Archive for the ‘Identity Politics’ Category

This article is fascinating from the standpoint of exposing the next demographic group to exit the Democratic Party.

It starts by saying “Daniel Bonthius was never much interested in politics before Donald Trump came along. Both his parents are involved in the labor movement, but he earned a musical theater degree in Boston and moved to New York City to make it as an actor. Like many of the city’s aspiring actors, Bonthius, 33, was waiting tables and working for an event planner—and had been doing it for most of a decade when Donald Trump obliterated the political system in 2016. After the election, a shocked Bonthius invited friends over to his home in Sunnyside, Queens, a one-time Irish enclave that has seen an influx of new residents. “I just wanted to talk out what happened with people who felt the same way I did,” he says. That gathering eventually morphed into an Indivisible group, a grass-roots left-wing answer to the Tea Party, and in early 2017 it hosted a new candidate for Congress the first time she met with an organized group of voters: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.”

What happened next is fascinating:

New York’s 14th Congressional District is more than 70 percent people of color, and 50 percent Hispanic. Ocasio-Cortez, who was born in the Bronx to a Puerto Rican mother, fit the district’s changing demographics, and neatly fit a larger narrative of a national Democratic Party in which increasing progressivism and diversity go hand and hand.

But a closer examination of the data tells a different story. Ocasio-Cortez’s best precincts were places like the neighborhood where Bonthius and his friends live: highly educated, whiter and richer than the district as a whole. In those neighborhoods, Ocasio-Cortez clobbered Crowley by 70 percent or more. Crowley’s best precincts, meanwhile, were the working-class African-American enclave of LeFrak City, where he got more than 60 percent of the vote, and portions of heavily Hispanic Corona. He pulled some of his best numbers in Ocasio-Cortez’s heavily Latino and African-American neighborhood of Parkchester, in the Bronx—beating her by more than 25 points on her home turf.

What’s noticeable is that blue collar Latinos and African-Americans rejected a progressive Latino. The progressive Latino attracted white collar people, the same as a white progressive would’ve. That’s pretty fascinating. Enter Blexit:

Don’t be surprised if blue collar people of color are the next demographic group to leave the Democrats.

Saying that picking Erin Maye Quade is Erin Murphy’s first unforced mistake isn’t controversial outside the DFL. Since I’m not in the DFL, I’m not that worried what the DFL thinks. Frankly, I’m confident that I’ve got lots of company in thinking that.

Filling out Erin Maye Quade’s identity isn’t difficult. She’s admitted to organizing with Barack Obama in 2007-08. She’s led this year’s anti-gun protest at the Capitol. She’s from Apple Valley. Combining with Erin Murphy is natural since the DFL is the Metrocrat Party. Increasingly, to the DFL, life outside the Twin Cities Metro doesn’t exist. Increasingly, to the Metro DFL, people who want to protect their families are considered weird. If you don’t believe me, ask Lori Swanson how welcoming the DFL is to NRA members. Swanson led Matt Pelikan by 5 points after the first ballot. Shortly thereafter, the DFL endorsed Pelikan. After the first ballot, Pelikan dropped a neutron bomb in the convention center, telling everyone that — gasp! — the NRA had given Swanson an A rating. Within 15 minutes, Swanson withdrew.

Why would we think that an anti-mining, gun-grabbing, pro-single-payer health care ticket from the Twin Cities would attempt to represent rural Minnesota? That being said, I’m praying that this is the DFL ticket this November. Check out the last half of this video:

Quade first admits that she’s a first-term legislator. Next, she virtually admits that parents can’t afford child care. Perhaps, she should’ve told Gov. Dayton not to let several hundred million dollars leave the program as a result of fraud.

Nothing in Ms. Quade’s legislative history suggests that she’s prepared to be governor if, God forbid, Murphy is incapacitated. Then again, I question whether either of these women are interested in representing the people of rural Minnesota. I’m betting they won’t.

This ticket screams identity politics. This ticket doesn’t seem interested in representing all of Minnesota’s 87 counties. In the end, that’s why I think Murphy-Quade will get beat by Walz-Flanagan.

