Big Lie of Stolen Election Obscures Cheney’s, GOP’s Bigger Longstanding Lie
The current rift roiling the Republican Party has centered on the “Big Lie.” To be a Republican insider these days, the prevailing wisdom goes, one has to accept that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump. If one doesn’t, one is sure to be shunned.
Put another way, the rift isn’t about the strength and substance of one’s conservative principles or advocacy for Republican policies — or even about a loyalty to Donald Trump’s policy agenda. Indeed, as has been pointed out, embattled Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) actually voted in line with Trump’s legislative agenda than her successor in her Republican House leadership position Elise Stefanik (R-NY).
Pundits, professors, and politicians alike, at least, have characterized the opposing sides of rift in these terms, pitting on one side an out-of-control Republican contingent insistent on peddling, if not believing, the delusion that the election was stolen from Trump, against a traditionalist, somehow sane, and principled wing of the Republican Party committed to the embracing the truth, upholding the Constitution, and promoting a conservative vision that purportedly orbits the realm of reason and roots itself in truth and constitutional principles. The former side, the story goes, has abandoned democracy and promises its…
