) and will only serve to remind people that Liz Cheney has absolutely no real history in Wyoming.
She also seems to have forgotten a very basic element of the WY electoral process, i.e., we have same day voter registration and Democrats routinely turn into Republicans when they walk into the polling place for the primary and then switch back to Democrat on their way out. Personally, I’ve done this at least 4 or 5 times and I will surely do it again next year. Democrats often do this simply to meddle in the Republican primary, often to vote for the most conservative crazy in the field. But this time, I am sure a lot of Dems will happily switch just for the joy of voting against Liz Cheney.
That would be a sweet feeling. However, his reader is wrong about one thing. I know a few Wyoming residents who have been around as long as s/he has who don’t like Pete Simpson, Alan’s brother.
Baud
If she did take out Enzi, any chance WY votes Dem?
mistermix
@Baud: 0.00000000000000001%
OzarkHillbilly
I briefly lived in WY back in the late 70’s and can state that there is a very strong nativist streak there. But then, nobody likes a carpetbagger.
@Baud:
No.
OzarkHillbilly
@mistermix: I would say you are being overly optimistic, MM.
Shakezula
She has a career?
No, honestly, what does she do?
Villago Delenda Est
She’s a chip off the old block…daughter of a war criminal whose head should be on a pike somewhere. Vile, arrogant bitch.
Litlebritdifrnt
OT and some good news same sex marriage now legal in England and Wales after Queen gives her assent to the legislation.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23338279#TWEET824743
This piece from the Beeb is from yesterday, the Telegraph tweeted that the Queen had assented this morning but now I can’t find the link.
piratedan
there’s always a chance depending upon how vindictive this gets. Remember Delaware? Nevada? Could be the first step of the R’s penchant for self destruction in 2014, more extremist candidates ripping the party apart. Since this is Wyoming, its unknown if the True Believers outnumber the Old School and its possible that someone takes their ball and goes home. I’d certainly be looking at someone to run in Wyoming now, just as a courtesy candidate on the D side.
Senyordave
Liz Cheney is one of the few people out there who could give her old man a run for his money in terms of a general lack of humanity. the two of them are complete sociopaths.
c u n d gulag
So, it’ll be the “establishment” Senator from WY, who serves in DC, versus the carpet-bagging wannabe, from VA?
“I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.”
What is it, you say?
POPCORN!!!
MattF
I’m glad to hear that WY’s voters aren’t likely to elect the Spawn of Satan to the US Senate. No, really.
Villago Delenda Est
@piratedan: Yeah, but Cheney, to my knowledge, isn’t running as a teatard insurgent. She’s just another establishment Rethug looking to suck from Uncle Sugar’s teat. As noted above, this is DC arrogance. Won’t play well in Wyoming, it’s not as if Enzi has strayed far from orthodoxy, and by all accounts is popular.
Violet
@piratedan:
Is there any Dem in WY who has the statewide connections who could be the “goodwill candidate” if Cheney and Enzi end up in such an ugly primary battle that they’re both damaged?
Roger Moore
If they have same day voter registration, doesn’t that mean Liz will blame illegal immigrant voters for her loss?
handsmile
Carpetbagging Liz may or may not incur the wrath of Wyoming Republican voters, but I am certain her campaign will do absolutely nothing to imperil her career. Why this is likely to get her even more bookings with Dancin’ Dave and his fellow bobble-heads!
The Village media will remain Liz Cheney’s principal constituency and her most ardent admirer.
Bobby Thomson
@piratedan: No, Castle was going to be elected to the Senate with the votes of stupid Democrats who thought he was moderate and had earned it. Without Castle, Republicans had no shot in a state where Republicans are having an increasingly difficult time winning statewide elections. Nevada also was trending Democratic. This would be more like a nasty primary fight in the District of Columbia. Won’t affect the ultimate outcome.
Barry
@handsmile: Seconding this. The Village doesn’t really believe in ‘failure’ for it’s citizens, and Liz is a citizen of the Village.
thruppence
Who runs the voting machines in Wyoming?
Higgs Boson's Mate
Cheney moved back to Wyoming last year after not being a resident of that state since, as near as I can tell, 1989. I know very little about Wyoming politics and less about the attitudes of Wyoming voters. I do know how I’d feel if a massive bag of entitlement who’d held no elective office dropped into my state and ran for Senator.
