My two cents: I thought it was very good when Liz Cheney had a lightsaber duel with her father and brought him back to the light, leading him to throw Donald Trump into a shaft and helping restore peace to the galaxy
— Hemry, Local Bartender (@BartenderHemry) August 17, 2022
I think we all know Liz Cheney isn’t great. The GOP trading her in for an absolute loon is still a bad development.
— Jort-Michel Connard 🐘 (@torriangray) August 17, 2022
oh, look, i see the political media finally found a republican loss they’re willing to celebrate https://t.co/XFnzWcC2Fw
— GONELIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachi) August 17, 2022
Rep Liz Cheney (R-WY) tonight: “Two years ago I won this primary with 73% of the vote. I could’ve done so again. The path was clear. But it would’ve required that I went along with President Trump’s lie about the 2020 election”
— Scott MacFarlane (@MacFarlaneNews) August 17, 2022
Cheney: “With God’s help we will prevail”
… As she concedes primary election and concludes speech by saying she’ll do all she can to ensure Donald Trump doesn’t return to Oval Office
— Scott MacFarlane (@MacFarlaneNews) August 17, 2022
I would very much like to see Cheney on a debate stage with Trump — the last election cycle proved none of the GOP men knew how to handle him, in part because of trying to compete on the identical turf of theatrical masculinity. https://t.co/8qSGGmQ3w7
— Garance Franke-Ruta (@thegarance) August 15, 2022
That two-bit New York wanna-be mob boss broke the (last remnants of) the Permanent Republican Party, and it wasn’t his to break. From hell’s heart I stab at thee; for hate’s sake I spit my last breath at thee…
… Cheney is clear-eyed when it comes to her chances of actually winning the presidential nomination in a party that is still so loyal to former president Donald Trump, according to friends and advisers. She sees her future role similar to how she views the work of the Jan. 6 committee: Blocking any path for Trump back to the Oval Office.
“It’s about the danger that he poses to the country, and that he can’t be anywhere close to that power again,” she told a crowd of supporters in Cheyenne just before the committee hearings launched in early June.
Traditional conservatives opposed to Trump have already discussed the possibility of Cheney running for the White House. “That chatter was very strong even before that Dick Cheney commercial,” Dmitri Mehlhorn said, referring to a campaign ad that ran nationwide on Fox News and featured the former vice president denouncing Trump…
But, for certain, Cheney and a small but influential bloc of anti-Trump Republicans have decided that there must be a 2024 candidate who will run as an unabashed opponent of both the ex-president and other contenders who spew his mistruths about the 2020 election.
Cheney and her crowd want a candidate who would serve merely as a political kamikaze, blowing up his or her candidacy but also taking down Trump…
Cheney has been very outspoken in her denunciations of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and other Republicans who have remained loyal to Trump despite his help precipitating the Capitol attack.
But she has also been upset with a separate group of Republicans who despise Trump but instead hope the ex-president will just fade away, particularly Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)…
But the reality is she may never get anywhere near a debate stage https://t.co/TEbfC0Fz6v
— Garance Franke-Ruta (@thegarance) August 15, 2022
“That we should wish to cast him down and have no one in his place is not a thought that occurs to his mind. That we should try to destroy the Ring itself has not yet entered into his darkest dream.” https://t.co/JdATZX6q1C
— I, Fred, will knock you all down!! (@LesserFrederick) August 16, 2022
Could this be… cancel culture? (No, but the op-ed authors have a book to sell):
NYT’s opinion board is so unprepared to meet this moment. This isn’t “cancel culture” under the most generous definitions of the word https://t.co/eyuGkTKE8C
— ProofOfBurden (@ProofofBurden) August 17, 2022
and they were totally fine with Cheney in leadership until she came out against the election Big Lie. That’s all it is: fealty to Trump and a refusal to go along with the obvious anti-Democratic Trump coup. Any other ‘reason’ is just total bullshit.
— Centrism Fan Acct 🔹 (@Wilson__Valdez) August 17, 2022
IRA and 2023 Premium levels
RinaX
To hell with Liz Cheney. It’s nice that she respects the rule of law, but so does every other Democratic member of Congress. Sorry (not sorry) that her party is so shitty that one small streak of decency makes her a pariah. Her replacement will vote just the same as she did, so whatever.
