The Patriot Post® · Monday Short Cuts

Insight

“The short memories of the American voters is what keeps our politicians in office.” —Will Rogers (1879-1935)

“One of the most dangerous trends of our times is making the truth socially unacceptable, or even illegal, with ‘hate speech’ laws.” —Thomas Sowell

Observations

“Beginning in 2016, the Democratic Party descended into the politics of hystericism. It began with a mind-bending tale of a second-rate power stealing our democracy with a few Facebook ads and a Manchurian candidate. The collective psychotic break that followed was bolstered by an unethical political media and a corrupt investigation into the president that was predicated on an opposition-research document filled with fictions, distortions and Russian disinformation. Democrats wanted to cripple the president. They succeeded. Since then, a large swath of the left has become so reliant on infantile fearmongering that they seem incapable of debating any issues or dealing with the reality of an opposition party. When they’re not slandering political opponents as (semi-) fascists or racists or misogynists or homophobes or transphobes or death cultists, they’re engaging in cloistered pseudointellectual debate-club discussions on ‘saving democracy.’ Democrats, who have spent years delegitimizing the Supreme Court and rule of law, undermining legislative norms, cheering on unprecedented and blatant executive abuses and using the DOJ to target their political enemies, among other ‘democracy’-destroying behaviors, do not occupy any high moral ground. And while ‘democracy’ was once just a transparently silly euphemism for ‘stuff we want,’ it has since evolved into a rhetorical device that denotes a decisively illiberal mindset.” —David Harsanyi

“It has long been my contention that politics more often divide the country on cultural than on economic issues, and current cultural issues have found some mention in this year’s campaigning. Democrats hammer away at abortion, although its salience is falling as voters realize the decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization hasn’t outlawed abortion everywhere and as Republicans respond by pointing to Democratic support for abortions up to the moment of birth. What voters actually seek, in an affluent country currently at peace, is to keep things under control. Republican candidates are definitely talking about out-of-control inflation, violent crime and illegal immigration, all plausibly linked to Biden policies. Voters remember the times, recently, when those things were under control. They want those times back. That’s why Republicans are headed for a good year. But we may also be headed for a time in coming years when the issues that go unmentioned in this year’s campaigns, China especially, may suddenly seize the attention of both parties — and the nation.” —Michael Barone

“If the Ukrainians can achieve a clean victory forcing a Russian withdrawal, that’d be marvelous. It’s more plausible, though, that we are shaping the conditions for an eventual negotiation that may only temporarily suspend the conflict and that certainly won’t be an ideal end state. A potential deal would involve Russia holding Crimea, a guarantee that Ukraine won’t join NATO and a referendum in the areas Russia held prior to the onset of this phase in the war in February 2022, while Ukraine gets the rest of its territory back and orients itself to the West. Would this be ‘rewarding Russian aggression’? Moscow would have taken a bite out of Ukraine, yes, but at such an extremely high cost that no one could rationally conclude that Putin made anything but a calamitous blunder. The principle that territory can’t be taken by force is worth defending, yet there’s always the prudential question, at what cost?” —Rich Lowry

For the Record

“I don’t know what the hell happened at Nancy Pelosi’s house and I suspect none of us will ever know for sure. But I do know that trying to paint a hippie nudist from Berkeley as some kind of militant right winger is absurd and will always be absurd. Being that this is San Francisco, it seems perfectly plausible that some drugged out nut case broke into their home. Trying to turn this San Francisco crime story into an indictment of Republicans is what’s implausible and ridiculous.” —Matt Walsh

Yellow Journalism

“Pelosi attacker carried zip ties, in Jan. 6 echo.” —Associated Press

Demagogues

“It’s reported that the same chant used by this guy they have in custody was used on January 6th in the attacks on the U.S. Capitol.” —Joe Biden

“It’s one thing to condemn the violence. But you can’t condemn the violence unless you condemn those people who continue to argue the election was not real, that it’s being stolen, that [sic] all the malarky that’s being put out there to undermine democracy….. You can’t just say: ‘I feel badly about the violence. We condemn it.’ Condemn what produces the violence.” —Joe Biden

“The Republican Party and its mouthpieces now regularly spread hate and deranged conspiracy theories. It is shocking, but not surprising, that violence is the result. As citizens, we must hold them accountable for their words and the actions that follow.” —Hillary Clinton

Village Idiots

“There are those who will dismiss the meaning of the assault on Pelosi as the act of a lone, unsettled man. But he was echoing far-right conspiracy theories, legitimated by cynical people for their own purposes. There were many hands on that hammer.” —Barack Obama’s former chief strategist David Axelrod

“We should not be shocked that this happened. We have seen the storm clouds of political violence assemble. There is a direct line from January 6 to today. And it stretches even farther backward. We should be very careful about using the term ‘fascism,’ but a political system plunging toward normalized violence and instability is one that is taking on very dark undertones.” —journalist Dan Rather and filmmaker Elliot Kirschner

“Donald Trump has been spreading The Big Lie for 2 years. The violent assault on Paul Pelosi and the attempt to murder Speaker Pelosi is directly related to that Lie. Donald Trump is 100% responsible for this and Jan.6.” —actor Rob Reiner

“Some GOP like McConnell & Romney, condemned attack on Paul Pelosi. Most remained silent. Others made jokes. Others suggested attacker be released. Others tried to score points by comparing to Rand Paul getting decked by his neighbor. This from the Party of ‘Christian values.’” —"The View" co-host Ana Navarro-Cárdenas

“People bringing up the left-wing nut who tried to kill Steve Scalise and other Rs are missing the point. The former Republican president and current GOP leader has been stoking political violence since 2015, energetically so since Dec. 19, 2020. There is no analog among Dems.” —HuffPost’s S.V. Dáte

“It was an assassination attempt, an extension of January 6th, the full expression of the new mantra of a political party gone insane. Call it that! I WANT Biden to state this MAGA terrorism was inspired by Trump.” —former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann

“The New York Times put the attempted assassination of the United States Speaker of the House below the fold. If you want to know just how numb America has become to Trump’s inspiring of fascist violence, here it is.” —MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough

The BIG Lies

“When the president walked into this administration, the economy was in ruins — it was in absolute ruins.” —White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre

“Inflation is not going up due to government policies. Inflation is going up due to Wall Street decisions.” —Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

And Last…

“The Left isn’t worried that they’ll be banned or targeted. They know that isn’t going to happen and nobody is calling for it. They are simply worried that other viewpoints will be heard. They know they cannot compete in a free and open ideological marketplace.” —Matt Walsh