West of the Cascades
@Violet: Dave Freudenthal won the Governorship in WY in 2002 and 2006 as a Democrat – unknown if he would seek the seat if Cheney won the Republican primary. Election trivia: Freudenthal got slightly more votes for Governor in 2006 (135,516) than Enzi did for Senate in 2002 (133,710).
It would be very, very interesting to see Democrats change registration to vote FOR Liz Cheney — that’s what I would do — hard to understand bothering to switch to “R” for a day just to vote against her when a vote for her is far more ratfucking …
piratedan
@Villago Delenda Est: granted but how much you want to bet that she won’t tap that vein in order to keep her candidacy afloat? Enzi may have the locals and his own quiet connections in DC, Liz is jacked into the Media bubble and you know that she’s gonna float along in her own world and use those connections.
Mudge
@Senyordave: “Liz Cheney is one of the few people out there who could give her old man a run for his money in terms of a general lack of humanity. the two of them are complete sociopaths. ”
That’s the point. Modern Republicans are all sociopaths. The question is whether Enzi is sociopathic enough. Liz Cheney will get loads of national money, Enzi will get very little. Dick Cheney will twist all the appropriate arms to get endorsements and heaven forbid if Enzi has a skeleton in his closet. Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell had neither big national money (they ran before Citizen’s United) nor a famous, connected dad.
I do not for a minute think this is a fatal career move. Running for office in Virginia might have been.
Bobby Thomson
@piratedan:
That’s all he needs.
piratedan
@Bobby Thomson: granted Bobby, they’re not exactly the same, but still, Castle most likely WOULD have been elected but his own party couldn’t get out of his way. Reid numbers WERE bleeping atrocious until Senora Second Amendment got the nod. In that case, there are parallels and as has been mentioned upthread, it’s not as if Dems can’t get elected statewide in Wyoming, call it the Montana Lite effect.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Mudge:
FWIW, The National Republican Senatorial Committee has stated that it will back Enzi as a matter of policy.
Aimai
Too much to hope Cheney keels over campaigning for his daughter because he can’t get a regular supply of virgin baby blood on the trail?
Bobby Thomson
@Mudge:
Christine O’Donnell outraised Chris Coons two-to-one, and I can tell you right now the vast majority of it came from out of state. It didn’t help her one bit.
There comes a point at which money stops having any effect, or even becomes counterproductive, and that threshold is a lot lower in a low-population state.
IowaOldLady
This seems different than Christine O’Donnell to me. O’D was a loon but she was the result of a local uprising. Cheney is apparently just waltzing in uninvited.
piratedan
@Bobby Thomson: well you would hope that all who votes (voter fraud notwithstanding… gee think Liz would bus in some white nationalists from Idaho to bolster her numbers?)
Not in the habit of automagically writing off a seat just because, especially so with the R record of nominating and running an entire gamut of fail and Liz certainly seems to fit that criteria and I’ve rarely been disappointed in underestimating the amount of self inflicting wounds bthat R’s have been administering to themselves over the last few election cycles.
kc
I think the letter writer has underestimated the craziness and overestimated the decency of Republicans.
If Cheney wins the GOP primary she will bd the next senator from Wyoming.
rikyrah
I think this entire story is funny
Mudge
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: That may be true. But what about the Koch Brothers. Oil men, like Dick Cheney. We’ll see what the NRSC pumps into Wyoming once Koch (or other private) money appears. Also, Nate Silver thinks the Repugs have a good chance to recapture the Senate. Wyoming should be safe regardless of who runs in the general election. I suspect the NRSC will save its funds for close races in 2014, not a Republican primary. One confusion is what does one spend money on in rural Wyoming? Some TV, airplanes to visit every hamlet, bribes? The radio will no doubt spew lies and distortions about Enzi. Repetition leads to belief, (see death panels).
IowaOldLady
Does this mean Cheney won’t appear on Sunday talk shows as long as she’s running? Is there a bright side to this?
kc
@Baud:
No chance, I bet.
Mudge
@Bobby Thomson: May be true about O’Donnell’s money. But she was, as noted by IowaOldLady, a loon (or was it a witch?). The Cheneys are more venal than O’Donnell and I sense they would put a large cash advantage to its most evil use.
