As a police officer, I investigated crime for a living. So, it is so frustrating to see people committing what would be crimes if you or I said or wrote these things about non-famous people. But the laws have degraded to the point where you virtually cannot commit the crime of libel or slander against a famous person. And since politicians are famous, anyone can pretty much say anything they want about them. They can also include their followers as long as they insult them collectively: like the “clingers,” the “deplorables,” and “malodorous Walmart shoppers.” And there are many examples of this rhetoric unleashing violence.
I hear a lot of commentary, particularly from the left deriding the political division and vitriol in America today. High-ranking Democrats call their Republican colleagues racist and other vile epithets and reflexively refer to their legitimate political views as “hate speech.” But I cringe when I hear one of the few more reasonable liberal or squishy conservative pundits admonishing “both sides” for the vitriol and violence. Both sides?
Okay, if that’s the case, where is the torrent of examples of the Right assaulting the Left or preventing them from speaking on college campuses? I’m not talking about the fringe Right, such as white nationalists and white supremacists. I’m talking about the libertarian, conservative, or Republican leadership. The mainstream Right is simply not attacking the “mainstream” Left in the way the Left attacks the Right. The best you can do is find a few examples such as the admittedly disturbing words spoken by Rep. Steve King (R-IA) recently.
The Republican leadership stripped Rep. King of his committee memberships while Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar can make blatantly anti-Semitic statements, and dehumanize President Trump when compared with President Obama saying, “One is human and one is really not,” yet remain on her committees—including foreign affairs. There’s some proof right there, eh?
On the Left, you can go from the fringe (frankly, I don’t know what it takes to qualify as leftist fringe these days, but…) to the Democrat leadership and find all kinds of hate-filled attacks on not only President Trump but also his supporters.
In fact, anti-Trump madness (otherwise known as Trump Derangement Syndrome) is still subjugating leftist psychology. And not just anti-Trump. It’s anti-Right, anti-Conservative, anti-libertarian, and anti-law enforcement.
A quick online surf brings up a glut of thefts, property damage, assaults, and civil rights violations committed by the Left against people on the Right who are wearing or otherwise displaying their support for President Trump.
Stolen yard signs and hats, damaged vehicles and buildings, and assaults on street corners, at gas stations, in high schools, and on university campuses are too numerous to list here. During my career I investigated and observed many cases of sign-stealing committed by the Left but not one case committed by the Right.
For a recent example, after telling him repeatedly to take his hat off, a school bus aid took umbrage with a 14-year-old boy wearing a MAGA hat. And, of course, we have the now infamous sucker-punch assault by a leftist bully against a conservative activist on the Berkeley campus.
I’ve even got personal experience with this, although it made me chuckle rather than angry. I was not assaulted (cops don’t make the best victims), but a couple of years ago, a postal worker had to return to my house because she’d forgotten to deliver an item. I was outside, so I walked down to her vehicle. The uniformed postal worker handed me a large envelop and said, “I can’t believe I came all the way back here for this!” It was a packet from the NRA.
Every time a Leftist leader (especially a Democrat legislator) refers to our president as a Nazi, KKK, racist, bigot, homophobe, Islamophobe, misogynist, etc., it serves as tacit approval to harass and even assault people who support the president. How can it not?
Think about it. When a political party conflates the opposition party with the KKK or Nazis, it gives their supporters permission to act out, even violently, doesn’t it? I mean, doesn’t every one of us believe we would have been okay—even righteous—to assault, even kill KKK members on a night-ride out to lynch black people? Wouldn’t the same be true if you were a German citizen in the 1930s and 40s. It not only would have been seen as okay to assault or kill Nazis, especially Hitler, but also wouldn’t it have been your duty?
So, when supposedly responsible leaders of a major political party, their media allies, and their celebrity supporters conflate President Trump and his supporters as the equivalent of the KKK and Nazis, is it any surprise some leftists are verbally and physically attacking those supporters? Aren’t those leaders essentially telling their supporters it’s their duty to “resist,” harass, or even assault those on the Right?
Actually, the real surprise would be if the Democrat leadership were saying those vile things and their supporters were not following their leader’s words with slander, disruption, and violence.
Saul Alinsky would be so proud.