MomSense
We may all be going about our lives as usual, but our Democracy is in an existential crisis and she was on the defeat fascism side. My concern since the 2016 election results has been how the hell do we ever rebuild a democracy with almost half the citizenry supporting authoritarians. This isn’t about Liz as much as it is about we the people. Cheney losing to a fascist is not a wash. It’s bad because it is one more indicator of how difficult this fight for democracy is.
Baud
@MomSense:
We just have to take it one step at a time.
davecb
Unlike some folks on either side, she’s prepared to say that parts of her party’s position should be open to compromise.
JPL
They might as well rename the party, because the republican party exists no more. If the democratic party can keep control of the house, I do hope they keep her on the January 6th committee. Their work might be done by then though.
MomSense
@Baud:
Yes. It’s just everyone is focused on Liz but the real story is the people who support fascism. It’s a lot of fucking people.
JPL
Pence said that if asked, he would consider testifying in front the January 6th committee. hmm He might know that it’s trump’s party, and his only hope is to put a dagger in him.
Baud
@MomSense:
We are a lot of fucking people too.
RinaX
@MomSense: she was on the defeat fascism side
Was she? She had zero issues with kids in cages or any of the rest of Trumps disgusting agenda. He may have offended her particular brand of authoritarianism, but I’d feel no safer in a country run by Liz Cheney types.
Laertes
That’s true as far as it goes, but it’s a much easier position for Dems to take.
If Trump had been a Democrat, lots of our side would have been the very best Trumpers.
Every day, all across the internet, I see lefties who, if the moment felt right, would eagerly join a bloodthirsty mob. Who don’t even understand the rule of law, much less respect it.
JPL
@RinaX: You’d still be able to vote, so you’d have the opportunity to vote her out of office.
RinaX
@Laertes:
I don’t consider those people our side.
Immanentize
I am such a sucker for an LOTR reference.
Meanwhile, the new national consensus will be that Cheney’s work on the January 6 committee is just a sour grapes, sore loser, spite move.
Chief Oshkosh
I don’t agree with JC in his FP post on this, nor with RinaX. It is a very bad thing that a conniving sociopath who aggressively endorses overthrowing democracy just beat (by 40 points!) a conniving sociopath who at least espouses a fundamental belief in electoral, representative government.
It’s not about the candidates, it’s about the electorate. Cheney won 73% of the vote two years ago. Her wackadoodle competitor just won by about the same. Essentially, about 70% of the Republicans in Wyoming weren’t voting for what we thought they were voting for all these years. They were voting for pure power, the form of which they didn’t and don’t give a rip about
ETA: I see that in the time it took to write, several others beat me to it!
jonas
How significant Cheney’s loss is depends, I think, on what kind of platform she finds for her anti-Trump crusade after she leaves office. Aside from regularly kicking Trump’s ass from the dais of the 1/6 committee room, she was otherwise a reliable vote for generalized Republican kkkrazy. In that sense, things are kind of a wash. I expect she’ll mostly become a regular on cable news shows and the Sunday morning talk shows. The MSM luuuuuuuvs themselves a maverick, as we all know.
Immanentize
@MomSense: Hi!🙋♂️
MomSense
@RinaX:
Did I say I wanted the country run by Liz Cheney types? The person who won would have assisted in a coup attempt and will assist if given the opportunity in 2024.
RinaX
@JPL: Are you sure? I’m not. Didn’t she vote against reupping protections for elections.
Liz has no problem with the right kind of fascist who wears the right face while chipping away at civil liberties. Trump is just too crude and says the quiet part out loud.
MomSense
@Immanentize:
Hey there! How’s tings? That’s my best attempt at the Medfuh/Slumerville greeting.
RinaX
@MomSense: You said she was on the side of defeating fascism. I disagree. She just hates Trump, not his damaging policies.
Immanentize
@Chief Oshkosh: This
And I’ll add, I am not sorry Cheney lost, but I am deeply worried about who has been winning. And I believe that all converts to the light should be welcome. Even if they are only converted to a small aspect -+ like fascism is bad. Let the rest evolve over time if possible.
Also, as we know, converts are sometimes the best soldiers for a cause. Which LC is proving to be.
lowtechcyclist
There was that brief Wyoming debate clip that I think got front-paged here at some point, where she looked like the only person on stage with a functioning brain while all the others came across as idiots.
