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Hold On To Your Country: Vote Down the Leftists

27 Tuesday Oct 2026

Posted by in Election, Socialism, Tyranny

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The Babylon Bee has it just about right. But putting aside important medical, ethical and cultural issues for the moment, lots of voters are pissed off about “affordability”, or a lack thereof. Will that, or something else, keep GOP voters away from the polls? Or will it cause them to switch allegiance to Democrats, or persuade independents to swing left this time? That would be a huge mistake.

Dumb Policies and Own-Party Turnout

The trend of rising prices isn’t new, of course, and it will continue as long as federal spending continues to escalate. In that context, voters should recall that Democrats, enabled by the Fed, left us with much higher prices after Joe Biden’s term in office, and Dems aren’t offering workable solutions to reduce the cost of living — they don’t have any.

But for his part, Trump hasn’t exactly restrained the growth of government, and his protectionist (and almost certainly illegal) tariff policies have taxed businesses and consumers. The Iran war and blockade have completely washed out the price effects of other pro-energy policies, at least for now, though it would be crazy to allow Iran to possess nuclear weapons.

I’m unhappy with Trump on a number of other scores, such as his push for the federal government to take wasteful and ultimately coercive equity stakes in hitherto private companies, which might ultimately offer Democrats a treasure chest to fund their favorite NGOs. Furthermore, Trump’s political motivations are so baldly obvious, like his promise to have the Treasury pay every American $5,000 if both houses of Congress remain in GOP hands for the next two years.

So yes, there are reasons to wonder whether the GOP will struggle in this year’s midterms that go well beyond the usual explanations for incumbent underperformance (own-party apathy and a motivated opposition).

What Motivates Me

Since I’m not drooling over the prospect of a $5k payout, and in fact I hate the profligacy it would represent, what do I care if the Democrats take control of Congress? Well, there’s plenty to fear from a Congress controlled by Democrats, and I will discuss some of risks below. I fully confess that what follows is a rant, but right now it needs to be said.

The Democrats have become preoccupied with fervid anti-Americanism, anti-Semitism, anti-capitalism, and vengeance against their political enemies. (Don’t tell me about Trump’s Justice Department… what do you expect after years of immigration fraud and criminally bogus government actions against him.) The Dem’s platform this time is largely focused on the chanting of words like “affordability”, “government health care”, and “Free Palestine”, without explaining exactly what policies they’d implement. But their real agenda is far worse than any of that sounds.

The thing is that ultimately Trump will move along. Disenchanted Trump voters should keep that in mind, even as they keep a suspicious eye on him and potential successors. Despite Trump’s penchant for expanded executive power, I believe that in the long run our public and private institutions, and our constitutional order, are in much safer hands with a Republicans majority in Congress than a Democrat majority. As a matter of fact, certain Democrats have as much as promised to demolish many of our key institutions if they are elected or control Congress. They would pull out all the stops to eliminate anything they think might place the left at a disadvantage.

Even Dumber Policies

I’ve dealt with the pros and cons of most of the following issues in the past, so I won’t elaborate much on any of them. And it is by no means a complete list! Suffice it to say that the kinds of positions shown below would be disastrous for the nation, our prosperity, and for the cause of individual liberty. Just so I’m not accused of painting with too broad a brush, let me qualify this by noting that there are centrist democrats who do not support all of the listed positions. Nevertheless, this is where their party is headed, as it’s members continue to normalize and drift toward ever-more extreme positions:

  • Abolish the Senate? This would destroy the key basis of the Great Compromise that enabled the founding of our nation. Without it, a simple majority in the House could enable a tyrannical regime or destabilize the country.
  • Abolish the electoral college? Again, an effort to destroy a compromise that was and is critical to our union.
  • Pad the Supreme Court with extra justices? Get a Democrat supermajority? Like hell!
  • Rewrite the constitution? Well, only if you want to remove limits on the power of the federal government to confiscate, regulate, and spend without restraint.
  • Restrict speech? Because the left does not recognize the distinction between words (opinions or honest disagreement) and violence, or pretends not to. Hurting feelings is not violence!
  • Legalize abortion? It’s somebody else’s body in your body. A person. Let them live!
  • Legalize infanticide? Because they view children as inconvenient and basically worthless!
  • Confiscate the means of production? Sure, and the victims of this theft will simply have to explain to these geniuses how it all works. Break out the Richard Scarry books. No problem!
  • Tax wealth? Goodbye standard of living.
  • Impeach Trump? For being elected and for governing!
  • Demonize success? Because they think profit has nothing to do with creating value.
  • Prosecute Elon Musk? Because we must punish the most productive man on Earth! This threat long preceded the Starlink shutdown in Ukraine, which was arguably justified.
  • Assassinate Elon Musk? Because we must eliminate the most productive man on Earth!
  • Universal healthcare? As PJ O’Roarke once said, “If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it’s free.” People aren’t as crazy about it when they learn the details.
  • Stop the data centers? No one should fall for this. Data centers can be great opportunities for local communities, so why prohibit them outright? No, they seldom use much water and they aren’t pushing up retail power costs. Negotiate!
  • Abolish ICE? Zero immigration enforcement. Get real!
  • Wide open borders and no vetting? Please, take my land, my home, my daughters!
  • Defund the police? Guess what’s coming to your neighborhood. Who you gonna call?
  • Abolish prisons? Same.
  • Crime and Release: Sympathy for aggressors. Victims… meh.
  • Revoke gun rights? You can forget about self-defense. But disarm and conquer is the final objective.
  • Outlaw voter ID? Kiss electoral integrity goodbye.
  • Abandon Israel? Exterminating Jews, from the river to the sea. Oh, and apparently here too! Genocide in Gaza is a fiction enabled by Hamas’ strategic ploy to forcibly embed with civilians.
  • Higher oil prices? Yes, much higher than even now, because the left hates fossil fuels.
  • Publicly ostracize Republicans to diminish their career and social prospects? Because they differ!
  • “Reeducate” Republicans? Because they differ!
  • Shoot Republicans? Because they differ!

Much of this adds up to a putsch for a one-party state. Don’t tell me I’m exaggerating: I’ve heard members of my own extended family engage in eliminationist rhetoric. And I’m far from alone. It’s not a joke. Yes, those are just words, but nevertheless, the left is actively normalizing even the most extreme and nonsensical positions. These people are insane.

The Clown Car

Who do the Democrats wish to elect in November? Well, for starters, a bunch of dyed-in-the-wool, big government lefties who would push for many of the agenda items listed above. This includes Senate candidates such as Roy Cooper (NC), Sherrod Brown (OH), and DSA member Angie Nixon (FL). But the worst of the worst for the Senate might be Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, a fake physician with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood (see this ridiculous ad from a supportive PAC, especially the end). Then we have James Talarico in Texas, a wokie who has played up his pastoral ambitions and has flipped on critical issues (youth transgender medical care and sports, abortion, and energy). And what about Graham Platner? … Oops, no, the Maine Oystergrüppenführer had to drop out due to accusations of sexual abuse — but this guy received 70% of Maine Democrats’ vote in the primary and support from prominent Democrats elsewhere. Nice people!

Some of the Democratic House candidates are even more extreme, including Democratic Socialists Darializa Avila Chevalier (NY), Melat Kiros (CO), Donavan McKinney (MI), William Lawrence (MI), and DSA-backed Claire Valdez (NY). Don’t allow them to waste the next two years of congressional time and energy trying to make ridiculous charges against Trump stick, or even worse, waste our time debating a socialist policy agenda.

The Democrats’ gubernatorial candidates include another collection of radical nut cases. Oregon Governor Tina Kotec is one of them. So is Gina Hinojosa of Texas, who has received an endorsement from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which in turn defends Sharia law. Others include Amanda Janoo (VT), Deb Haaland (NM), and Hannah Pingree (ME), all for big taxation and grandiose plans for big government.

These Democrats are cheered on by such luminaries as:

  • the noted anti-Semite and socialist Hasan Piker;
  • Kamala Harris, whose patter is nearly 100% vapid drivel;
  • the oily, DSA worshiping Gavin Newsom;
  • the inimitable socialist Bernie Sanders, who has never done an honest day’s work in his life;
  • the former transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, who thinks highways are racist; and
  • the former narcissist-in-chief Barack Hussein Obama, who has played an instrumental role in radicalizing Democrats over the past two decades and would love to have another opportunity to pull strings.

Electoral Mischief

One of the policy issues bulleted above requires elaboration: our country has a major lack of election integrity. Our electoral process is not free and fair. It is rife with fraud. Already, well before Election Day, we have a major scandal with noncitizens voting, and you can be assured that it’s not confined to LA or California (see here for the latest case). In Georgia, various kinds of voter fraud in this election have already been identified, which may interfere with certification of the results. Cybersecurity has now become an additional concern with respect to electronic voting.

