Category: Elections

TBT: [Four] Years of Excellence

The Portly Politico1 Comment

President Trump officially kicked off his 2020 reelection campaign earlier this week, and it’s been almost exactly one year since the post below.  I’ve been quite impressed with President Trump, who has governed far more conservatively than I and many other conservatives could have ever hoped.  While there is still much to be done on immigration—border crossings have accelerated due to misguided progressive policies that encourage child trafficking—and the wall seems to be more an abstraction than a concrete reality, Trump has slashed taxes, created jobs, and strengthened national security.

Trump has also stacked the federal courts with conservative-leaning judges and justices.  And that’s in the face of progressive aggression and Deep State coup attempts.

His record speaks for itself.  President Trump has taken the reins of the Republican Party and has done much to shore up the Republic.  Here’s looking to four more years—and to Keeping America Great!

Father’s Day—16 June 2018—marked three years since President Donald Trump’s now-legendary descent down the golden escalator at Trump Tower, following by his controversial but true-to-form announcement that he would be seeking the Republican Party’s nomination for President.

I was, initially, a Trump skeptic, and I voted for Texas Senator Ted Cruz in the South Carolina primaries the following February.  When Trump first announced, I wrote him off—as so many others—as a joke.  I appreciated his boldness on immigration, but I still thought the PC Police and the campus Social Justice Warriors were firmly in control of the culture, and that no one could speak hard truths.

I also remembered his brief flirtation with running in 2012, and thought this was just another episode in what I learned was a long history of Trump considering a presidential bid.  At the South Carolina Republican Party’s state convention earlier in 2015, I asked two young men working on Trump’s pre-campaign (this was before The Announcement) if he was reallyserious this time.  The two of them—they looked like the well-coifed dreamboat vampires from the Twilight franchise—both assured me that Trump was for real, and I left with some Trump stickers more skeptical than ever (note, too, that this was before the distinctive but simple red, white, and blue “Trump” lawn signs, and definitely before the ubiquitous “Make America Great Again” hats).

I even briefly—briefly!—considered not voting for Trump, thinking that he was not a “real” conservative.  I still don’t think he’s a conservative in the way, say, that a National Review columnist is (although, the way they’ve gotten so noodle-wristed lately, that’s a good thing; I’ve just about lost all respect for David French’s hand-wringing, and Kevin Williamson went off the deep-end), but rather—as Newt Gingrich would put it—an “anti-Leftist.”  That’s more than enough for me.

But my conversion to Trump came only belatedly.  I can still find a notebook of notes from church sermons in which I wrote, “Ted Cruz won the Wyoming primary.  Thank God!” in the margins.

Then something happened—something I predicted would happen on the old TPP site—and I couldn’t get enough of the guy.  It wasn’t a “road to Damascus” epiphany.  I started listening to his speeches.  I read up on his brilliant immigration plan (why haven’t we taxed remittances yet?).  I stopped taking him literally, and began taking him seriously.

And I noticed it happening in others all around me.  Friends who had once disdained the Republican Party were coming around on Trump.  Sure, it helped that Secretary Hillary Clinton was a sleazebag suffused with the filth of grasping careerism and political chicanery.  But more than being a vote against Hillary, my vote—and the vote of millions of other Americans—became a vote for Trump—and for reform.

Trump made politics interesting again, too, not just because he said outrageous stuff on live television (I attended his rally in Florence, South Carolina before the SC primaries, and I could feel his charisma from 200 feet away; it was like attending a rock concert).  Rather, Trump busted wide open the political orthodoxy that dominated both political parties at the expense of the American people.

Take trade, for example.  Since World War II, both Democrats and Republicans have unquestioningly supported free trade.  Along comes Trump, and suddenly we’re having serious debates again about whether or not some tariffs might be beneficial—that maybe it’s worth paying a little more for a stove or plastic knick-knacks if it means employing more Americans.

That’s not even to mention Trump’s legacy on immigration—probably the most pressing issue of our time, and one about which I will write at greater length another time.

Regardless, after over 500 days in office, the record speaks for itself:  lower taxes, fewer regulations, greater economic growth, greater security abroad.  At this point, the only reasons I can see why anyone would hate Trump are either a.) he’s disrupting their sweet government job and/or bennies; b.) they don’t like his rhetorical style, and can’t get past it (the Jonah Goldbergite “Never Trumpers”—a dying breed—fall into this group); or c.) they’re radical Cultural Marxists who recognize a natural foe.  Folks in “Option B” are probably the most common, but they’re too focused on rhetoric and “decorum”—who cares if he’s mean to Justin Trudeau if he gets results?  The folks in “Option C” are willfully ignorant, evil, or blinded by indoctrination.

As the IG report from last Thursday revealed—even if it wouldn’t come out and say it—the Deep State is very, very real.  That there were elements within the FBI willing to use extralegal means to disrupt the Trump campaign—and, one has to believe, to destroy the Trump presidency—suggests that our delicate system of checks and balances has been undermined by an out-of-control, unelected federal bureaucracy.  Such a dangerous threat to our republic is why we elected Trump.

President Trump, keep draining the swamp.  We’re with you 100%.

Deportemal II: Trump Vows Mass Deportations

The Portly Politico4 Comments

On Monday, President Trump announced the deportation of millions of illegal aliens beginning “next week,” vowing that ICE agents would remove such aliens “as fast as they come in.”

