03 Jan The Perils of Privilege
What if I told you that there is a female politician in the news today, who began her extraordinary career 36 years ago, fresh out of college, when she went to work for the State Department and then the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)? What if I told you that after almost five years of working for the government, she took a position at a consulting company run by (and named for) a former Assistant Secretary of Defense, a position she left to attend law school at one of the top programs in the country? What if I told you that, after law school, she took a job at a prestigious law firm as an international attorney and a consultant to the World Bank Group? What if I told you that, in 2002, at the tender age of 36, she was appointed Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, where she served for two years before leaving to work on a high-profile political campaign? What if I told you that after that campaign, the State Department wanted her back, and she returned as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs and Coordinator for Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiatives? What if I told you that she left the State Department again, to work on another campaign – a presidential campaign – of which she was one of three national co-chairs, and that she eventually became a senior foreign affairs advisor to a different campaign, that of her party’s presidential nominee? What if I told you that she then founded a major non-profit institute with another well-known foreign-policy expert to deliver the American people information that they might not otherwise have about international terrorist operations? What if, finally, I told you that she ran for Senate, unsuccessfully, but kept at it and won a House seat two years later?
My guess is that you’d probably say that this woman is a SERIOUS player and might even be deserving of high honors, maybe even the Presidential Citizens Award. You might even say that she’s precisely the kind of politician the GOP, with its infamous diversity problems, should want in its party leadership. Heck, you might go so far as to say that she should run for president in 2028, and that she is PRECISELY the kind of candidate the Republicans will need to rebuild after four more years of Trumpian volatility.
Now, consider the following:
What if I were also to tell you that when she got her first job at the State Department, her dad just happened to be the Secretary of Defense? And what if I told you that the consulting gig was at a company where her father had friends, namely the company’s founder? And what if I were to tell you that the second and third jobs she had at the State Department happened to coincide with her father being Vice President of the United States? And what if I were to tell you that the campaign she worked on in between jobs two and three was her dad’s? And what if I told you that she founded her non-profit with Bill Kristol, who had been the chief of staff to the guy who was the vice president under the father of the guy under whom her own father was vice president? (That’s Dan Quayle, for those of you scoring along at home.) And what if I were to tell you both the House seat and the House leadership position to which she was elected were, once upon a time, also held by her father? And finally, what if I were to tell you that she has been married 28 years but has never used her husband’s last name, preferring to keep her maiden name, i.e. her father’s name?
Would her accomplishments seem…a little…well…less impressive then? Would you maybe think that this woman was less qualified for the jobs she’s had than she was connected to the people who did the hiring?
To be clear, I am NOT, by any means, saying that this woman is or was unqualified. She is very smart and has long been considered a serious and substantive person – her father and his connections notwithstanding.
What I am saying, though, is that there is little question that a great many more opportunities have been afforded to Elizabeth Cheney than would have been afforded to someone named, for example, Elizabeth Perry, which is what she would be called if she had taken her husband Philip’s last name.
Trading on her last name and exploiting the connections her father provided for her does not make Congresswoman Liz Cheney a bad person or even especially unique in American politics. It does not mean that she should be dismissed or slighted in any way. She, like all of us, should be evaluated on her merits and her merits alone.
LOL
Sorry. Just kidding. Liz Cheney shouldn’t be judged on her merits. Heaven only knows what might befall the poor woman if that were the case. Rather, she should be judged on her political usefulness. Or so the Democrats seem to think. The Democrats weighed her in the balance and found her…potentially valuable. They made her an integral part of Kamala Harris’s campaign, especially her closing argument. The other day President Biden did, in fact, award her the Presidential Citizens Award. Because of her efforts on the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack, the Democrats decided Liz Cheney is a hero to the republic and should always be treated as such.
Unfortunately for them and for her, the Democrats have, of late, been pretty poor judges of what is and is not politically valuable. Liz Cheney should enjoy her moment in the sun now, because the next four years are probably going to be rather difficult for her. The new administration and its allies in Congress are eager to mete out their own justice regarding January 6, and Mrs. Cheney is a prime target for investigation.
To be completely blunt, I have no idea what an honest investigation of Cheney’s actions might uncover. I don’t know if she played by the rules as she insists or if she tampered with witnesses and obstructed justice as her critics contend. The problem she faces is that it probably doesn’t matter. One might assume that a former legislator would be given the benefit of the doubt and would be the beneficiary of a little goodwill, but then, it’s hard to imagine anyone in the country who has depleted the goodwill bank more repeatedly and more profligately than Liz Cheney. She’s all out of goodwill among Republicans. The fact that kissing her backside yielded no results for the Democrats means she’s probably out of goodwill with them as well. As for the American people, she’s not exactly the type of person who usually elicits their sympathy. Spoiled daddy’s-girls usually aren’t.
The ideal outcome in all of this would be for Cheney to get what she deserves – be that vilification or exoneration. Whether she can, in fact, get what she deserves after a lifetime of getting what she probably didn’t, is another story. She would be wise not to hold her breath.