But in that brief clip, she made it clear that she differed from her opponents on Covid-19, where she recognizes the science, and by being pro-Ukraine. So she’s diverged from the GQP on more than just Trump and his attempt to overturn the 2020 election.
She may still agree with the loons on 90% of the stuff that comes before Congress, but the remaining 10% is worth something. She is extremely conservative, but she’s extremely conservative in this Universe, not in the bizarre GQP alternate reality. That too is worth something, and I’m sorry she will be replaced by some total loon.
CindyH
@Chief Oshkosh: but you said it so well
Anonymous At Work
I think that framing this election loss by Cheney as “cancel culture” is correct and the right thing to do. It should be cancel culture just as much as the loss of the Chocotaco is “cancel culture” or the manager of a supermarket not accepting expired coupons is “cancel culture”. Everything is “cancel culture” until the phrase goes away. It’s the politically-correct thing to do.
Immanentize
@MomSense: I miss chatting with you — glad I caughtcha.
These are more likely to be heard as greetings in the “Medford, the gateway to Somerville” hood these days.
MomSense
@RinaX:
I’m not talking policies. I don’t give a shit about Liz Cheney. I’m talking about where we are as citizens and that her loss to a coup supporter by people who like her opponent because she would gleefully overturn an election is a pretty bad sign.
Nicole
I know the wisdom is “the GOP wants fascists,” and while yes, I think that is true, I also think Cheney was probably also a crappy Representative for Wyoming. If you’re going to move into a state you don’t live in, it doesn’t matter if your family gives you an initial name advantage; you’re still going to have to do the work at some point. Hillary Clinton was every bit as much a carpetbagger as Cheney or Oz (well, less so than Oz, who is too cheap to actually buy his own property in PA, I gather), but she put in all of the work needed to learn about NYS. And she did the work for NYers once she was in the Senate seat. If she hadn’t moved on to be SoS, she’d still be cruising to reelection every six years here. Not a carpetbagger, but similarly, Joe Manchin is in no danger of losing his seat in a state that actively hates Democrats. Because, whatever else one says about him, he puts the work in making connections with his voters on the state level. I don’t think Cheney did; I think she got her national seat and went straight back to Washington and eventually the people of Wyoming said, “What have you done for me lately?” and as she’d made no case for why she was better for the state, not the nation, but the state of Wyoming specifically, than the other (Trumpy) GOP candidate, well, not a hard choice for GOP voters.
It’s workhorses vs. show horses. The MSM loves show horses, because they’re more fun on TV, but it’s the workhorses the nation depends on. And while voters will vote in a show horse (probably more often than we should), eventually they’ll ask “What have you done for me lately?”
I mean, it’s terrifying to think of, but if Trump had been able to do even a bare minimum with the Covid crisis in 2020, he’d probably have been reelected. But he couldn’t do the work.
And I’m not saying Cheney isn’t doing the work on the Jan 6 committee, but that’s exciting work that gets on TV. It’s the work for your constituents that is hard and boring but that’s where the votes come from.
MomSense
@Immanentize:
I lived in a triple deckah in Slumerville before the glow up.
jonas
@lowtechcyclist:
You make a good point. For Republicans now, conservatism isn’t a set of policy priorities or a philosophy. It’s just whatever trolls libs. 100% Cleek’s Law, with the racism said out loud and proud.
Another Scott
Wikiville:
I wouldn’t be surprised if she moves to Virginia or Wisconsin and gets involved in politics there to rebuild her base. She’s got lots of options, and the only constant in politics is change.
Cheers,
Scott.
RinaX
@lowtechcyclist: Whats coming from the Republicans doesn’t surprise me, so I simply can’t see her loss as some oh noes moment. Them fools been crazy, they’re just tired of pretending. would have gotten the same treatment if she’d gone against any of their designated kings.
Brachiator
As of Aug. 1, 2022, there were 285,000 registered voters in Wyoming, including 40,000 Democrats and 208,000 Republicans. Trump earned nearly 70% of the vote in 2016 and 2020.