Since the start of the campaign, Doug Wardlow has had a plan for what he’d like to accomplish if elected. After winning the GOP endorsement to be their candidate for Attorney General, Wardlow issued a statement, saying “I am humbled and honored to receive the Minnesota Republican Party endorsement. I promise that as Minnesota’s Attorney General I will restore law and order and work with President Trump to stop illegal immigration and voter fraud.”

What isn’t known is who Wardlow’s DFL opponent will be. It might be Matt Pelikan, the DFL-endorsed candidate. Rumors started spreading late Saturday that Lori Swanson might run for governor in the DFL Primary. If that happens, it’s rumored that Ryan Winkler might jump into the AG primary against Pelikan. Finally, it’s still possible that Mr. Wardlow will face Lori Swanson.

After yesterday, though, the DFL is a fractured political party. Their gubernatorial endorsement went long before getting the delegates upset. Friday night, a rumor started that Rebecca Otto might team with Erin Murphy if Otto didn’t do well on the first ballot. Late Saturday afternoon, Otto chose to team with Tim Walz. Saying that the delegates felt betrayed is understatement. Saying that the DFL is deeply fractured is understatement, too. While it’s still possible for the DFL to unite, that isn’t the DFL’s only problem. In fact, it isn’t their biggest problem.

The DFL’s biggest problem is that they aren’t a serious political party that’s serious about solving Minnesota’s problems. They’re mostly interested in identity politics. That’s why some delegates touted the fact that Matt Pelikan, if elected, would be the first openly gay state attorney general. They didn’t say anything about how qualified he was, though Mike Hatch criticized him as being inexperienced.

Here is Wardlow’s letter accepting the Republicans’ endorsement:

Wardlow will be a handful for whoever the DFL runs against him. He’s sharp, principled and a strong campaigner. Lori Swanson, Matt Pelikan and Ryan Winkler aren’t any of those things. Swanson is obviously the toughest opponent he’d face but she isn’t invincible.

The DFL emerged from their convention upset with themselves and facing a bunch of primaries. Republicans emerged from their convention united and facing just 1 primary. Most importantly, Republicans emerged with a message, great candidates and a lengthy list of legislative accomplishments.

Nancy Pelosi’s statement after Friday’s jobs report sounds like the paranoid rantings of a lunatic stuck too long on an island. Let’s call this one ‘Pelosi Island’.

Pelosi’s statement starts by saying “May’s jobs report shows that strong employment numbers mean little to the families hit with soaring new costs under the Republicans’ watch. Republicans’ cruel, cynical health care sabotage campaign is already spiking families’ premiums by double digits and pushing millions off their coverage, according to the nonpartisan CBO. Big Pharma continues to hoard the benefits of the GOP tax scam, using their handouts to further enrich executives and shareholders instead of lowering prescription drug costs for seniors and sick kids. At the same time, the President’s reckless policies are exploding gas prices, wiping out the few meager gains that some families should have received from the GOP tax scam, as wages remain stagnant.”

Wow! Ms. Pelosi is totally bitter. First, if that Pelosi keeps showing up to criticize good news, Democrats might actually lose seats in the House. People don’t vote for sourpusses to run Congress. Next, she’s just flat wrong about wages remaining stagnant, The official BLS report said “In May, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose by 8 cents to $26.92. Over the year, average hourly earnings have increased by 71 cents, or 2.7 percent.”

The tax cuts, combined with the wage growth, more than offset the increase in gas prices. Factor in the 542 companies that gave their employees bonuses, improved their benefits or who contribute more to their employees’ 401(k) plan and American workers are far better off than they were during the Obama administration. It isn’t even close, in fact.

This paragraph is unintended humor:

Democrats know that the American people deserve A Better Deal, with Better Jobs, Better Wages and a Better Future. We are committed to creating millions of new good-paying jobs and raising wages, lowering the soaring cost of living for families and giving every American the tools to succeed in the 21st Century economy. Democrats will never stop fighting for the hard-working middle class families who are the backbone of our nation.

Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt. People abandoned the Democratic Party in 2016 because they finally found someone who’d fight for them, not Big Labor or Big Government. They left the Democratic Party in droves because of the Party’s focus on identity politics instead of pocketbook issues.

The Democrats still don’t have an appealing economic message, instead mumbling their way through a PR campaign about “a Better Deal.” That type of gibberish won’t appeal to anyone. Just watch this, then tell me what’s appealing about it:

Getting shipwrecked on Pelosi Island isn’t exactly appealing. In fact, Ms. Pelosi looks rather discombobulated.

This afternoon, a loyal reader of LFR forwarded me an email newsletter from TakeAction Minnesota. Included in that email was a link to this article, which deals with the topics of voting and gun control.

It starts by saying “At last month’s March for Our Lives in Washington, DC, the 20 young people who spoke had a clear message for the hundreds of thousands of protesters: Vote. Specifically, they urged their supporters to vote out of office any lawmaker who stands in the way of gun control. ‘The voting is what we’re pushing here,’ Stoneman Douglas student and #NeverAgain activist Jaclyn Corin said in an interview with Crooked Media before the march. ‘The March is kind of a statement saying, ‘Hey, we’re gonna be voting in November. Watch out—all these people are voting against you.'”

This year, Democrats are pushing 2 things hard — raising the minimum age of buying certain types of guns to 21 and lowering the voting age to 16. Democrats are arguing simultaneously that 16-year-olds are wise enough to make informed decisions on who should represent people in Congress but 20-year-olds are too stupid to safely operate a semi-automatic firearm. Wouldn’t you love to hear David Hogg or Emma Gonzalez explain that?

Actually, the explanation is rather simple. First, Democrats want to flood the polling booths with as many uninformed voters as possible. People that think things through vote for conservatives more often than they vote for Democrats. That’s a statement of statistical fact. It isn’t a statement of derision. Next, raising the age of purchase to 21 is an emotional issue for people. The Democrats’ base will be fired up as a result.

Republicans need to frame this election as a referendum between sensible policies vs. irrational policies. Let’s illustrate:

1. There’s nothing irrational about enforcing our international borders. There’s nothing sane about opening our borders to drug cartels while fighting an opioid crisis.
2. There’s nothing irrational about reducing regulations and increasing competition.
3. There’s nothing sane about increasing regulations that cripple competition.
4. There’s nothing irrational about moving national guard troops to the Tex-Mex border to prevent human trafficking.
5. There’s nothing sane about letting human traffickers bring in sex slaves from Latin America.
6. There’s nothing irrational about shutting down the borders to prevent violent felons from entering the US.
7. There’s nothing sane about letting violent felons into the US by turning a blind eye towards the Tex-Mex border. That inevitably leads to new members of the Angel Parents ‘club’.

Conservatives, it’s time for you to ask yourselves if you want Congress run by people who won’t protect its citizens by electing Democrat majorities in the House and/or Senate or whether we’ll tell our friends, neighbors, co-workers and church family to get out and vote for sane conservatives, then voting ourselves. What’s required from conservatives is gritty determination to vote. Losing the House and/or the Senate will stop President Trump’s common-sense agenda on immigration, regulations and shutting down gangs like MS-13.

It’s ok to disapprove of President Trump’s tweets. Some of his tweets are inexcusable and shouldn’t be defended. His economic and national security agenda, however, aren’t just defensible. They’re essential.

Finally, it’s essential that all patriots vote to save this republic. I know that sounds a bit melodramatic but it’s where we’re at right now. Democrat progressives hate the principles that this nation was founded on. That’s how they can advocate for raising the minimum age to buy a gun to 21, then immediately argue that it’s essential to lower the voting age to 16. These aren’t sensible arguments. They’re the arguments of irrational people. Liberalism isn’t a political philosophy. It’s a mental disorder.

