Asked about Ted Cruz, Cheney declined to criticize the Texas senator who steered the party off the charts when it comes to disapproval among the great mass of voters.
That's because Cheney doesn't at this point have any interest in the great mass of American voters. He's interested in the handfull of Wyoming Republican primary voters who will decide the fate of daughter Liz Cheney's challenge to Republican Senator Mike Enzi.
Enzi is a steady conservative whose only "sin" was to get in the way of Cheney-family ambition. But he is in the way, so Dick Cheney is quite willing to remake himself as the Tea Party's ardent defender in order to aid Liz Cheney's campaign.
Indeed, instead of ripping Cruz -- as he would have done in his former days as a White House chief of staff, GOP congressional leader, secretary of defense and vice president -- Cheney now compares Cruz with daughter Liz.
"I think [Cruz] represents the thinking of an awful lot of people obviously in Texas," says Dick Cheney. "But my own daughter is running for U.S. Senate in Wyoming partly motivated by the concern that Washington is not working, the system is breaking down and it's time for new leadership."
Shameless? Well, yes.
But that's how Dick Cheney rolls.
The Republican Party is just a vehicle.
The state of Wyoming is just a political playground.
What matters to Cheney is the Cheney brand. And if he has to attach a Tea Party label in order to advance it, why Richard Bruce "Dick" Cheney is more than willing to oblige.
John Nichols is the author of Dick: The Man Who Is President and The Rise and Rise of Richard B. Cheney (The New Press).
Tom Tomorrow deconstructs Tea Party logic.
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