From Vader to Savior: Democrats Embrace Dick Cheney
That Harris would accept the endorsement of Dick fucking Cheney is one of the most unbelievable moments in modern American politics. It’s also a sign that Democrats are fueled purely by Trump hate.
In what might just be the unholy alliance of the century, Dick Cheney and his daughter have both announced they plan on voting for Kamala Harris in November.
"In our nation’s 248-year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump. He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him," Dick Cheney said in a statement. "As citizens, we each have a duty to put country above partisanship to defend our Constitution. That is why I will be casting my vote for Vice President Kamala Harris."
His daughter concurred, stating that “As a conservative, as someone who believes in and cares about the Constitution, I have thought deeply about this. Because of the danger that Donald Trump poses, not only am I not voting for Donald Trump, but I will be voting for Kamala Harris.”
Shockingly, Harris’ campaign took the endorsements in stride.
"I'm honored to have their endorsement," Harris told a group of gathered supporters at a Pittsburgh campaign stop, adding that the pair were “courageous” and that “it's okay, if not important, to put the country above party."
That Harris would accept the endorsement of Dick fucking Cheney is one of the most unbelievable moments in modern American politics. It’s also a sign that Democrats have completely abandoned any sense of principle and are fueled solely by a visceral hatred of Donald Trump.
Consider how Democrats viewed Cheney before his Harris endorsement.
Far leftie Bernie Sanders tweeted pre-Trump that Cheney had “lied about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and got us into a horrific war that we should never have started,” and he was considered cartoonishly evil for his support of torture, or “enhanced interrogation techniques” as he called it.
Multiple leftist media outlets openly called him a war criminal. Prior to Trump’s rise to power, many viewed Cheney through the same rabid lens, gnashing their teeth and demanding he face justice for his crimes.
Objectively, Cheney’s reputation has been thoroughly trashed since his tenure. A 2011 article from The Atlantic noted that he left office with a mortifying 13% approval rating, and the nation is still facing the negative consequences of his push to invade Iraq post 9/11.
But with one simple endorsement, all that vitriol flies out the window.
The aforementioned Sanders suddenly saw the light with regards to Cheney and praised him for supporting Harris.
“I applaud the Cheneys for their courage in defending democracy. Obviously, on all the issues, we have very different points of view,” he said last Sunday. “What I think Dick and Liz Cheney are saying is that in this existential moment in American history, it’s not just issues.”
This goes a little further than just disagreeing on the issues, Bernie.
Democrats said Cheney had gallons of innocent blood on his hands. Crazy that a few words about saving democracy and stopping the orange man are enough to rehabilitate someone they repeatedly compared to Darth Vader.
Now that the animating malice of the Democratic party has shifted from Cheney to Trump, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
It’s difficult to imagine this going the other way.
If Hillary Clinton were to somehow change her mind and endorse Donald Trump over Kamala Harris, something tells me the utter revulsion Republicans have for the architect of Benghazi would not be overwritten by a single statement.
Cheney’s endorsement is unlikely to change many minds and in fact has the potential for backlash which makes the Democrat’s enthusiastic acceptance of his support all the more baffling.
The Cheneys represent a brand of neoconservatism that died definitively in the sands of the Middle East. Trump’s victory and subsequent rebukes of the endless wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have firmly soured the idea of nation building in the GOP psyche.
On a practical note, Liz Cheney lost her Wyoming seat to Harriet Hageman in a 2022 bloodbath, which indicates her voice probably won’t do much to sway Republicans either.
But apparently, neocons have found fertile ground in a newly bloodthirsty Democratic party.
Why else would Cheney insist that Americans support Harris? Do we actually believe that Cheney, who repeatedly lied to both Congress and the American people about WMDs in Iraq, suddenly gives a shit about the integrity of democracy?
Cheney supports Harris because she and the Democrats are now the standard bearers for foreign interventionism and war mongering. His goals will be better served by Harris in the White House than Trump, thus she gets his support.
I throw the hypocrisy accusation at Democrats frequently, but I think this goes further than simple two-facedness. This is an utter abandonment of the values that Democrats purported to hold for a short term deal with the devil.
Cheney was the proto-Trump, an arch-villain despised by the Democratic party. And now he has been redeemed.
Who knows, maybe Democrats will come around to Donald Trump once someone new comes around. As Dick Cheney’s rehabilitation shows, apparently no one is that far gone. Trump stands now where Cheney once stood.
And Democrats are oh so forgiving.