Only a Democrat could think about something as crazy as the Contraception Equity Act. It all started when TPM ran this article, in which they wrote “On Monday night, moments after the Senate voted overwhelmingly to end the government shutdown, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) quietly put forward the nomination of former pharmaceutical executive Alex Azar to lead the Department of Health and Human Services. While his confirmation is likely to sail through the Senate on Wednesday, Democratic lawmakers and women’s health advocates are sounding the alarm about Azar’s statements on reproductive rights, religious rights, and the intersection of the two.”

That’s just the start of their complaint. Next, they wrote that “Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) asked Azar to comment on the strategic plan HHS released in October that endorsed so-called fetal personhood, asserting that it was an “unconstitutional definition of persons as beginning at conception, which has no basis in science.” Azar responded by endorsing the controversial change in HHS’ stated mission. ‘The mission of HHS is to enhance the health and well-being of all Americans, and this includes the unborn,’ he wrote.”

Thanks to this article, DFL gubernatorial candidate Erin Murphy announced “This is why my Contraception Equity Act is important. In Minnesota, a woman’s decision making about contraception must remain with her and not her boss.” This is political grandstanding. There’s no chance this legislation will get a hearing, much less a vote. Murphy knows this. That isn’t her concern. She’s submitting the bill to attract more women to caucus for her.

This is why my Contraception Equity Act is important. In Minnesota, a woman’s decision making about contraception must remain with her and not her boss. https://t.co/d00QJjW0W1

— Erin Murphy (@epmurphymn) January 29, 2018

Someone should explain this to Rep. Murphy:

If the shutdown hits, Republicans should criticize Democrats for being opposed to virtually everything that Republicans have proposed. While it’s totally justifiable to call this the #SchumerShutdown, because he’s encouraged Democrats to vote against funding the government, it’s also a Democrat shutdown because a bunch of so-called Democratic moderates haven’t developed a spine to stand up to Sen. Schumer or the Democrats’ special interests.

I have a theory on why we’re staring at another possible shutdown. It’s called a base election. How often have we heard that term the last 5 years? On the Democrats’ side, base elections are driven by identity politics. In that situation, Democrats have a checklist of things that they always vote for and another list that Democrats wouldn’t vote for if their lives depended on it. Whatever happened to senators actually voting to do the right thing?

In that respect, Lindsay Graham is most like Democrats because he won’t vote legislation that’s serious about border security.

This afternoon, Sen. Mitch McConnell delivered this speech on the Senate floor. It won’t be a wakeup call but it should be. Here’s something that he said in his speech:

The deadline to fund the government is nearly upon us. The Senate is now just hours away from an entirely avoidable government shutdown. At midnight tonight, funding for programs that millions of Americans rely on — like veterans’ services, opioid treatment centers, death benefits for the families of fallen soldiers, and health insurance for nine million vulnerable children – would be thrown in chaos.

Last night, the Senate began consideration of a bill passed by the House which would erase these threats. The bill keeps the federal government open. And it extends the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, which provides coverage for nine million children in low-income families, for six years. This vote should be a ‘no-brainer.’

And it would be, except that the Democratic Leader has convinced his members to filibuster any funding bill that doesn’t include legislation they are demanding for people who came to the United States illegally. What has been shoehorned into this discussion is an insistence that we deal with an illegal immigration issue. He’s insisted that he won’t support any legislation at all for the American people – no matter how noncontroversial or how bipartisan – unless we pass a bill on illegal immigration first.

Watch the entire speech here:

Let’s be exceptionally clear about this. Sen. Schumer is insisting on protecting illegal immigrants but he isn’t insisting on funding increases to our military. What type of wretched person has priorities like that? It’s immoral that a U.S. senator fights harder for protecting illegal immigrants than he’s fought for our military.

Any dirtbag that puts a higher priority on protecting illegal immigrants than he puts on properly funding for the military isn’t worthy of elected office. Other Democrats supporting that dirtbag are complicit in his hideous actions.

If Democrats want to vote for the #SchumerShutdown, then they should pay the price this November. This isn’t just the Democrats failing a policy decision. It’s Democrats failing a moral decision, too.

