This has been some year, and we are still not done yet. First, we learned that the people who are truly holding the morality card on the abortion issue are not the Fetus Cult, but those who recognize that pregnancy is a very profound women's health issue, and why pregnant women must be the priority over the fetus they are carrying. Second, we learned this week that the essence of the conservative position on immigration is one of racial hatred and especially cruelty.
Fascist Republican jerks, Ron DeSantis and Gregg Abbott, assumed, in sending undocumented people, including those seeking asylum from nations suffering under economic sanctions our nation has enacted, to Martha's Vineyard in New England, that these "libs" would be as hateful and cruel as the conservatives who hate immigrants. If you saw the DeSantis press conference, at some point, you observed the tittering cruelty of his wife and others on the platform behind him, and, if you knew American history, would note echoes from the 1960s, when the southern state "welfare" policies were to do the same to poor black people, i.e. sending them north to let the Yankees deal with "them." But what did we learn this week? The people on Martha's Vineyard, after getting over the shock of people suddenly showing up at their doorsteps, stepped up and have been providing material and emotional support to these desperate people. So-called "libs" across the nation have been donating to the local church there to help these people as well.
I really think we are well past the time when our society, starting with broadcast media, begins to openly shun, delegitimize, and root out people who call themselves right wing and even "conservative." To rephrase what William Buckley and Brent Bozell, Sr. wrote in their defense of Joseph McCarthy, at page 333 of their book, McCarthy & His Enemies (1954): "Some day, the patience of America may at last be exhausted, and we will strike out against (Conservatives). Not because they are treacherous...but because...we will conclude 'that they are mistaken in their predictions, false in their analyses, wrong in their advice, and through the results of their actions injurious to the interests of the nation. That is a reason enough to strive to free the conduct of the country's affairs from the influence of them and their works.'" Except, Buckley and Bozell were talking not of "conservatives," but "liberals."
A major part of Buckley/Bozell's defense of the Red Scare and McCarthyism was to ensure we would not only delegitimize aggressive labor union leaders, and assorted "Reds," but also ensure there would never be another New Deal. The Red Scare political strategists and warriors came first for the New Deal internationalists, who sought detente in the first years after WWII, and were treated as if they were all traitors (not all were innocent of the charge, but most were). Then, the project was to ensure no socialist or communist was part of any major corporate owned media conversation so that the liberals became the "left." Then, even after McCarthy's censure in the Senate (for daring to go after the military as Communist tinged, the way the modern right wingers say the military has gone "woke"), the project was to continue to ensure no socialist or communist was ever part of the conversation, but began to turn "liberal" into not only a sign of weakness, but an ideology designed to take "your" money to give to those "undeserving." And it is how we got to the point where Michael Dukakis, the Democratic Party's technocratic, and only culturally liberal (not a New Dealer in economics by a long shot) nominee for president in 1988, was treated as if he was foreign to American "values."
If you ever want to understand how "liberal" became a dirty word in American politics, the Buckley/Bozell project and the Cold War should supply the answer. But, again, this has been a learning year for many Americans. Your right wing, racist aunts, uncles, parents, grandparents, and friends need to be confronted for their cruelty, their racism, their sexism, their ignorance, and told they are no longer entitled to be part of the political discourse. We don't need their opinions, even when they may be reasonable, because others who are not cruel, racist, sexist, and ignorant may have positions such as (a) don't spend too much taxpayer money; (b) maintain a strong military presence or police; and (c) the importance of religion in our lives as we search for meaningful relationships and communities.
Again, it is now past time to recognize that voting for most Republicans as a general proposition--I, too, have a single exception where I am voting Republican this year, believe it or not--is to undermine America's best values, and they are no longer fit for being part of a civilized discourse. They should be treated as traitors and shunned until they renounce their delusions, recognize their views have been injurious to our nation, and have been wrong in their advice for what ails our communities, our nation, and our planet. When we treat the modern Republican Party as anything other than an organization designed to undermine our way of life, we are undermining ourselves. Again, you want to tell us we shouldn't spend too much taxpayer money on various programs, for the common defense or welfare, to quote our Constitution? Fine. You want to tell us we need to maintain a strong military or police force? Fine. You want to tell us about the importance of religion in our lives? Fine. But, first make sure you are no longer supporting the Republican Party as an institution, renounce Trump, and his minion political figures running for office this year, and begin, and I mean, begin to prove your loyalty to what has truly made America great.
