Thoughts by Former Republican Richard Bleil
Today the Republican Party furthered their hypocrisy by voting Liz Cheney out of the number three position in the party. I don’t agree with everything Liz does, but she did have the courage to stand up for truth, stand against the insurrection, and show some class in a party that is rapidly becoming the party of lies and obstruction.
Let’s start at the beginning, and it all began with Trump. About four and a half years ago, Trump won the presidency with an electoral majority, but with the largest popular vote loss in history. As irritating as this was to a clear majority of Americans, it also seemed irritating to Trump himself. Showing his mettle, from the Whitehouse he began complaining of how he actually won the popular vote, if only it were not stolen from him by illegal votes.
In the four years following, he lost the popular vote and the electoral college vote, as Biden took the Presidency. This was not a surprise (but a great relief) as during his four years as president his approval rating never broke 50%, the first time in the history of keeping approval ratings this has happened. America is built on the principles of democracy, and the importance of peaceful transition of power. Unfortunately, Trump began the Big Lie, claiming that he actually won the election, but that it was “stolen” from him by illegal voting.
Now, here’s the odd thing. Even though his popularity was always so low, and his lies were laid bare time and time again, and his childish behavior is anti-constitution, un-American and treasonous, the Republican Party has elected to align itself with Trump. His rhetoric and words caused the insurrection of January 6. Even today those facing charges are often saying they were misled by the president and his bully pulpit “news” source. Shortly after finding it necessary to cower in fear from the insurrectionists, Republicans refused to hold Trump accountable for his actions as only a few (and too few at that) voted to impeach him.
Today, Trump continues his lies, collecting donations from his supporters for things like the latest Arizona recount, a recount that is illegal. I’m guessing they’ll find that Trump won, but the recount is a violation of federal law in the first place as it is a private company, and Arizona, in violation of federal law, turned over the ballots to the company.
And yet the Republican party, the party that claims to be of law and order, continues to back Trump. Today, they voted to oust Lynn Cheney from her position as the third most powerful Republican in Congress because she holds old-fashioned standards. She believes in civility, greeting Biden after his first address to Congress showing the class of Republicans of old. She didn’t agree with him, of course, but she showed civility. The minority leaders have made it clear in interviews that their priority right now is blocking Cheney and interfering with his initiatives, regardless of their popularity even among Republican voters. In other words, they don’t care what the people want, their goal is pure obstruction.
Today’s vote to oust Cheney is nothing short of a statement of where the party stands. They made it clear that they do not stand for honesty. Liz was ousted for speaking out against the big lie, in and favor of integrity and truth. She is not the only one. A group of high ranking Republicans have signed a letter calling for a return to the founding principles of the Republican party, threatening to form their own party if their demands are not met. I hope they do; this is a party I could get behind.
Worse than that, this is an act of pure sexism. Now they are struggling to find a female Republican congresswoman (of which there are few) that closely aligns herself with Trump to replace Cheney. It’s important to them that this be a female so they can claim that gender had nothing to do with their vote. And yet, there are other Republican Congressmen (yes, in this case I literally mean “men”) who have spoken out against Trump and have faced no or little repercussion as a result.
Today’s Republican party is about obstruction and oppression. They refuse to change their platform to be more appealing to voters, and instead are relying on legislation to oppress the votes of those they fear will not vote Republican. I hope those centrist Republicans do form the new party. What’s more, I hope the Republican party lose even more seats next year. It seems unlikely as midterm elections almost always favor the opposition party to the president, but never before has there been such infighting, anger, racism, sexism and anti-American behavior. I find it hard to understand how anybody can still align themselves with the Republican party and still claim to be pro-American.
Bleil's Banter 