Technorati: #SchumerShutdown, Chuck Schumer, Illegal Immigrants, DACA, Democrats, Mitch McConnell, Military, CHIP, Republicans, Election 2018

A month+ ago, Ed Gillespie didn’t seem to have much of a chance of becoming Virginia’s next governor. This morning, I’m predicting that he’ll win next Tuesday’s election. This article explains why he’s likely to win. The article opens by saying “A television ad depicting supporters of Virginia gubernatorial hopeful Ed Gillespie as Confederates who attack children of color has been pulled in the wake of the terror attack in New York City. The Democratic group Latino Victory Fund removed the controversial ad, which showed a pickup truck driver chasing down children of color on Tuesday, Oct. 31.”

This close to an election, polling isn’t reliable because things are fluid. At this point in the campaign, it’s all about Get Out The Vote (GOTV) operations, capitalizing on backlashes and momentum swings. I’d bet the proverbial ranch that the pulled ad is creating an anti-Northam backlash. Cristobal J. Alex, the “president of the LVF,” posted a tweet saying “We knew our ad would ruffle feathers. We held a mirror up to the Republican Party, and they don’t like what they see. We have decided to pull our ad at this time. Given recent events, we will be placing other powerful ads into rotation that highlight the reasons we need to elect progressive leaders in Virginia.”

Alex apparently didn’t learn the first rule of holes, which is that “if you’re in one, stop digging.” This Washington Post editorial states “Ralph Northam would not have run this ad and believes Virginians deserve civility, not escalation,” a spokesman for Mr. Northam emailed us.” Northam didn’t criticize this ad immediately:

Northam’s silence says everything that voters need to know about Northam’s lack of character. Ben Shapiro’s article details the ad, saying “Monday, just days ahead of Virginia’s hotly contested gubernatorial election, the Latino Victory Fund released an ad opposing Republican Ed Gillespie. The ad is uniquely horrifying. It features four minority children, Latino, Asian, Muslim, African-American, running for their lives from a white man driving a pick-up truck. The truck is festooned with a giant Confederate Flag, a ‘Don’t Tread on Me’ license plate, and a prominent “Gillespie for Governor” bumper sticker. It runs the children into a dead end, its lights washing out their terrified faces. The children wake up in their beds. We then flash to video of the Charlottesville white-supremacist march, as a voice asks, ‘Is this what Donald Trump and Ed Gillespie mean by the American dream'”

Don’t be surprised if this causes an anti-Democrat backlash that swamps Northam. In fact, I’d argue that the backlash has already started.

When I wrote this post, I hadn’t heard of Hannah Scherlacher. When I finish writing this post, Sen. Franken will wish he’d never heard of Hannah. In my post, I wrote about Sen. Franken’s reliance on ratings from the Southern Poverty Law Center, aka the SPLC, during Amy Coney-Barrett’s confirmation hearing. To hear Sen. Franken tell it, SPLC is a neutral arbiter of who is qualified to be a federal judge. The truth is that SPLC is a bunch of bottom-feeding low-lifes who have stockpiled tons of cash in accounts in the Caribbean.

Sen. Franken, what part of that sounds legitimate? But I digress.

Hannah’s op-ed questions SPLC’s integrity from a personal standpoint. In her op-ed, Hannah wrote “It’s an understatement to say that I was dumbfounded as to how I ended up on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s (SPLC) LGBTQ hate-list — I have never said or done anything to indicate hate for the LGBTQ community. When I called to inquire, SPLC informed me that I am guilty because I did a radio interview with Family Research Council Radio (FRC). I am a program coordinator for The Leadership Institute’s Campus Reform. org. The segment was about socialism, but because FRC holds traditional family values, I was labeled an LGBT-hater just for being a guest on the show. No LGBT topics even came-up.”

Sen. Franken, have you no shame?

What US senator would rely on sloppily-gathered information from a bunch of bottom-feeders like the SPLC? Ms. Scherlacher’s sin was to do an interview with the Family Research Council, an organization whose mission statement states that their “mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a Christian worldview” and whose vision “is a culture in which all human life is valued, families flourish, and religious liberty thrives.”