I have no dog in the fight and would love to see a Democrat win the race (note that MM is offering 100 quadrillion to one odds above, where do I send my dollar?), but I cannot see why, on day 2, Cheney is being so heavily discounted. Tell me about all the times that modern Republican voters did the smart thing .
Mandalay
@Mudge:
Certainly not the end of her “career”, but it is probably the end of her running for office if she loses to Enzi. What else could she run for? Running for the house seat in Wyoming would be a step down, and really appear opportunistic. And if she ran for office in any other state she would become a double carpetbagger.
In her awful, whining promo video she seems to think she is running against Obama rather than Enzi. I just don’t see how she can persuade Wyoming voters to throw Enzi out. But Enzi can certainly persuade Wyoming voters to throw her back to where she came from…the Beltway.
Violet
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
Hillary Clinton did this. Whether she was a “massive bag of entitlement” is another issue. I remember thinking she didn’t have a history of living in NY, so it seemed somewhat carpetbagger-ish.
jacy
I’m a Wyoming native and I have tons of family in Wyoming. (I graduate from UW.) Historically my family was strongly Democrat — my grandfather was good friends with Gale McGee and ran for local office as a Democrat — but those that remained in the state are now mostly Republican. (My mom moved away and became a radical left-wing hippie, and her brother, who was an Air Force major, now lives in San Antonio and is a very outspoken liberal.)
There’s no way Liz Cheney wins anything. Enzi is popular and well-liked. He plays to his constituency very well. People in Wyoming tend to be pretty plugged in politically, because there are so few people that they’re used to being involved in politics at a local level. Trust me, she has no chance in hell of unseating Enzi.
Mandalay
@Bobby Thomson:
This. How much money do you really need to spend to saturate the airwaves in Wyoming? Whatever it is, I am pretty sure that a three time senator has more than enough.
And what can Cheney really say against Enzi? “It’s time for a change”? Pretty weak sauce.
But Cheney will get dry assfucked by Enzi as a privileged beltway freeloader. I can hear him yelling “I am calling on the people of Wyoming to send that Virginian back to where she belongs: blabbering on the Sunday morning chat shows with her fellow Washington insiders! And she can take her sense of entitlement with her!”.
Stephen Brophy
Link doesn’t go to TPM, but to a sketchy looking white page with a block of text in upper right corner saying ‘click here’ in several different languages. Given your recent malware issues I hastily backtracked. Is this a problem?
Tone in DC
I’m fairly certain that rotten (to the core) apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
Let the foul spawn of Darth Cheney run. She’ll piss off enough people, who may stay home in disgust,and let some Democrat with half a brain squeak by in a close race.
Violet
@Stephen Brophy: I had that happen too. Eventually the link goes over to TPM. It’s some kind of feed link. Wondered if it’s related to the malware as well.
comrenc
@Violet:
New York has in modern decades been considerably more favorably hospitable to carpetbaggers running for its senate seat than in most other states -. Bobby Kennedy and Hillary Clinton being examples of this. When the seat came open when Hillary Clinton left the senate for the State Department, the problem Caroline Kennedy had was not that she was arguably a carpetbagger, but rather that she arguably had not paid acceptable political dues to earn her shot at the seat, beyond her celebrity as a former First Child.
Perhaps it’s because New York (at least the big urban parts thereof) views itself as a key hub-of-the-nation drawing the best and brightest from all over for higher offices like US Senate. This dynamic is weaker as you go lower, and the “outsider” factor may play more strongly in a run for a Congressional or state legislative seat.
PsiFighter37
Just another example of some entitled shithead kid who thinks because Daddy was somebody important, they are entitled to something.
Liz Cheney is entitled to fuckall, which I hope she learns with the appropriate electoral smack down.
handsmile
From the Guardian’s article on “mother and patriot” Liz Cheney’s candidacy for the US Senate:
“It’s bound to be a divisive race. I’ve found the nastiest races are those between candidates who have almost everything in common. Cheney and Enzi agree on 98 or 99% of the issues, so they will have to define their differences, and often these contests become very personal and bitter,” [Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia].
Also, former WY Senator Alan Simpson is quoted from his recent NYT interview “that such a campaign could bring about ‘the destruction of the Republican party of Wyoming’.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/17/liz-cheney-stand-senate-wyoming
Reads to me like a long description of “Popcorn!” or at least a tall cool drink for a sultry day.
