Over the years, many Americans who failed to bow a knee to any tenant of progressive theology have been labeled everything from Nazi fascists to bigots and haters of every shape and size.
That used to worry the average American. Not so much anymore. Those kinds of attacks are so ubiquitous these days, they’ve become little more than background noise.
Being labeled a “racist” used to really mean something. In fact, to be called a racist was about as bad as it got.
Then the progressive left decided all white people are racist. In fact, everything is racist. The whole country is racist and anyone who denies it is proving they are racist. Every member of the dominant culture is part of an all-pervasive racist tapestry that is woven into every aspect of American life.
Defining racism so broadly is beyond regrettable. It trivializes and inures the public to actual instances of racism that should raise the ire of people everywhere.
Whether it’s race relations or any other aspect of progressive dogma, the left hyperventilates so often that no one pays much attention anymore.
With well-practiced distress, the left sounds the alarm. “The sky is falling, and this time we really mean it! Either we get our way or it’s the end of everything. Agree with us or you’re evil.”
Even Supreme Court justices are jumping on the “everything is an existential threat” bandwagon.
In response to the court’s recent decision to limit the power of lower court judges to issue nationwide injunctions, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote, “It is not difficult to predict how this all ends. Eventually, executive power will become completely uncontainable, and our beloved constitutional Republic will be no more.”
There you have it. Either the court agrees with Jackson, or it’s the end of the Republic.
Jackson’s dissent was so illogical and so hysterical, Justice Amy Coney Barrett felt it necessary to reply. “We will not dwell on Justice Jackson’s argument,” she wrote, “which is at odds with more than two centuries’ worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself,” adding, “Justice Jackson decries an imperial Executive while embracing an imperial Judiciary.”
What is it about the left that makes it incapable of understanding why anyone might not believe what it believes, or want what it wants?
Oppose open borders? You’re anti-immigrant. Want to do something about waste, fraud and abuse? You’re anti-poor. Think the policies of liberal district attorneys are wrong and harmful? You’re anti-social justice.
Don’t think oil companies are evil empires or that climate change means the end of the planet in a few years? That makes you anti-earth. Don’t believe a transgender, biological male athlete should be allowed to compete in women’s sports? You’re anti-trans.
Disagree that there should be no restrictions on a woman’s right to an abortion? You’re anti-woman. Think federalizing election laws is unconstitutional, you’re anti-minority. Don’t have a problem using the National Guard to quell rioting in Los Angeles, your anti-democracy.
Anti-immigrant. Anti-poor. Anti-justice. Anti-trans. Anti-earth. Anti-woman. Anti-minority. Anti-democracy.
Congresswoman Ilhan Omar believes the United States has become one of the worst countries in the world. “To have a democracy,” she said, “a beacon of hope for the world, to now be turned into one of the, you know, one of the worst countries, where the military are in our streets without any regard for people’s constitutional rights, while our president’s spending millions of dollars propping himself up like a failed dictator with a military parade — it is really shocking.”
If anyone needed confirmation that the Democratic Party has lost its way and is headed in the wrong direction, they need look no further than New York City, where Democrats just made Zohran Mamdani, an antisemitic socialist, their nominee for mayor.
If he becomes mayor, Mamdani intends to hike property taxes on “whiter neighborhoods.”
I have to wonder how a policy that taxes people based on the color of their skin fits into the left’s conception of racism?
Antisemitic, anti-white, anti-capitalist — apparently none of it matters to the Democratic Party, which has no problem funding Mamdani’s campaign.
Until Democrats and their leadership realize politicians like Omar and Mamdani are killing their party, and do something to isolate them politically, they will never again win the hearts and minds of the American people.
For too long, the far left has set the party’s agenda, and the center, such as it is, has simply gone along for the ride, afraid to say or do anything that might upset the party’s radical base.
Democrats find themselves in quite a pickle at the moment. The way things stand now, without the radical left, they cannot win another national election, but unless they abandon the policies of the radical left, they will continue to bleed support, which is already at historic lows.
To save the party, moderate Democrats must cut ties with their far-left colleagues, inviting Omar and other likeminded politicians to form their own party.
It seems more likely the far-left will send moderate Democrats packing, but either way, only when they are freed from their progressive task masters will Democrats be able to get back to the policies and values that once made their party, in the words of Democratic strategist James Carville, “the most effective political party in the history of the world.”
But it’s a long road back, and time is short.
Chris Roemer resides in Finksburg. He can be contacted at chrisroemer1960@gmail.com.