In the recent primary, Harriet Hageman got 66.3 percent of the GOP vote. Liz Cheney got 28.9 percent. So, for now let’s say that 29 percent of Republicans are potentially sane. This may be useful down the road.
stinger
“mistruths”?? Are the “l”, “i”, and “e” keys broken on Washington Post keyboards?
RinaX
@MomSense: We are where we have been as citizens since Reagan. Repubs are just doing away with the niceties so no one can fool themselves anymore. If you’re black, attemps to have your opinion voided isn’t anything new.
MomSense
@Brachiator:
Reverse Crazification?
Immanentize
@RinaX: I think you are wrong about this. Liz is not, I think, driven by personal animus — although that is part of what it is now. I think she has seen the awful possibilities of democratic collapse. Now I agree she was a cheerleader of putting in the pillers that has led us here. But I think she is one of the people who, when the natural consequences of prior actions become obviously dire, was willing to at least call out the bad bad consequences. And that is a positive, not to be lightly dismissed.
And her focus on Trump is a smart part of a counter-intelligence move (learned from her Daddy’s spy friends?) to neuter* a movement, you must cut off the head. I have seen the J6 Cmmt work primarily through that lens.
*I went to a lefty law school at a very intolerant lefty time. In those years, use of terms like “neuter” and “emasculate” were booed in classes, and the word wymyn was widely promoted. Also, books about pre-menstrual syndrome were denounced as “violence against wymyn.” All with great, often vicious, backlash. Oh how not far we have come.
MomSense
@RinaX:
Yes, please talk to me like I didn’t live through the Reagan years, like I wasn’t already politically active and organizing even before I could vote.
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@MomSense:
The Joint Powers occupying America 10 years from now will have to do some extreme denazification in order to make it stick.
One of the big parts will be to let the megaschurches decay empty, like the Germans did the parade grounds at Nuremburg and the Poles did at Auschwitz.
Searcher
Re: the RNC rule, can we take a moment to laugh at the notion that Trump would endorse any nominee for President who beat him in a primary, ignoring for a moment that Trump is a lock for the Republican nomination?
Gin & Tonic
@Immanentize: I thought it was Meffa.
And I like the classic “whattayou, reetahded?”
Ken
I can’t see Cheney as a “political kamikaze”; as others have said, the Republican apparatus won’t let her within a mile of the nominating process. Whatever that process may be, these days — I’m rather hoping DeSantis is in for a rude surprise when he finds that a couple dozen states forgot to change their rules after 2020, and are still awarding their delegates to Trump without bothering with a primary.
Immanentize
@MomSense: and what a glow up. A house in Union Sq. near where my friends live went for over 3m!
Ken
Don’t think so, they’re still able to write about “emails”.
RinaX
@MomSense: Take it how you want.
Anyway, Liz Cheney is a shitbag and I don’t care at all that she got curb-stomped by the same crazy she enabled for years. Her loss doesn’t signal anything more than we knew before. Repubs will do anything for power and get to revel in that because our media failed a long time ago, and it’s what their voters desire.
MomSense
HW Bush was waist deep in Iran Contra. He knew that supply side economics was bullshit and went with it anyway. He ran a horrifically racist campaign. He launched a BS war for oil in Kuwait. He and Ailes were buddies and he was a big supporter of FOX news knowing its aims. He didn’t try to overturn the results of the election. That’s where we are now. They have gone past voter suppression and disenfranchisement to include overturning elections.
Immanentize
@Gin & Tonic:
That requires the ever fabulous classic: Shit Boston Girls Say.
“Look at this fuckin’ character”
MomSense
@Immanentize:
That triple deckah on Raymond Ave is condos now. What the hell. I would have been better off not going to college and using that money to buy a house.
Ken
Though if she were, I can totally see her going full “1970s Vincent Price villain” for her revenge, with her opponents dying in bizarre ways like having their faces eaten by locusts.
Raoul Paste
Fox has been inching away from Trump as of late. Cheney’s loss might change that, but I doubt it, because the big money boys know that Trump is bad for the economy. We shall see
MomSense
@RinaX:
Like I said it’s not about Liz Cheney and I don’t give a shit about her. It’s about the electorate and, if we manage to survive this, how we build a functioning democracy.
Ella in New Mexico
@MomSense:
THIS is what is truly, terribly scary: This change happened in two short years.