The FRC’s vision and mission earned it a spot on SPLC’s hate map. That’s significant because that map has helped cause physical pain:

Reckless and irresponsible hate-labeling not only stifles free speech and expression, it empowers and emboldens vicious groups and individuals to violently attack people. Consider the 2012 Family Research Council shooting, when a man walked into the organization’s office in Washington, D.C., with 100 rounds of ammunition and 15 Chick-fil-A sandwiches. He planned to kill as many staff members as possible and smear the sandwiches in their faces. He said he chose his target based on SPLC’s Hate Map.

This is more than ironic:

Nowhere is the danger more real than on our college campuses where Antifa, By Any Means Necessary, and other domestic terror groups (which are not found on any SPLC hate list) now feel emboldened to attack conservative students and shut down events under the guise of, ironically, fighting fascism, hate and white supremacism.

Some of the organizations found on the SPLC’s Hate Map are legitimate hate groups. It’s indisputable that the KKK, Holocaust deniers and the Skinheads deserve to be on that map. Being a traditional values Christian shouldn’t land a person on SPLC’s hate map, though.

I’ll close this post with Hannah’s closing argument:

Groups like the SPLC threaten our constitutional rights and the very fabric that makes this nation great. We need to start pushing back. If this trend of bullying and ostracizing anyone with a different opinion continues, we can only expect a chilling, mob-rule effect and the suppression of speech and ideas in this country.

I am calling on SPLC to remove me from this list and stop engaging in the game of identity fear politics. I urge all Americans who have been bullied, silenced, and pushed into a corner by radical groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center to push back too.

Amen, Hannah.

Technorati: SPLC, Al Franken, Hate Map, Bullying, Antifa, Democrats, Hannah Scherlacher, Family Research Council, Amy Coney-Barrett, Confirmation Hearings, Religious Liberty, Religious Test, Conservatism, First Amendment

In 2012, Mitt Romney was criticized for his comments about the 47% of Americans that don’t pay any taxes. What Mitt said was “There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what. And I mean, the president starts off with 48, 49, 48—he starts off with a huge number. These are people who pay no income tax.”

Immediately, Mitt was accused of not being in touch with America. As a result, President Obama won re-election. This election, Democrats lost because they had their own 47% moment, which Josh Kraushaar explains in this article. In the article, he wrote that “In her campaign tell-all, Clinton sounds like a full-fledged member of the progressive #resistance, content to blame all of her campaign’s woes on sexism, media bias, James Comey, and Russian interference. But she never fully grapples with the biggest problem that crippled her campaign, and which continues to dog her party: the Democrats’ growing cultural disconnect from the rest of the country. Clinton’s decision to call Trump backers deplorable was one of her campaign’s low points. But the problem runs much deeper within her party. Progressives now instinctively label pro-Trump conservatives as ‘white supremacists,’ a slur that paints nearly half the country with a racist brush.”

The Democrats’ problem persists. They still sound as out-of-touch as Hillary did. They still hate blue collar America as much as she did. Another of Hillary’s campaign low spots happened in coal country when she insisted that her administration would put lots of coal companies out of business:

Democrats think that they’re riding a wave of popularity on the NFL/National Anthem fiasco. This paragraph shows how out of touch they are and how far they’ve drifted:

For a sign of how far to the left Democrats have drifted on culture, just look at the last major anthem protest to sweep up a sports league. In 1996, Nuggets star Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf refused to stand for the national anthem, calling the American flag a symbol of tyranny. He was promptly suspended for a game and fined by the NBA. There was no uproar in favor of his right to protest, even in a league where most players were African-American. Condemnation of Abdul-Rauf’s action ran across the political spectrum. Then-commissioner David Stern later mandated players stand in a dignified manner when the anthem was played—a wholly uncontroversial decision.

Democrats in East Coast newsrooms treat Christians like aliens from another planet. They wouldn’t know how to talk with Christians if their life depended on it.

Until they fix their culture wars problem, they should get used to looking in from the outside.

Technorati: Hillary Clinton, Culture Wars, What Happened, Democrats, Election 2018