Higgs Boson's Mate
It never ceases to disturb me that a nation born of a bloody war to gain its independence from hereditary rule even considers another Cheney, Bush or Clinton.
Roger Moore
@Mudge:
Media in Cheyenne, Casper, Gilette, Laramie, and maybe Green River, plus on whatever cable and satellite channels cover the state. Direct mail and internet ads. Greasing the palms of local politicos so they back your candidate. Yes, it’s more of a retail politics than wholesale, but it still needs money.
Violet
@handsmile:
One can only hope! I do think the Democrats need to be looking for a well-liked candidate who is already known. Maybe someone like Dave Freudenthal, the former Governor who West of the Cascades mentioned above. If Enzi and Cheney destroy each other, then Enzi’s likeability diminishes. A well-liked but conservative Dem could possibly sneak in because he or she looks unsullied by comparison.
Chris
Root for injuries.
Amir Khalid
@Stephen Brophy:
If you “click here”, as I did, you go straight to the TPM story. Nothing to worry about.
Roger Moore
@handsmile:
I’m rooting for
injuriescasualties.Roger Moore
@Amir Khalid:
It still looks like something that got stuck in there by a malicious piece of JavaScript. It may only be harvesting clicks for some advertising scammer rather than installing malware, but it’s still not what I expect to see.
FlipYrWhig
Mike Enzi: Obscure Senator, or the Most Obscure Senator?
handsmile
@Violet: ,@Roger Moore:
Casualities, injuries, Darth Cheney’s incapacitation (aimai @26): what’s not to hope for here?
Why this might even nudge Nate Silver to recalibrate his current Senate forecast (Wyoming now “Safe Republican” with a 1%/99% (!) ratio).
Dave Freudenthal only stepped down as Governor in January 2011 (after two consecutive terms), so I’d have to think he has certain state-wide advantages (name recognition, campaign staff, donors) to draw upon should he choose to enter the race. At the moment, no Democrat has declared his/her candidacy.
Will have to rely on West of the Cascades or those from the Cowboy State for better-informed opinion. A purple Wyoming? Unpossible!
Origuy
@Roger Moore: Laramie and Cheyenne get Denver TV stations. Advertising in that market will run up the price.
Gin & Tonic
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: I do know how I’d feel if a massive bag of entitlement who’d held no elective office dropped into my state and ran for Senator.
How do you spell Hillary Clinton again?
raven
@Gin & Tonic: Whoa boy, here it comes!
Patricia Kayden
I wouldn’t be surprised at all if Cheney won in a landslide. I expect that red states will get a lot redder in the near future given all the talk about the Blacks/Browns taking over and “the gays” forcing everyone to marry them. Cheney is a red meat stirrer like Cruz. She just may win and add to the polarization in Washington. Alas, President Obama’s last two years in office may not be too fun.
scav
Does it really matter how any one of us feels about out of state candidates? We can opine about how it might impact said bagger des floor coverings chances of actually winning in a specific context, but are we 100% sure winning is actually a part of the game? Campaigns can also serve as crowd- and otherwise-funded publicity tours, oriented toward outstate audiences and with feet well-inside-the-doors of all sorts of media outlets. The tedium of mere Governance gets in the way of the eternal media campaign.
MattF
Have to mention Jen Rubin’s take in the WaPo on Spawn of Satan running for Senator (no linkee). Rubin says Cheney would bring ‘gravitas and expertise’ on national security issues. Speechless.
J.D. Rhoades
BTW, cleared my Firefox cache but still getting the malware warning. And now people tell me Chrome won’t let them go to my blog specifically because it links to BJ. Fucking Chrome.
Loneoak
Christ, the song that is the namesake of this thread is playing right now in the coffeeshop where I’m working this morning. How often does that happen?!
burnspbesq
Every dollar spent in a Wyoming primary is a dollar that can’t be spent elsewhere. It’s all good.
Boots Day
I never dreamed I’d be defending Liz Cheney, but she really did grow up in Wyoming. It makes as much sense for her to run for office there as anywhere else.
She’s still evil, though.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Roger Moore: Looks like mm copied the link directly out of his feed reader instead of getting the direct link. That happens with some feed reader software.
For a long time, if you did a right-click-and-copy from a Google search page, it would instead give you a link that passed through Google first.
