LIZ CHENEY: SHE'S RUNNING

Hi, I'm back. Thank you, Yastreblyansky, Crank, and Tom -- great work while I was away.

I return to find out that the crypt has been opened:

Former vice president Richard B. Cheney and his daughter, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), are to appear at a lunch fundraiser Monday in support of President Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign and the Republican National Committee, according to an invitation to the event....

The former vice president has been critical of the Trump administration’s foreign policy moves. At a private gathering this year, Richard Cheney pressed Vice President Pence on a number of the administration’s foreign policy decisions, particularly the Trump administration’s isolationist stances.

Cheney has criticized the Trump administration’s hard line toward U.S. allies in NATO....

Nonetheless, Cheney and his daughter, the current chair of the House Republican Conference, are to appear at the fundraiser....

If you look at this through a policy lens, it makes no sense -- Cheney is a neocon who never met a war he didn't like, while Trump rattles sabers but seems hesitant to use them (somehow, we're not at war with Venezuela or Iran). Trump cozies up to dictators Cheney wouldn't (Putin, Kim Jong Un). Meanwhile, the guy who's still leading the Democratic presidential field is a moderate who has not only praised Cheney but would almost certainly have a much more conventional post-Cold War approach to foreign policy.

But daughter Liz is making her move. She's led the GOP attacks on the four first-year Democrats in the House known as the Squad. She's been the self-appointed scourge of alleged Democratic anti-Semitism. She uses the dated language her party's aging base loves -- remember when she called Bernie Sanders a "commie"?

Dad is doing this fundraiser because Liz is running for president in 2024. It doesn't matter that Dick is associated with the now-disdained Bushes. It doesn't matter that Liz isn't an "America first" advocate. It's all about liberal tears, and she makes it her life's work to try to induce them. That's what GOP voters will be looking for four years from now.

Will she win the nomination? Hard to say -- there are a lot of full-time lib-bashers in the party who'll be making their own moves at the same time. But she definitely has a shot.