Siths of the Father
“You’re going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view”
Dick Cheney embraced comparisons between him and Darth Vader, but our pop culture maven Jack Hughes says the way the former Vice President and his daughter dispatched Donald Trump subverted the paradigm deliciously in a way that put the onus on us to accept new friends or beat dead horses.
by Jack Hughes
In Return of the Jedi, the final film of the first Star Wars trilogy, the evil Emperor meets his end (it’s complicated). The title is misleading in that he’s not defeated by a Jedi Master – not Luke Skywalker, not Obi-Wan Kenobi, not even Yoda (in either original AARP or baby form). The Emperor is overthrown literally by Darth Vader, one of his own, who defects from the dark side amid a paternal crisis of conscience.
Former Vice President Dick Cheney, who turns 80 this week, has repeatedly said he was “honored” and “proud” to be called the Darth Vader of the Bush Administration. He wore it as badge of honor, again literally, when he dressed up as Vader for a short segment on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. I confess, costume aside, I never saw a real close resemblance until I reflected on recent events and Cheney’s role in them.
Still, I did get when people said it seemed a bit too ‘on the nose’ for Cheney to joke that being compared to Vader “humanized” him. Darth Vader, of course, had a decades long career in the top leadership of an imperialist government during which he endorsed, enabled, or encouraged its most hawkish ideas. In fact, he oversaw the execution of those ideas – in every sense – so didn’t exactly have the cleanest hands.
Vader apologists will undoubtedly chime in here to say the point and plot of Return of the Jedi is there was still good in him. Luke pretty much staked the success of the rebellion on the belief that, in the end, a plea for Vader to do the right thing would not go unanswered. Cheney advocates would doubtless say he has good in him and proved it by doing the right thing when he came out forcefully against Donald Trump.
And that’s when it all came together for me. Trump has been likened to the Emperor, not least because they both saw executive authority as a source of unlimited power. (When told the Senate would decide their fates they both considered it treason then.) Each proudly established military space forces, and, oddly, given how it turned out in the movies, Trump’s campaign team even compared themselves to the Death Star.
It’s also true, from a certain point of view, that how Cheney dealt with Trump in recent months is analogous to how Vader dispatched the Emperor – he gave him the shaft. Moreover, Darth Vader and Dick Cheney did what they did with very much the same motive in mind: They were fathers who wanted to help out their children. Vader turned on the Emperor to help Luke and Cheney turned on Trump to help Liz.
Congresswoman Liz Cheney offers a ‘new hope’ to some in the Republican Party. Her strong stand against Trump suggests she may aspire to his former office in 2024 or, maybe, she wants to be Speaker. Either way, she’s got the right pedigree (the establishment ‘strikes back’ as it were). Her bona fides as a rebel leader are now, in a word, unimpeachable – having voted against the ‘emperor’ for having no clothes.
To be clear, Liz Cheney doesn’t need her vader – which is, fittingly, the Dutch word for ‘father’ – to attain an even higher office. She’s influential and impressively well credentialed in her own right, having served as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs and now, in Congress, Cheney is both the U.S. Representative for Wyoming as well as Chair of the House Republican Conference.
We should find this lack of faith disturbing.
Still, Dick and Liz Cheney are known to be very close collaborators. They worked together for many years in government and co-authored two books. It’s therefore inconceivable that they didn’t co-author their playbook for how to confront Trump and didn’t coordinate his attacks. (I imagine it was like when Vader told Luke it was his destiny to destroy the Emperor, so they could rule the galaxy as father and son.)
That’s a good segue back to Return of the Jedi, because after Darth Vader hastened the Emperor’s fall he asked Luke to “help me take this mask off.” The removing of Vader’s mask symbolized his break with the dark side just as Cheney signaled his break with Trump by putting on a mask (COVID). It was an unmistakable rebuke of the president which Liz proudly tweeted out using the hashtag #realmenwearmasks.
Cheney then joined all living former Defense Secretaries, Republican and Democrat, in signing a public letter in the Washington Post which not only declared the election over-and-decided but also threatened any civilian or military leader who might deign to put the republic at risk by defying the vote result. That he was a signatory to the unprecedented letter was shocking enough – but they then confirmed it was his idea.
This led Jacob Silverman to write “Liz and Dick Cheney Are No American Heroes” in the New Republic (which sounds like a Star Wars publication but decidedly isn’t). He is not as forgiving as I am. Silverman believes Cheney is a war criminal, which didn’t change because Trump failed Cheney for the last time – just as when Vader threw the Emperor into a reactor it didn’t bring back the people of planet Alderaan.
Still, this may be symptomatic of a condition which is not America’s alone – a lack of faith in our political leadership. We should find this lack of faith disturbing. To start reversing this trend, we need to stop being afraid of giving credit to someone we think of as ‘bad’ when they do something we think of as ‘good’ – “fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”
Both liberals and conservatives view each other as being the ‘dark side’ and, as such, we’re too reluctant to praise what the other side says – even when we agree. We deal in moral absolutes to avoid even the appearance of absolving those with whom we usually differ. We should open our minds, for as Obi-Wan cautioned: “You’re going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.”
As for Cheney/Vader, the pandemic prevented a perfect postscript. In the final scene of Return of the Jedi, while celebrating the end of the Emperor’s reign, Luke sees his father’s spirit appear alongside Obi-Wan and Yoda in force ghost form. At the inauguration, commemorating the end of Trump’s reign, Liz was denied seeing her father appear beside political ghosts such as Dan Quayle – but he was there in spirit.
Jack Hughes is a communications consultant based in Canada. His previous contributions to The Experiment include “Same of Thrones,” “Tippecanoe and Agnew Anew,” “Harris / Shuri 2020,” “What Would Nixon Do?” and “Firth and Firthiness,” among others. His inexplicably extensive writings on Dan Quayle are “The Unusual Suspect,” “The Unusual Suspect II,” and “The GOPfather.” His most recent contribution was “The Ballot of Bill McKay.” Connect with him on LinkedIn here.
What do you think of today's email? I'd love to hear your thoughts, questions and feedback. I might even put ‘em in the newsletter if I don’t steal it outright.
Enjoying this newsletter? Forward to a friend! They can sign up here. Unless of course you were forwarded this email, in which case you should…
If your new year’s resolution was to lose weight, try Noom, and you’ll quickly learn how to change your behavior and relationship with food. This app has changed my life. Click on the blue box to get 20% off. Seriously, this works.
Headspace is a meditation app. I’ve used it for a couple years and am absolutely shocked at how much it’s taught me about managing my inner life. Try it free for a couple weeks. Don’t worry if you’ve never done it before. They talk you through it.
I now offer personal career coaching sessions through Need Hop.
We set up a merch table in the back where you can get T-shirts, coffee mugs, and even tote bags now. Show the world that you’re part of The Experiment.
We’ve also got a tip jar, and I promise to waste every cent you give me on having fun, because writing this newsletter for you is some of the most fun I’ve had.
Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of the American Myth by Bryan Burrough, Chris Tomlinson, and myself comes out June 8 from Penguin Random House. There is no better way to support this book than to pre-order a copy. You’re going to love reading what really happened at the Alamo, why the heroic myth was created, and the real story behind the headlines about how we’re all still fighting about it today.