Jell-OH Schott
But Mika was on my teevee this morning saying how nice Liz Cheney is.
burnspbesq
I disclaim any responsibility for replacing keyboards or monitors damaged as a result of clicking this link.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/07/16/conservative-christian-group-mailed-vibrator-to-michele-bachmann-report/
H/t TRex.
Groucho48
Christian Science Monitor headline and lead-in:
The article doesn’t completely write Enzi off, but, it looks like the Village has already picked who it wants to win.
NickT
All I can say is that if Wyoming puts its scruffy redneck boot in Liz Cheney’s well-padded Beltway grifter ass, it’ll be the best thing that state has done for the US in the last 30 years.
namekarB
If, for sake of argument, Cheney wins the Republican Primary, what are the chances of Enzi running as an independent or as a Democrat?
Yatsuno
FYWP.
@Groucho48: Methinks the Village shall be mightily disappointed in the outcome of this election. And I also have a feeling Freudenthal is monitoring the situation very carefully. Believe it or not there are liberals in them thar hills.
Violet
Apparently she “moved to Wyoming in late 2012”, but Wikipedia says her kids attend some school in Virginia. Is she living apart from her kids and husband? How does that play with the “pro-family” wingnuts?
FlipYrWhig
@namekarB: Enzi would sooner eat his own foot than have a D after his name. But he could pull a Murkowski and be a nominally independent Republican for electoral purposes, I’d bet, unless state law says otherwise…
Roger Moore
@Origuy:
At least when I was living in the area they also had some of their own TV stations, too, and definitely radio. I suspect that radio is going to be more important in Wyoming than it would be in other places.
Yatsuno
@Roger Moore: Radio is HUGE there. TV signals can be unreliable and very few folks have cable outside the major towns. Radio gets you a larger reach into the more remote parts of the state especially the AM frequencies. I’d bet Rush and Hannity are big names there but I don’t know how much influence they’ll have.
Roger Moore
@Yatsuno:
It shouldn’t be that much of a stretch. Colorado and Montana both have two Democratic senators. It shouldn’t be that much of a stretch to think that the state immediately between them could elect one.
RaflW
It sure seems like a vanity run designed to enhance her Village bookability.
And that’s a shit reason to run.
ETA: @Groucho48: All the more reason I hope she gets that boot to the ass by WY voters.
Roger Moore
@Yatsuno:
Also, too, it’s a lot easier to listen to the radio on your multi-hour drives to get anywhere interesting than to watch TV.
Alex S.
@Roger Moore:
The Dems need to have a plains state playbook. It doesn’t work without any Senators from these states and the losses have been significant lately. It wasn’t so long ago that there were two democratic senators from North Dakota AND South Dakota AND Nebraska. I guess that Freudenthal would be another Ben Nelson or Max Baucus but even those guys can be useful.
IowaOldLady
@Jell-OH Schott: My friend the Iowa NPR reporter says Steve King is charming in private too. Goes to show you that a soulless evil heart doesn’t always show.
Violet
Speaking of western states:
He’s an Osmond.
Yes, why force kids to learn anything? No benefit to society to have educated kids. Especially girls. Then they just get uppity and don’t know their place.
Yatsuno
@Violet: This is not surprising for a Mormon-dominated state. They originally fled to Utah to try and found their theocracy (amongst other reasons) but had to compromise a lot in order to get into the Union. No doubt there is lingering resentment over teaching anything but the holy writs of Joseph Smith.
gelfling545
I’d like to think that the WY voters would reject Cheney but I have come to realize that many acts that I consider insane Republicans embrace with enthusiasm so I wouldn’t count on it.
Roger Moore
@Violet:
That’s far enough down the vortex of insanity that I don’t expect it to get traction even in Utah.
mds
@Violet:
You realize you’re asking this about Mary Cheney’s sister, right? It plays just fine as long as: (1) she’s a Republican; (2) she looks good in hobnailed jackboots; and (3) she kicks the hippies, the darkies, the poors, and any gay people who aren’t related to her.
Violet
@Yatsuno: Yeah, I thought the same thing. But plenty of fundie Christian types also agree that education, especially for girls, is somewhat optional.
@Roger Moore: One can hope. Guess we’ll see.