Of course, the manipulation of elections is nothing new. Local vote counts in jurisdictions dominated by a single political party are the most vulnerable to shenanigans, and those areas tend to be heavily urban with reliable Democrat majorities. These distorted and exaggerated vote counts can certainly have an impact on national results. The best means of bringing this kind of manipulation under control is voter identification, strict deadlines, and eliminating cyber threats via paper ballots. Of course, the election process is once again a major issue this cycle. If you want secure elections, DO NOT sit this one out!

Seditious Conspiracy?

Finally, in a dramatic illustration of how crazy and seditious some high-level Democrats have become, there is strong evidence that insiders, including prominent office holders, are attempting to lay plans for a so-called color revolution after the mid-term election. Here is Glenn Reynolds’ summary of the alleged plan:

“If the Democrats take the House and Senate (and maybe if they don’t), various leftist groups will stage violent protests, intended to press Trump into invoking the Insurrection Act and sending in troops. Once he does, Democratic governors in blue states will denounce his acts as illegal (whether they are or not) and mount resistance on various levels. The goal is to destabilize things enough that they can seize power and replace the Constitution.“

This might sound far-fetched, but again, there is solid documentation to back up the allegations. Chuck Devore in The Federalist gives more detail here (and there is more here). The Trump Administration certainly knows about this plot, but the excellent X poster Cynical Publius believes they want to avoid abetting these plans by deferring any necessary actions until after the midterms.

Final Thoughts

The people behind the plan to stage a color revolution are skunks, and one hopes they’ll be punished. But Democrats have other broad problems, I mean, other than the sheer stupidity of expecting big government to solve problems and protect basic liberties. Factions like the DSA, and a significant share of Democrats overall, really do want a one-party state. But today, the far left wing includes an Islamist faction whose beliefs are fundamentally at odds with ideals the left had championed for decades, like the rights of women, gays, lesbians and more recently, the trans community. Left-wing Jews need a loud wakeup call as well.

I think this clip from Bill Maher and Justine Bateman represents a pretty accurate take on what could happen if the leftist Democrats “get it all”. Do not allow them to take control of our country. They will bring disaster. Get out and vote, and make your vote count against Democrats, even against more moderate Democrats, because they are unlikely to present an obstacle to the radical agenda. Hold your nose if you have to, but you just might help to preserve our safety, our liberties, and our country.

Open Borders or Racism: a False Dichotomy

27 Thursday Jun 2019

Posted by in Immigration, racism

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What are you, a racist? To avoid that charge, apparently you must support fully open borders with absolutely no restrictions on crossings. The basis of that bizarre claim is that most immigrants are not of the ethnic majority, or rather most illegal immigrants are not of the ethnic majority. Thus, if you favor border controls of any kind, you must hate ethnic minorities. You are a racist! This hasty generalization is commonly made by reactionary minions of the Left, and it is standard rhetoric of leftist propaganda.

As many have noted, the U.S. benefitted for many years from a relatively liberal immigration regime, but policy became increasingly restrictive over a period of six or seven decades starting in the 1870s, sometimes in ways that were racially motivated. A few reforms began to take place in the 1940s, though various quotas remained a fixture. More recently, the threat of terrorism prompted restrictions, and the large population of illegal immigrants in the country, including immigrant children, stimulated debate over deportation vs. a path to citizenship.

Disparate Impacts

A real outcome of border controls takes the form of a “disparate impact”, a phenomenon prominent in areas of the law such as employment, fair lending, and fair housing. For example, standards like degree requirements or minimum credit scores tend to disqualify minority or “protected class” applicants disproportionately. Those standards, however, are not targeted explicitly at any class of individuals. Likewise, minorities represent a disproportionate share of those disqualified under immigration quotas. And minorities represent a vastly disproportionate share of illegal entrants apprehended by ICE because, as a practical matter, most border controls are targeted at country of origin, but not at specific minorities. Almost all illegal U.S. immigrants are members of populations that are ethnic minorities within the U.S. The top 10 countries of birth for all U.S. immigrants also have predominantly Hispanic or Asian population. These countries accounted for roughly 57% of legal immigrants in 2017.

The courts have generally ruled that business standards having a disparate impact are defensible based on business necessity and the absence of effective alternatives having less disparate impact. So the issue here is whether border controls meet a compelling need having nothing to do with racial or ethnic preferences, and whether any adverse impact on protected classes can be minimized.

