Death of Democracy and Democrats Too

If QAnon is a right-wing conspiracy theory, the Democrats’ allegations that Republicans are killing democracy is the left’s conspiracy. While I genuinely like and respect Anderson Cooper, I have to fundamentally disagree with his statement the other night that January 6th was “the worst single act of political violence since the Civil War.”

Terrorism is, definitionally, “the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.”

One person died that day and it was one of the people storming the Capitol. We’ve just gone through a week about the Tulsa Race Massacre, which was arguably a far worse post-Civil War attack on our democracy. Likewise, more people died on United 93 keeping terrorists from flying a plane into that Capitol on the same day. Two planes brought down the World Trade Center that same day. Another slammed into the Pentagon.

In 1954, Puerto Rican nationalists opened fire inside the United States House of Representatives. There were also the various Weather Underground bombings and the assassination of John F. Kennedy and then of his brother Robert. Those are all arguably worse than what happened on January 6.

But it has become dogma on the left and among many in the press that January 6th is the worst. By the way and for the record, I do think it was bad and in the top ten, but I would put it lower than the Tulsa Race Massacre, the terrorist attacks on 9/11, the gunfire in the House of Representatives, the Kennedy Assassination, and the Weather Underground bombings. Congress very literally got back to work the afternoon of January 6th.

Nonetheless, once James Carville issued the clarion call to define the GOP by January 6th, the talking point has flared up.

Coupled with it has come a political press-based pressure campaign against Joe Manchin to assist in scrapping the filibuster. No matter how often Machin has said he would not, including penning an op-ed in the Washington Post, reporters have repeatedly asked him as if asking him just one more time might change his mind. One can easily identify the progressive activists masquerading as objective members of the press just by seeing who asked Manchin about the filibuster after his Washington Post op-ed.

Now Machin has done something else. He has penned a new op-ed in which he declares his opposition to HR1/S1, the massive progressive voting reform package. Various Democrats, members of the press, Hollywood stars, and progressive activists across the country have all declared our democracy would die if the legislation is not passed.

Awkwardly for the Democrats, Manchin makes one really good point that spectacularly discredits the Democrats’ talking points.

Are the very Republican senators who voted to impeach Trump because of actions that led to an attack on our democracy unwilling to support actions to strengthen our democracy? Are these same senators, whom many in my party applauded for their courage, now threats to the very democracy we seek to protect?

Joe Manchin just killed the Democrats’ voting reform package. I guess democracy is dead now.

The Democrats Are Killing Themselves Too

I have been warning Democrats for a while that they were playing with fire. You get everyone to see themselves as a racial identity group and it blows up on you.

Here’s the problem for Democrats. White people don’t see themselves as an identity group. Critical theorists on the left say that is a form of privilege. But therein lies a problem for Democrats — the more white people vote as an identity group, the less they’re going to vote for the party that tells them they’re oppressors who must pay reparations.

Do you really think the rich suburban secular soccer mom is going to go along with punishing her family and, in particular, her kids because of the color of her skin or because someone she’s not related to did something two hundred years ago? Really?

Likewise, Hispanic voters and Asian voters do not see themselves as a racial group. To the extent Hispanic voters do, they trend toward viewing themselves as white. Add them to the voter pool of white people and Democrats lose even more.

McAllen, TX just saw its sizable Hispanic population elect a Republican mayor. Don’t make more of it than it is because the turnout was small and the margin of victory smaller. But this continues a trend in Texas. As Hispanic immigrants view themselves as American and Democrats force them into a racial category, they go with white people.

Asian voters are from a plethora of countries. Korean voters tend to be Christian. Indian subcontinent voters are trending Republican because of people like Bobby Jindal and Nikki Haley. Japanese and Chinese descendants lean Democrat.

Hispanic or Latino voters are Cuban, Puerto Rican, Mexican, Columbian, Argentian, etc. In Florida, they’ve all trended to the GOP as Democrats double down on identity politics and Republicans treat them as voters who want jobs and safety.

For years, Democrats and a great many political pundits in the press have told us demography is destiny and we’re going to wind up with a Republican Party marginalized like it is in California. The real-world data suggests Texas and Florida are more likely than California and that trend hurts Democrats.

But the press, pundit class, and progressives all share the same bubble and cannot actually see it. Everyone else who wants to be blind to race or does not view themselves as part of a racial identity group realizes what is happening.

Unfortunately, Democrats react hysterically when this is pointed out and, because of Trump, assure us all the GOP is dying. If the GOP really were dying, the left would not be in such a meltdown about HR1 and the filibuster.