It’s not like we don’t have historical prescidents for the rapid flipping of democracy into authoritarianism…fast is how it happens.
So now we are now guaranteed a very, very bad, extreme Trump worshipper as the sole At Large Representative from Wyoming vs. a relatively predictable, sane and definitley antifascist conservative to add to the rest of the crazies who may just tip the house +1 and begin their war on US Democracy.
We’re in trouble, America.
Belafon
She voted against the voting law.
Geminid
@Gin & Tonic: My friend Debbie grew up in Medford, raised by an Irish father and a Sicilian mom. I always figured “Blow it out your ass, buddy” was the town motto.
Immanentize
@MomSense: Ask me about my apartment on South Beach in Miami. Oh, what I lost by being a public defender instead of a corporate lawyer.
Immanentize
@Ken: or leopards…
Immanentize
@Geminid: half Irish, go figgah.
stinger
@Ken: 😢
MomSense
@Immanentize:
At least it will be under water, literally(!!), by the time all of us can afford to retire.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Immanentize: I need translations for some of that. What are “shelltoes” and is it a good thing or bad thing that her Ma bleached them?
There’s a big debate in the comments on “blinkas” vs “directionals”. Half the comments say she got it wrong with “directionals”, half say their family says that too.
eclare
@Nicole: And now I have the Janet Jackson song for an earworm!
MomSense
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
I think she’s from East Boston.
VOR
Virginia, yes. She has probably spent most of her professional life living in Virginia and probably owns a home there now.
I doubt Wisconsin is an option. Although born in Wisconsin, she has no other historical ties, far less than her ties to Wyoming. IMHO she would be perceived as a carpet-bagger in Wisconsin. As a counter-example, Al Franken was able to re-position himself in Minnesota. Franken grew up in Minnesota, attending elementary through high school in the state. He also strongly embraced the local state culture to blend in. It helped his original opponent grew up on the East Coast, thus at least partially neutralizing the sort of attack Fetterman is using so effectively against Oz.
catclub
The Jen Rubin club. although a latecomer. I just found out that both Kinzinger and Cheney voted against the first (Ukraine extortion) impeachment. Kinzinger said in march 2022 he regretted that vote. Cheney in march 2022 was ok with it.
So 98% of fascism was still ok for them.
Archon
@RinaX:
Sure, but Democrats must make their peace and form some type of informal coalition with anti-fascist Republicans.
Frankly, were in Weimar territory. We need a united front and as many allies as possible.
Archon
@catclub:
I hated everything about the Trump Presidency but Jan 6 represents a real line for me at least. If you support Trump AFTER what happened that day you are a fascist, period.
Democrats need to form alliances with non-fascists Republicans, there is no way around that to save our Democracy.
Gravenstone
Why you gotta do us dirty like that, man?
Emma from Miami
Sweet Christ. She is an impassioned enemy of our enemy. Sometimes in politics you make deals with people you can’t stand because you gain something. Stopping the Trumpers is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING we can do at this moment. A good low-down knife fighter should always be welcome. We can go back to killing each other afterwards.
brantl
@Laertes: Oh, horseshit!
brantl
@Immanentize: Cheney’s gotten less than 1% of anything right, granted that’s mathematically 1000 times better than 95% of her current party, but that just makes her “a giant among the height-challenged”.
J R in WV
@Nicole:
TFG couldn’t even just shut up and let the professionals do the hard work. One of the first things he did was destroy the committee Obama built to protect the nation from new pandemic diseases. And vaccines, oh boy, did he fukc that up!
A shame he didn’t get a better case of the corona virus, maybe being completely unable to talk… that would do it!
catclub
@J R in WV:
Yes to all of this. and if he had been re-elected, cheney would be in there backing him 99%, as she was before, simply because if he won the election he would not need to incite an insurrection.
billcinsd
@Nicole: Joe Manchin is in no danger of losing his seat in a state that actively hates Democrats
That seems incorrect, as Manchin only won by 3.3% in 2018, a very good year for Democrats overall. Also, there was a libertarian on the ballot that got like 4% of the vote, so Manchin got less than 50% of the vote overall.
MisterForkbeard
@Searcher: Trump refused to do this back in 2016. IIRC. He refused to say he’d back the republican nominee unless it was him.