The Comeback of Vice

So, the Cheney family is fanning out on all fronts.  Younger daughter Mary is setting up a new family-run DC strategic consulting firm, modeled on Henry Kissinger’s. Eldest daughter Liz is partnering up in  a new advocacy group called “Keep America Safe.” And both, together with their father, are on the hustings attacking President Obama… every which way, characterizing him as weak and weakening this country.

You can read Jason Horowitz’s reporting on this in The Washington Post, and columnist Maureen Dowd’s semi-humorous take on the matter in the New York Times.

There seem to be some important deeper questions to be asked here. Namely, why are the Cheneys going on the offensive so aggressively at this particular time? Could it have anything to do with the former Vice President’s lingering problems of potential responsibility for illegal acts committed by the previous administration? Clearly, if Cheney can keep the Obama people focused on proving how tough they are on national security matters, they will be less inclined to pursue Cheney’s own culpability in those same areas. News organizations tend to highlight the lively bits—the irony, the unpopularity of the Cheneys, the caustic comments back and forth. But the reasons for this flurry of activity—that’s what we need to see plumbed.

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