Over the weekend, I noted the weird characterization of Chick-Fil-A by a columnist in the New Yorker as “creepy” because of its “pervasive Christian traditionalism.” This is how societies polarize and tear apart: When there is no longer any common ground to meet on, and the “other,” whoever that might be, has been so thoroughly demonized that it is no longer possible for many people to see the humanity in those they disagree with.
This is a game that the Democrats have been playing since before the election of Donald Trump—each new measure put forward by or supported by the Republicans is declared to be a murderous conveyer belt of carnage. People will die if this passes, the Democrats inform the American people each time the Republicans put forward legislation.
This is not ideological disagreement. This is no longer two different political parties posing different solutions to the same problem, while recognizing that the other does care about the problem. This is one political party essentially saying that the other hates many Americans—especially minorities—and does not care if they die. It is this type of rhetoric that led to many of the hysterical reactions on the night of Donald Trump’s election, where millennials wept hysterically and talked about how Trump would “put people like me in camps” and other bizarre scenarios: Because that is the message that the Democrats are sending to their base.
And that’s precisely the message that Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota delivered at a conference recently, talking about how “lives depended” on his work as a Democrat—and that the Democrats needed to win so that people didn’t perish miserably under Republican policies. “Women are dying because we are losing elections,” Ellison said, referring to maternal health in several states. “We don’t have the right to lose a damn election. We have to win. We have to win.”
Right. And why do the Democrats have to win? Because people will apparently die at the hands of Republican policymakers if they don’t—and please don’t mention the millions of pre-born babies in the womb that will die if they do. They prefer that you refer to feticide as “reproductive health” or something less unpleasant.
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For anyone interested, my books: The Culture War, Seeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of Abortion, and How To Discuss Assisted Suicide, are available for sale here.
