Episode Details

Friends,

I trust Joe Biden’s steadiness and judgment, and if he runs again, I’ll probably back him in 2024. But today I want to suggest someone who isn’t even a Democrat, and whose positions on many issues I (and I suspect you) strongly disagree with — but who could possibly be the best president of the United States for the perilous time we’re entering.

I’m referring to Liz Cheney.

Before you reject this idea out of hand, please bear with me. Even if you still end up thinking it’s a ludicrous notion, let me take you through the argument.

I’ve been in and around American politics for well over a half century. I’ve never seen this nation as bitterly divided as it is now — not during the Civil Rights movement, not during the Vietnam War, not during Watergate. And it looks as if the current division is growing deeper and even more dangerous.

Donald Trump didn’t just attempt a coup. He attempted to push America into a civil war. And he’s still at it — endorsing candidates who will repeat his Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him, encouraging states to change their election laws so Republican lawmakers can disregard the popular vote, and pushing them to install secretaries of state and other election officials who will count votes in ways favorable to Republicans — especially him, should he run for president again in 2024.

In short, Trump wants a civil war centered on himself — on his Big Lie, and on the racist nationalism he fueled to build his political base. Trump’s narcissism is so poisonous that he is committed to splitting the nation over its commitment to him. As president, Trump never understood that he was president of America as a whole. He considered himself to be president only of his supporters, whom he called “my people.” Those who didn’t support him were his enemies. Since the 2020 election, he has done everything possible to stoke war between his supporters and his perceived enemies. Clearly, that’s his aim in 2024.

It will be impossible to reunite this nation without a leader who is the exact opposite of Trump — driven not by narcissism but by a passion for the rule of law and the Constitution — someone who has staked everything on opposing Trump’s demagogic authoritarianism, someone with huge stores of courage and integrity.

Since the attack on the Capitol, Liz Cheney has demonstrated more courage and integrity than any other politician in America. Democratic lawmakers have opposed Trump’s Big Lie, to be sure, but most knew they wouldn’t pay a price for their opposition. Cheney knew she would pay a price — and she has.

Six days after the attack on the Capitol — when no other Republican in the House or Senate was willing to rebuke Trump — she said this on the House floor:

Much more will become clear in the coming days and weeks, but what we know now is enough. The President of the United States summoned this mob, assembled the mob, and lit the flame of this attack. Everything that followed was his doing. None of this would have happened without the President. The President could have immediately and forcefully intervened to stop the violence. He did not. There has never been a greater betrayal by a President of the United States of his office and his oath to the Constitution.

The following day, on January 13, Cheney joined nine House Republicans and 222 Democrats in voting to impeach Trump. She subsequently agreed to be vice-chairman of the committee investigating the January 6 insurrection.

As a result of these actions, Trump and House G.O.P. leaders have sought to drive Cheney out of the party. House Republicans revoked her status as the third-highest-ranking leader of the Republican caucus. Wyoming Republicans have censured her. Trump and the Republican Party are backing he