@gelfling545: I’m rooting for injuries. Let’s get Liz Cheney branded as some kind of interloper who’s only out for herself. Let’s get Enzi torn apart by the Cheney attack machine. Let all the infighting turn off the voters of Wyoming so that nice, sensible Democratic candidate (as yet unnamed) can win.
Mike in NC
So the Cheney crime family is seeking to expand it’s power and territory? Nobody could have predicted.
IowaOldLady
@Violet: Even if a Dem doesn’t win, it’s good for people to see the mean and the crazy up close. I run into a lot of people who still think the Rs are the party of Eisenhower.
Violet
@mds: Oh, yeah, sure. But Mary Cheney isn’t running for office. Liz Cheney leaving her husband, and maybe her kids, to live in another state halfway across the country is exploitable from a political standpoint. I’d expect Enzi to capitalize on it in some ads.
It’ll play a couple of ways–prove she’s s carpetbagger because she can’t wait to get back to her husband/kids who still in in VA. And it’ll brand her as anti-family since she was willing to leave hers for her political aspirations.
Stephen Brophy
@Amir Khalid: I just went directly to TPM and clicked there – thanks for the reassurance though.
catclub
@Boots Day: “It makes as much sense for her to run for office there as anywhere else. ”
Except perhaps the place she has lived the past 23 or so years – Virginia.
Stephen Brophy
@Violet: Thanks, Violet – I took a more direct route.
susan
Caroline Kennedy made a bid for Hillary’s Senate seat and flamed out. Famous last names aren’t always enough.
Peej
@Violet: NY is used to that sort of thing. RFK was the first one. I think the state likes to have celebrity politicians.
Chyron HR
@Violet:
Big Graham Osmond, the one they kept locked in the attic?
Yatsuno
@Violet: She’ll get some votes though. Daddykins still has deep connections in the state and the national party. He will be more than willing to throw some weight around in order to get her the title. And if all else fails, cheat. He’s not above that either.
Amir Khalid
@susan:
But Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg seemed rather halfhearted about it, as I remember. The impression I got was that some people around her, whom she was maybe not comfortable refusing, wanted her in the Senate more than she wanted it herself.
IowaOldLady
@Amir Khalid: The couple of times I saw her she was also surprisingly inarticulate.
Violet
@Peej: If it’s okay with the voters of the state, then it’s okay. NY apparently likes having celebrity pols, as you say. Not sure it’ll work as well in Wyoming.
I’m trying to imagine how this’ll work. Cheney is connected to a powerful political family with roots in Wyoming. She’s also been on their TVs, if they’ve got cable and Fox News, for awhile. So it’ll be sort of like having a celebrity running for office in their state–but one with some connections to the state.
Meanwhile, Enzi has been Senator for a long time, is well known throughout the state and is a known quantity politically. He hasn’t done anything particularly wrong to warrant a challenge (live boy/dead girl,etc.), so it’s not like people in WY have a built in reason not to like him.
Cheney is young, fairly attractive, and well spoken. She’ll bring a bit of celebrity to the race. Might even be some starbursts factors there. Some voters may look at her and think, “She’s got so many great connections in Washington. She knows how the system works. She’ll do good stuff.” Others will look at her and think “carpetbagger”, “out for herself, not for WY.” And some will feel bad that poor, hardworking Enzi is being treated like this by this.
I think it could get bloody and end up hurting the Republican party in Wyoming. Couldn’t be happier about that.
StringOnAStick
It was mentioned above already, but I think the long-view plan isn’t affected if Spawn wins this or not. As it is now, Spawn obtained her bobble-head cred simply by being spawn; no prior elected experience. Perhaps this run is about grabbing a bit of that, even if she loses. Perhaps it is about pleasing Big Daddy*. Perhaps it is about having a reliable and controllable neocon spouting neocon policy loud and proud, and she know her DC cocktail weenie “journalists” will just love covering their buddy’s campaign, thus keeping the neocon brand/knob well polished.
* Remember, it is always about pleasing Big Daddy Cheney.
Just Some Fuckhead
Holy fuck, it’s been over 12 hours since we talked about cats. Is the site down?
Chyron HR
@Just Some Fuckhead:
No, just an attack of meow-lware.
Roger Moore
@Violet:
The potential problem with calling out Liz Cheney on family issues is that it risks coming out as an attack on her for being a working woman trying to escape the kitchen. Attacks need to focus on the carpetbagger side and leave suggestions that she’s abandoning her family as a subtext.
