GOP Cannot Move on From the Election When the Press and Neutered Republicans Pull Them Back In

AP Photo/Matt Rourke

The media keep their pet issue brewing with the help of Cheney and Kinzinger.

The Liz Cheney melodrama in the House has been an ongoing feast of hysteria — for one side. Despite all the insistence that right-wing media was screeching for her removal, it just was not the truth. Last night, as one example, following the vote to strip Cheney of her party position, Tucker Carlson did not even mention her. In fact, this muted right-wing focus was proven by none other than Brian Stelter, who thought he was insulting Fox News by displaying CNN’s obsession with the Cheney story, reporting on her over 300 times last week alone.

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Expectedly, today, the leftist media complex continued with this obsession. On Morning Joe, they addressed the Cheney vote at length, with Joe Scarborough bringing on Michael Steele so they could have a lengthy talk with resident RINO, Rep. Adam Kinzinger — three Republicans who together cannot add up to a solitary conservative. While it was expected that the Illinois contrarian would be the voice of instability, he managed to exceed even his own reputation.

Kinzinger delivered some of his usual self-flagellation, declaring the party is sick and likely will not be around much longer, but then Joe’s mattress partner, Mika Brzezinski, asked him about a report where the GOP leadership allegedly hid polling numbers from Adam that was damaging to Trump. “It’s like something you’d see out of North Korea,” said the dolt from outside Chicago, “You can’t make the ‘Dear Leader’ look bad.” 

Then Kinzinger, continuing to read directly from the script by the media, spewed the canard that has been repeated across the journalism landscape: that Liz Cheney has become even more influential than she ever was as a result of this vote to strip her powers. This is a laughable claim for a simple reason: If this were, in fact, the result, the press would not be so outraged at this vote — they would be thrilled. A Trump-hating problem-maker within the ranks is exactly what the press desires, so if she truly had just risen in stature, the press would be gloating, not hectoring.

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Kinzinger then made a laughable boast about House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy only appearing on a particular network. “They go to their little media corner that won’t question them, that wants to echo that conversation, same reason Kevin McCarthy only does one station at all — because he doesn’t want to take the tough questions.” 

He actually said those words…on MSNBC. Kinzinger has been a fixture on that leftist network for years, and he goes there specifically because they do not give him tough questions. They give him room to trash the Republican Party with leading questions, and then he does his little homerun trot after launching one out of the T-ball field. To find a more blatant example of someone being coddled, you need to go to a neonatal ward tending to crack-addicted infants.

Kinzinger is doing nothing more than making the attempt at bolstering his personal stature, and it has nothing to do with political rectitude. He can preen all he wants about leading the Republican Party, but you do not do so from the confines of a leftist news network. Your speeches on telling the truth ring less than hollow when made at the home of the 4-year Russian collusion hoax. 

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Kinzinger is a dupe being used by this press horde because he and Cheney feed them with what they need — the excuse to keep churning the election opposition narrative. The truth of the matter is the press is desperate to keep the focus on the Republican reaction to the 2020 election, proof of this arriving from two press briefings that took place yesterday. 

Congress Divided Republicans
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

Following the vote to have her removed, Liz Cheney addressed the media briefly. She made comments about her desire for the Republican Party to get beyond all of the controversies, using the word “forward” no less than 3 times in under a minute. Then the very next thing she did — she looked backward and pledged to fight Donald Trump going forward. You could practically hear the squeals from the journalists in response.

Later, when House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy left a meeting with President Joe Biden, he briefly spoke to reporters. “I don’t think anybody is questioning the legitimacy of the president’s election. That is all over with,” McCarthy claimed. That word, “claimed”, was used numerous times by CBS News, underscoring their desire to keep that issue alive. 

Many others in the press had similar reactions, and it shows how vacant the accusations have been which we have been delivered. All the press has been doing since the January upheaval seen at the Capitol is lecturing how the GOP needs to accept the election result and move on. Now, here we have the House Minority Leader lending voice to the very demand we have been hearing from the press for months, and they are refusing to allow for that to happen. 

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At MSNBC, Stephanie Ruhle spoke to Garret Haaake about this, and after blatantly dismissing McCarthy’s words, she turned to the network’s D.C. beat reporter, who admitted they will not let the issue go. Said Ruhle, “If they keep lying, people like you are going to keep asking them about January 6.” His response was, “They do have a strategy,” said Haake, regarding the Republicans on the Hill, “The strategy is to ignore it and hope it goes away…and hope that eventually, people stop asking questions about this.” 

Kevin McCarthy
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

And there is the gambit. The press demands you accept the election result and move on, yet the moment that very declaration is made they shoot to their feet and declare it is a lie, and that becomes their justification to keep churning the story they claim needs to be put to rest. So you have the likes of Cheney and Kinzinger, desperate to curry favor from the Democrat-snuggling media, refusing to let the election controversy go because they maintain that desired attention from the press.

They feed the craven media maw, and in so doing keep the loud criticisms raining down on their own party. The sick paradox is they read from the script that the GOP needs to grow and move forward, yet their own words are what is preventing it from happening. Tossing the likes of these camera whores over the transom is needed because they are inflicting damage to the GOP to burnish their personal image. Let the Democrats, and the press, have them — they certainly do not have the best interests of conservative values as a priority.

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