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Richard B. Cheney died on November 3, 2025, at the age of 84, leaving behind a complicated legacy that will be debated for years to come. His family said he succumbed to complications from pneumonia along with longstanding cardiac and vascular disease, closing a long chapter of public service and serious health struggles.
Cheney’s career read like a blueprint of the modern national-security state: White House chief of staff, congressman, Secretary of Defense in the Gulf War, and the vice president who served from 2001 to 2009. He was unapologetically influential, the kind of establishment figure who believed a strong America required decisive, sometimes unpopular choices.
When the unthinkable happened on 9/11, Cheney pushed America to act — to hunt down terrorists, harden defenses, and expand intelligence tools to prevent another attack; those choices reshaped the balance between liberty and security. Supporters say his actions kept America safer; critics say they expanded secretive state power and led to costly mistakes like the Iraq War and overbroad surveillance policies. The truth is both: history will judge the outcomes, but the impulse to centralize authority during crisis was unmistakable.
His health battles were public and severe: multiple heart attacks over decades and a heart transplant in 2012 that he survived for years while remaining a force in conservative politics. That fragile human story reminds us that even the hardest of operators are mortal, and that long personal sacrifice sometimes accompanies public service.
Conservative commentators have taken Cheney’s passing as a moment to draw lessons — and rightly so. Voices across the right have noted how the Gulf War, 9/11, the PATRIOT Act, and the broader national-security apparatus shaped the America we live in, and some warn that unchecked power, once accepted in one generation, becomes the precedent the next generation inherits. Those are sober points worth debating as we build the future.
Let there be no mistake: conservatives should be proud that we produced leaders who put national survival first, but patriotism must not be a blank check for permanent expansion of executive authority. Cheney’s life is a warning in the conservative tongue — be strong, be prepared, but never surrender the constitutional safeguards that make America worth defending. This is not weak-kneed libertarianism; it is hardheaded republicanism that values both security and freedom.
The last years of Cheney’s life also exposed the rifts within our movement — his public rejection of Donald Trump and his surprising endorsement of Kamala Harris in 2024 alienated many Republicans and revealed how establishment choices can fracture trust with grassroots conservatives. That breach is a useful reminder: our movement must answer voters’ demands, not simply manage them from the top down.
In the end, Dick Cheney’s record is neither saintly nor wholly condemnable — it is consequential. For patriots who love this country, the imperative is clear: honor the instincts that kept us safe, learn from the mistakes that cost us dearly, and recommit to a conservatism that defends America while fiercely protecting the liberties that define us.