Peej
@Just Some Fuckhead: nah….we’re all hanging out waiting for the kitteh pictures.
Amir Khalid
@Just Some Fuckhead:
The big kitteh news everyone’s waiting for (or should I say the big-kitteh news?) is the unveiling of John Cole’s new master, John Henry.
peripeteia
@Shakezula: peripeteia
Just Some Fuckhead
@Chyron HR: Very nice. I thought the site may have been under investigation for kitty porn.
IowaOldLady
@Amir Khalid: I love a writer who knows how to use a hyphen.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Violet: Wasn’t Liz Cheney’s traumatic childhood the subject of a book written by Scooter Libby wherein the young Liz was kept in a cage and forced to copulate with a bear?
Jay
Liz Cheney=Cory Booker?!
What the FUCK?
Jay
(And yeah, I get that Marshall’s reader isn’t comparing Cheney to Booker on policy grounds, but still, Lautenberg was older than Enzi, old enough to make people worry he’d die in his next elected term, Plus, Booker’s actually accomplished things-not all of them agreeable, of course, but still-for his city, state & country, leading lots of people in Jersey to like him. Other than enable torture, what’s Liz Cheney done? The side-by-side stacking of individual accomplishments is, to me, what makes the pairing of those two names most disgusting.)
Just Some Fuckhead
@Amir Khalid: John and I are fighting right now so I don’t care about his pre-owned reconditioned cat.
A Ghost To Most
@gelfling545:
This is why I have difficulty with the concept of ‘reasonable doubt’ or ‘what a reasonable person would think’ anymore. What half this country thinks is reasonable is stone-fucking crazy to the other half.
Tone in DC
@A Ghost To Most:
I think it’s more like what approximately 27% thinks is sane is nucking futs to the other 73% (or thereabouts).
scav
@Chyron HR: Don’t some of us wish.
Violet
@Jay: I read it as comparing the decision to jump into the race against a long time sitting Senator as being something more acceptable on the east coast (where Booker is and like he did) than in Wyoming. Not as comparing Booker and Liz Cheney. Ick.
Booker has accomplished things and been elected to an office before. Running for higher office is a natural step for him. Liz Cheney has done none of that. She’s running on her name not her record and against a Senator who isn’t an older person with multiple health issues. The two situations don’t seem all that similar to me, except for a younger person challenging an older sitting Senator who people didn’t expect would be challenged.
A Ghost To Most
@Tone in DC:
27% might be certifiable, but ~23% go along with them (and vote with them), so the net result is the same
schrodinger's cat
@Just Some Fuckhead: You outed yourself that day, you love kittehs too!
A Ghost To Most
@schrodinger’s cat: yep, you’re busted JSF.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Just Some Fuckhead
@schrodinger’s cat: Nonononononono. Just this one cat and it isn’t love. It’s more like a bromance. We watch ESPN together and make fun of the other cats.
Omnes Omnibus
@Just Some Fuckhead: I feel sorry for the bear.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Omnes Omnibus: Yeah, apparently as a result of that torture, the bear lost all capacity for empathy and emotion and became ferocious.
susan
It could be that the Cheney family is seething over the “bad rap” they think Dick has gotten for all the Bush screw-ups. I am sure they know that their husband/father is frequently referred to as Darth Cheney and worse.
Maybe Liz wants to get in the race so that she can assure us that her dad was loyal public servant deeply committed to the country he loved and the people he served. She could also maintain that his political policies were and continue to be right for the country, and that he deserves our respect and appreciation.
If he is now a bitter, angry old man, she might be trying to cheer him up by running for office and, along the way, doing her best to rehabilitate his (and the Cheney) reputation.
I expect that before too long a Bush will come along and do his/her best to try to get the stink off of that name too.
burnspbesq
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Methinks the fuckhead doth protest too much.
A Ghost To Most
@burnspbesq: yeah, I’m sure they are a regular Howard and Raj.
Roger Moore
@Just Some Fuckhead:
If Cheney did it, it was enhanced interrogation, not torture.
NickT
@susan:
That would be George P. Bush.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Roger Moore: Turning bears rogue is no way to keep America safe.
RaflW
Of fer fucks sake, apparently I can’t talk about CIR or something as FYWP thinks I’m spamming.
