Liz Cheney appeared on Larry King Live with James Carville and when asked about the tragic shooting at the Holocaust Museum, she suddenly has a problem with calling this type of violence terrorism. Now we need to be "careful" with our words.
And of course Cheney thinks this has nothing to do with our political discourse either. Heaven forbid she'd allow any of the blame for whipping up the crazies in this country to be laid at the feet of her buddies over at Fox News.
Anyone want to take dibs on how different a conversation this would have been had this been a foreign terrorist rather than a right wing, white-supremacist, domestic terrorist?
Carville's response is pretty pathetic and he doesn't even try to call her out for being unwilling to call this act terrorism. Despite that fact there was one improvement in this interview from the norm when pundits are debating Liz Cheney. I think Carville took a page from Joan Walsh's book, and didn't allow Cheney to monopolize the debate later on. You can read the full transcript on CNN's site here for that portion of the show.
KING: Our original topic -- and we will get into it -- was the future of the Republican Party. But one cannot go into any discussion tonight without asking about their reaction to today's fatal shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Museum, of all places, in Washington. An African-American guard is killed. The suspect, an 88-year-old white supremacist.
Liz, what do you say?
CHENEY: Well, I think it was obviously a horrific event, Larry. And I think that, as I understand it, they have apprehended the man who was guilty. We know who he was.
I do think people need to be a little bit careful about using words like terrorism before we know exactly -- you know, clearly, he was psychotic. But we don't really know much yet about whether or not he was representing any sort of an organization. I think we need to be a little bit careful.
But, obviously, it was -- it was a horrific event.
KING: All right, James, is it larger than this or is it just down to the point of a white supremacist kills a black American, in a Jewish museum?
CARVILLE: Right. Well, the first thing is, is he's a criminal. It's a criminal act. We don't -- there's no -- it is not a political act. What he did was a criminal act. So let -- let's call it what it is. If he's 88 or eight or 18, it doesn't matter. He's a criminal.
Of course it has huge significance. I mean 27 million people have visited the Holocaust Museum. It's, you know, probably the most dastardly deed in -- or one of them -- in the history of the world, in that you would have a hate -- somebody -- a criminal come in there with some hate motivation is -- certainly, it's newsworthy and it's significant. And, you know, this kinds of stuff has gone on in the world, it is going on and, in all likelihood, will continue to go on.
KING: Yes.
CARVILLE: But hopefully we'll use this as some kind of a teaching moment.
KING: Liz, is -- does -- is it parallel to some of the political discourse going on in America -- not to murder, of course -- but to what's happened to our politics with screaming talk shows and wild people on the other side and everybody's angry?
CHENEY: No. I mean, I think that we really -- it's very important to be careful here. I mean, I think, you know, in every society -- certainly in our society at every moment in history, we have had people -- criminals, as James puts it -- people who are, you know, crazy, psychotic.
Clearly, this man was a white supremacist, if you look at his writings; an anti-Semite; you know, a really vile human being. Every society has those.
But I really think it's a stretch too far to sort of say that somehow...
KING: All right...
CHENEY: ...can be connected to our political discourse.
KING: OK. Well said.
James, let's get to the topic at hand.
