The Patriot Post® · Thursday Short Cuts

Upright: “Conservatives continue to use the word ‘democracy’ when discussing American politics. They need to reclaim the term ‘republic’ and continue to discuss unalienable rights, namely, property rights. The Constitution’s purpose is to protect rights, not popular sovereignty.” —Washington Examiner’s Will Ricciardella

Observations: “Thought experiment: If 100 years ago, universal health care was guaranteed in this country — the best health care at the time magically available for all — but the trade off was medical innovation was slowed by 50%, how many people would that kill? If you slow medical innovation, historical data says you’ll kill a lot of people, but the advantage is you’ll never know you did that.” —The Babylon Bee’s Frank J. Fleming

Non sequitur: “We all treasure our freedom of speech, but nobody here has the freedom to yell ‘Fire’ in this crowded space. It is the same way with religious liberty. We respect, and I will fiercely defend, religious liberty. But not past the point where it is being invoked as an excuse to harm other people through this kind of discrimination.” —Pete Buttigieg, whose idea of “religious discrimination” means fighting against leftist coercion

Nope: “You know, we have a place called Georgetown, Delaware, that was founded in the 1600s.” —Joe Biden (Georgetown, Delaware, was founded in 1791.)

Literally or figuratively? “Sometimes I wake up and I think it’s 1920 and not 2020.” —Joe Biden

Dezinformatsiya: “I’ve covered Cuba for years and there’s a lot of great things to say about their social services, their education, their health system.” —MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell

Village idiot: “We currently have a president who embarrasses this great nation every single day with his incompetence, his unabashed ignorance, his lack of curiosity. Wouldn’t it be so refreshing to have a woman of Sen. Warren’s brilliance replacing him?” —singer-songwriter John Legend

Non compos mentis: “Purging public servants disloyal to a regime is banana-republic stuff. Our federal employees work for the American people, not the president.” —Hillary Clinton

And last… “I’ve seen Democrats be tougher on Trump for his coronavirus response than they’ve been on China, whose communist government censored and hid the outbreak, leading to its unnecessary spread around the world.” —Katie Pavlich