The simple fact is that most Americans opposing illegal immigration simply want those entrants to go through a liberalized legal process, which would of course reduce the disparate impact of tight border controls. So the worst that can be said about a preference for legal over illegal immigration is that it might have a disparate impact on prospective minority entrants, and that is uncertain under a liberalized regime of legal immigration. This preference is not racist, and it is not racist to demand that all entrants be vetted and identified, whether you believe it is economically sensible or that immigrants are more or less likely to engage in criminal or even terrorist activity.

Public Resources

Again, there are strong rationales for controlling immigration and enforcing the border that have nothing to do with racial preference. Borders are a critical aspect of national sovereignty, of course, including taxpayer sovereignty. There is no question that large numbers of immigrants strain scarce public resources in a variety of ways including public aid, education, law enforcement, housing, and other public services. In fact, the mere existence of aid programs provides incentives that encourage immigration, especially as activists push for broader accessibility of program benefits. The consequent strain on public resources escalates costs to taxpayers and compromises the quality of public programs for the qualified citizen-beneficiaries for whom they are intended. There is nothing racist about asserting that those strains should be minimized for the benefit of taxpayers and beneficiaries. Indeed, a recent poll found that a majority of Hispanics favor controls on immigration, including a border wall.

A further consequence is that citizens might perceive an unhealthy opportunism or exploitation by illegal immigrants availing themselves of what might seem like very generous public benefits. Rightly or wrongly, that perception tends to encourage forms of “otherism”. This is an example of how public policy can undermine social cohesion and the successful assimilation of immigrants.

The Labor Force

In general, immigration is a positive economic force. At a macro level, it supplements the growth of the labor force, traditionally a major driver of output gains. At the more fundamental micro level, it represents a movement of productive resources in response to incentives guiding them to higher-valued uses. The most productive workers tend to migrate away from low-wage economies toward high-wage economies. Again, however, low-productivity workers are attracted by the bundle of public benefits available, including our minimum wage laws. Those immigrants do not contribute to output gains at all if their productivity is less than the minimum wage. They will, however, attempt to compete for jobs at the minimum wage or even below that wage if their employers are willing to cheat.

Obviously, the legal minimum wage does not adjust to market conditions such as excess supplies of labor. The development of such a surplus would mean unemployment, including job losses among low-skilled legal residents. That is unfortunate not just for those losing jobs, but because these effects create more fertile ground for racism among both groups. This is another example of how public policy can create barriers to social cohesion.

So Who’s a Racist, Anyway?

Those casting aspersions of racism are often guilty of of losing historical perspective, and sometimes worse. A recent example is the refusal of democrats to deal with “the racist” Trump on the DACA bill he proposed in early 2018. That bill would have offered amnesty and a path to citizenship for 1.8 million Dreamers, individuals who arrived in the U.S. as undocumented child immigrants. How easy it is for progressives to forget that President Obama dithered away four years during which he could have proposed legislation to end the prosecution of Dreamers.

A more cogent example of selective memory among progressives is the history of the Democrat Party as one of racism, Jim Crow, and eugenics. The contention that the Republican Party has a history of racism is categorically false. We constantly hear that Republicans are guilty of using “dog whistles” to appeal to racist sentiment, but Mark Steyn provides a marvelous quote of James Taranto in which he gets at the truth of these divisive claims: “… if you can hear the whistle, you’re the dog.” There is great truth in that statement.

No one should forget that immigrants attempting to enter the country illegally are exposed to real dangers, and it should be discouraged. Natural conditions are harsh along the southern U.S. border, and many of those wishing to cross must contract for the services of guides who are often dangerous and untrustworthy. The risks for families and children should not be trivialized by those who would encourage massive flows of illegal entrants as a tool of policy change.

Border security is important to Americans because of the risks inherent in an uncontrolled border. These risks span national security, drug policy, taxpayer sovereignty, and other economic concerns. While racists might hate most immigrants, opposition to illegal immigration is often paired with support for liberalized legal immigration. That fact does not square with accusations of racism. Perhaps most importantly, encouraging an uncontrolled flow of immigrants in defiance of existing law creates harsh risks for the immigrants themselves, and especially the children who become innocent human collateral in the process. That the same shortsighted individuals who encourage such flows make a blanket charge of racism against those who demand a more rational and even liberalized process is grotesque and an affront to decency.