The United States is rich in geographic diversity. What other country has Arizona’s desert, Alaskan ice caps, Mississippi’s swamps, Tennessee’s hills, Florida’s mangrove wetlands, and Michigan’s great lakes?
Whatever terrain you like, you can find in America. That’s also true of our vastly different people. Californians are different than New Yorkers, who are different than Texans, who are different than Vermonters. In America, we’re blessed with variety in landscrapes, accents, and – yes – belief systems.
Yes, Americans disagree. Passionate discussion is one of our hallmark characteristics as a nation – our strength. We are not, and have never been a homogenous people. That means from state to state, the differences – in the culture and in governance — can and should be fairly extreme. I actually find it fun to be in the same room as a person from San Francisco and another from Tulsa, just to listen to their differing perspectives.
These differing perspectives were shown starkly when Republican Karen Handel defeated Democrat Jon Ossoff in Georgia’s special-election congressional race in the 6th Congressional district. Because the district encompasses many of the northern suburbs of Atlanta, political strategists hailing from all over the nation painted this southern area as a more moderate, sick-of-Trump type of place.
Things can get ugly, however, when people from San Francisco, or New York, or Los Angeles — or more importantly, Washington, DC — start believing they’re morally superior and should impose that moral superiority on everyone else. That’s where we are today. After Handel’s win, people started insulting the voters. David Burge tweeted, “So I gather GA06 has suddenly gone from Enlightened Sunbelt Suburban Panera Voters back to Inbred Reactionary Neo-Confederate Klansmen.” And then, “This just in: cornpone Georgia hicks sell Brooklyn Bridge to visiting California city slickers for $25 million.” Even CNN’s Jake Tapper lamented the “focus on attacking voters,” saying these hot takes come “from folks who love ‘humanity’ but hate people.”
A small group of people, the so-called cultural, coastal elite — have come to the conclusion that the rest of us are “deplorable,” and must be silenced or eliminated. If it can’t be done via elections, it’s fine to do it in other ways.
What comes of that approach is not pretty. In Handel’s neighborhood, envelopes containing white powder were sent to warn potential voters that she’s a fascist. And after the Democrats 2016 smashing electoral defeat, things haven’t been too great either. In Indiana, a car opened fire on a truck which was bearing a Make America Great Again flag. The Congressional baseball game was postponed when a gunman tried to kill as many Republicans as he could. In Manhattan, a production of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, depicts a Donald Trump character being stabbed to death in every performance. On campuses all over America, violent protests erupt when conservatives try to peacefully share their views.
This is what the left has wrought in America. Fascism requires that enemies be vilified and ultimately dehumanized so that they may be silenced and ultimately “eliminated.” This is not hyperbole, it’s just history. The rising fascism on the left is historically dangerous and leads inevitably to violence. Those on the left supporting groups like Black Lives Matter, Antifa, Occupy, and other leftist criminals ought to take a serious look at what they’re supporting. They should also think twice about supporting people in positions of authority who invoke the words, “Hitler,” “Nazis,” “Racists,” and every form of “phobe,” against the President, conservatives, Republicans, and Christians. At some point, there will be no turning back. We’re close to that point.
If you want to know where this all leads, I’d point you to Kurt Schlichter’s book, People’s Republic, and the prequel, Indian Wars which chronicles an America divided and at war with itself. But even if our future is not that extreme, it’s inarguable that our nation is growing more divided every day. These books should serve as a serious warning to any student of history or prognosticator on the future. We are walking, and now running, a dark path. We don’t have to go this way, but this is the way of the left throughout history. The left is trying to use force to put its preferred version of the future upon every American. The left is trying to silence dissent. The left is weaponizing the press, the government and social pressure against Republicans and conservatives. And yes, the left is actually fomenting violence against their political enemies. This is the way of the left historically, and this is the way of fascism.
Here’s the thing. Americans won’t be silenced, and we won’t be eliminated. We will fight, in the culture, politically, and otherwise if the leftists and fascists continue their attack. But there’s a better way.
Federalism allows us to believe different things, and live different lives, while still being a unified nation. Both liberals and conservatives should embrace it, in order to survive. To do so, we must join together to take the power away from an overbearing government in Washington DC. Our Founders gave us the ability to do this, by using Article V to call a Convention of States and limit the power of the federal government. The fundamental dividing faultlines of our time are all erupting because we’re allowing the decisions that affect our lives to be made in DC. Whether those decisions are made by the Trump Administration or the Obama Administration is not relevant. Most of them should not be made in DC at all. Important decisions that affect our lives shouldn’t be made in DC, whether it be by Congress, the President, the Supreme Court or a bunch of unelected bureaucrats. It is historically wrong, it is morally wrong. Fundamentally, Americans don’t like it.
It’s great that Republicans have been winning elections, but the pendulum always swings back. Instead of turning to DC by electing better people, we should return to our roots and allow the people, at home, in the states to decide. You and me, your neighbors and mine, should be deciding most of these issues. Just as New Mexico is different than Hawaii, our states and our laws can be different too. One size fits all governance, flowing from DC, is turning our nation into a powder keg. It has to stop.
We can stop it with a Convention of States now before things escalate into a full blown civil war. Why not try a Convention of States first?
