Chris Wallace, Liz Cheney and innate human decency

Jul 27, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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Kaieteur News- Here is what veteran Fox News interviewer and journalist said after he left the network, after 18 years: “… when people start to question the truth, who won the 2020 election… I found that unsustainable.”
The Republican Party has demoted Liz Cheney in the House of Representatives and from thereon, there has been a downward spiral in the relation between Ms. Cheney and her party. The crash came about because Ms. Cheney accepted the results of the American 2020 election that gave victory to President Biden.
Ms. Cheney’s victimisation by her party is a priceless lesson of life that every human should internalise. Prior to her acceptance of the results of the election, Ms. Cheney was one of America’s most extremist conservative politicians. She held (maybe still does) ideological, right-wing views that would not find even an infinitesimal space in the Democratic Party or most mainstream liberal parties or labour parties around the world.
But there came a point in her life, like Wallace where she decided that there are values in life that lie at the heart of who we are as humans. Ms. Cheney and Mr. Wallace see their country as a democratic nation and were appalled that an incumbent refused to accept an election that he lost.
In no other nation is the parallel stronger than in Guyana based on what happened in March 2020. I have not counted how many articles,which I have done on all the dimensions of the five-month election fiasco but I have carried my psychological conclusion about the scandal in several pieces and I will use the examples of Ms. Cheney and Mr. Wallace to reinforce it.
No Guyanese citizen, no Guyanese organisation familiar with what happened in this country from 1968 onwards when free and fair elections disappeared could have stifled decency and remain silent about what took place from March to July in 2020. Innate human decency had to force us to echo even a small sentiment.
I will always remember cultural icon Ian McDonald for the stance he took. A man known for literary talent and a complete avoidance of political issues, Mr. McDonald displayed innate human decency. He denounced what he saw happening to his country.
What could have existed in the minds of Guyanese, especially those over the age of 60, who saw what this country went through from 1968 but chose not to let conscience and innate decency flow? Mr. Wallace left Fox News not because he liked the Biden presidency or was a supporter of the Democratic Party. Ms. Cheney spoke out against her party’s lack of innate decency not because she favoured Biden over Trump.
There was only one determinant when both persons took their decision – their country was more important than party politics. We read in the letter pages of the newspapers of all types of praise for individuals and organisations that we are told we must remember that they participated in the struggle against dictatorship in the seventies and eighties. This reminder comes up when we lament the silence of those very people during the five-month election imbroglio and the continuation of that reticence for two and a half years right up to this moment.
I am still confused and will remain confused as to how such an egregious contradiction can be defended. How can one appreciate the value of the right to vote, fought for that right, yet lose sight of that very right 35 years after?
I saw a zoom panel discussion held about three months ago in which prominent opposition politician, Timothy Jonas told the head of the Transparency Institute – Guyana Chapter to explicitly state that there were attempts to rig the national election in 2020. Mr. Jonas’ statement was pellucid and directly stated. He was emphatic.
Anyone who watched that programme had to ask why Mr. Jonas was bringing up that issue when it was natural for the transparency group to have made such explicit condemnations the first day of the fraud? What was Mr. Jonas getting at? What did he want to tell Guyanese?
Interestingly, there was a woman panelist on the same programme whose silence during the rigging was in focus. The head of the transparency group then reminded the viewers that the lady was a pro-democracy activist in the 1970s and 1980s. But here the contradiction is stark.
If you fought for free and fair election in the 1970s and 1980s, then why would you not want to fight for it in 2020? Unless of course, you are no longer what you were in the 70s and 80s. A new book on Walter Rodney made that very statement about the WPA personalities who served in the APNU government.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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