Shitcake software.
Omnes Omnibus
@Just Some Fuckhead: It was before the DOMA decision, so who knows what would happen now.
Bobby Thomson
@Jay: Have you ever seen them in the same room? Think about it.
Jebediah
@Yatsuno:
Bookmark this, lib- when Darth Shitheart dies, no one will build him a Cheesa Giza, with or without pyramide cheese.
cckids
@IowaOldLady:
This. And no comparisons to Hillary, please, it isn’t as if it is an open seat. If that were the case, she’d be a shoo-in.
cckids
@Gin & Tonic: When Hillary ran, Moynihan had retired, the seat was open. Made all the difference in the world; she wouldn’t have won against a popular incumbent.
Of course, being an intelligent being, she wouldn’t have chosen to run against a popular incumbent. She knows how the politics game works.
Jebediah
@Amir Khalid:
John Henry is a perfectly cromulent name, but every time I read it I hear Drive-by Truckers “The Day John Henry Died” – a great but not at all cheery song.
“John Henry was a steel-driving bastard/But he was a bastard just the same…”
Gin & Tonic
@cckids: Sorry, which part of “massive bag of entitlement who’d held no elective office dropped into my state and ran for Senator” were you refuting? Cause I don’t see a negation anywhere. How long had she resided in NY prior to this? What elective office had she held?
gf120581
@susan: You hit the nail on the head. Liz has been on a one-woman crusade to restore her daddy’s image ever since he slunk out of power in January of 09. She’s driven by one goal and one goal only; to make Daddy proud. Complete daddy’s girl.
Personally, I think she’s as messed up as she is because she knows the only reason she exists is because Daddy needed a new excuse to avoid fighting in Vietnam.
mai naem
@susan: What are you talking about? You do realize George P. Bush, one of the brown ones, is running for land commissioner in Texas?
mere mortal
I must be missing something important. In what way is having to face a challenger in an election a slight? Isn’t that the whole point?
mainmati
I met Liz Cheney in 1991 when she was “special assistant” to an Assistant Administrator at USAID during Bush1. I was on loan to USAID to help manage the environmental program in eastern Europe. She had objected to my environmental review of US religious organization grants for activities there. She wanted me to give them a pass on the most basic health and safety standards. When I met her she was this grossly made-up and frankly arrogant person for someone who was only about 22 and knew nothing whatsoever about what she was talking about. Needless to say, I didn’t budge and she had no legal recourse. This was when all I knew was that Cheney was Defense Secretary. My conclusion is that she was both ignorant and entitled and would never have been in the position she was in at that time had she not been part of the Washington elite (aka, the Village).
IowaOldLady
I see Cheney says Enzi is maybe “confused” when he says she told him she wouldn’t run if he did. The horrible woman is implying he’s so old he’s not thinking straight. My blood pressure won’t take much of her.
Ramalama
I know this is a thread about Cheney. But I’m having a really tough time accepting the latter-day complaints about legacy that throw Clinton in with Bushes, Cheneys and (heard around the internets) Kennedys. Clinton is the only one mentioned who is not a child of the scion families, but rather a spouse. She grew up without the sense of entitlement, who earned her own stripes and married a guy who also earned his own stripes. If you recall, she planned on keeping her own name but was met with howls of derision and accusations of (fill in the blanks) and so knuckled under and took the name Clinton.
She battled and lost, and battled and won, alongside her husband. She made missteps, mistakes, meltdowns.
I recall when she went a carpetbagging for the senate seat in NY that she went on a listening tour. I recall howls of derision at such a thing, but it worked. The people voted for her. From what I can recall – we get upstate NY tv coverage in Quebec – they liked Hillary as their senator because she listened to what they wanted and did enough of what they asked for.
Disagree with Hillary’s politics all you like – but harping about her not earning the right to be in politics, to run for whatever position she wants to?
I beg to differ. I beg to differ. I beg to fucking differ.
Paul in KY
@jacy: Man, if Sen. Enzi’s TV consultants can’t make up some good TV ads that (truthfully, IMO) make her out to be Satan’s favorite daughter who bathes daily in kitten blood & would sell your mother to slavers for another booking in Meet the Press, well then he just wasn’t in it & deserves to lose.
BlueSkies
@jacy: ” (I graduate from UW.) ”
I see the probelm right there… ;)