Here are the two pertinent tweets from the president:

Critics and supporters alike are asking for details on how Immigration and Customs Enforcement will process the millions here illegally.  As I write this post, I’ve just listened to part of Ben Shapiro’s podcast on the announcement; he argues that a surgical, case-by-case approach is preferable, as some illegal aliens possess skills we would want in the United States.

While I appreciate Shapiro’s measured response, I can’t agree.  As I wrote in “Deportemal,” the time for half-measures has passed.  A lengthy review process of the millions of illegal aliens—which could be anywhere from 11 to 33 million (PDF; that document shows an illegal population of 12 million as of 2015), and maybe higher (that no one can know for sure is a major part of the problem)—would bog down for years, if not decades.  Another visa process ladled on top of inherent law-breaking will merely exacerbate the problem.

Consider:  our current catch-and-release system—migrants show up to one court date, get a temporary visa and orders to report back to court, then disappear into the countryside, never darkening an immigration court again—already gives migrants an easy in.  Essentially, touching American soil is like tagging home base:  once you’re here, you’re in.

Now, imagine adding an individual review process to that.  First, you’d have to assume good-faith on the part of illegals in the country.  They have virtually no incentive to come to another hearing.  Yes, they have the opportunity to be absolved of their illegal status (I’m assuming that’s what Shapiro is proposing), but if they think they don’t, they’ll avoid the process.

Second, a whole cottage-industry of gaming the individual amnesty system will emerge.  Lawyers skilled in the ins-and-outs of this fresh bureaucratic hell will profit at the expense of their countrymen and poor illegals.  Appeals—and you know with the federal government there would be a lengthy appeals process—would linger on for months, even years, further adding to the administrative load of ICE and our courts.

If we were dealing with a few thousand people, we could demonstrate some mercy and approach this issue with a lighter touch.  Unfortunately, we’ve failed to enforce our border laws for so long that we’ve allowed this crisis to metastasize, to the detriment of American citizens and potential immigrants alike.

Republicans squandered a golden opportunity to make some real strides on immigration reform during the 2017-2019 congressional session.  President Trump has moved mountains since then via constitutional executive orders and international diplomacy, particularly his threat of slapping hefty, incremental tariffs on Mexico.  Increased enforcement of Mexico‘s southern border has, according to Shapiro, already eased the number of arrests on the American border.

In the wake of President Trump’s massive 2020 reelection campaign launch last night in Orlando, Florida, it is imperative for immigration patriots to run (and win!) in 2020, and for Americans to support Trump’s reelection.  It’s our best hope to resolve this crisis, to the benefit of Americans and the world.

For more of my writing on immigration, check out “Lazy Sunday XIII: Immigration.”

Consider supporting the blog at my SubscribeStar page.  $1/mo. gets you exclusive access to new posts every Saturday.

Warren in West Virginia

The Portly Politico6 Comments

The news has been a bit slow over the weekend.  Other than the Facebook deplatforming controversy—a major issue—and the trade war with China, there hasn’t been much going on.

As such, I turned to the fount of all relevant political topics, Drudge Report, to see if anything interesting is afoot.  Buried about halfway down the cluttered list of headlines was a piece in Politico, “Trump backers applaud Warren in heart of MAGA country.”

Well, that’s something.  West Virginia went for Trump with 68.5% of the vote, the largest margin of victory any candidate has ever had in the State in a presidential election.

As I peeled back the layers of this brief fluff piece, though, I began to realize the news is not as good for Democratic hopefuls as the optimistic headline lead me to believe.  The media loves to play up the possibility of a major, unexpected “spoiler” for Democrats in deep red States.  Every four years, I always hear some scuttlebutt about South Carolina going for the Democratic candidate—“they really have a chance this year if enough black voters turn out”—but it never happens.

West Virginia, though, was reliably, solidly Democratic for decades, thanks in part to the outsize influence of the late Senator Robert Byrd.  Senator Byrd secured billions in federal funding for various projects in the Mountain State, a State that tops the charts for economic privation.  As the Democratic Party increasingly abandoned rural voters, however, and Secretary Hillary Clinton promised to destroy the coal mining industry—effectively ruining her chances in the State (which her husband won in 1992 and 1996)—West Virginia shifted towards the Republicans.

President Trump’s victory came amid a promise to restore the coal mining industry, to protect American jobs, and to fight the opioid crisis.  It’s on that last point that Senator Elizabeth Warren received applause.

Warren is a canny politician, but her hatred for conservatives is palpable—you can see the barely-restrained rage on her face when she talks about us.  But it seems that, unlike Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, Warren can control that anger when doing so will benefit her politically.  Going to the stronghold of the enemy of opining on a major problem within that stronghold is a shrewd act of reinvention:  “I’m not a crazy Leftist, I just get angry when good folks are taken advantage of” seems to be the idea.

Politico is quick to point out one woman who will change her vote from Trump to Warren (assuming Warren wins the Democratic nomination, a possibility that seems remote), and pettily notes the small “Support Trump” rally held near Warren’s speech (remember:  this is a town of a few hundred people), but here was a key section of the piece:

The 63-year-old fire chief, Wilburn “Tommy” Preece, warned Warren and her team beforehand that the area was “Trump country” and to not necessarily expect a friendly reception. But he also told her that the town would welcome anyone, of any party, who wanted to address the opioid crisis. Preece was the first responder to a reported overdose two years ago only to discover that the victim was his younger brother Timmy, who died.

Preece said after the event that he voted for Trump and that the president has revitalized the area economically. But he gave Warren props for showing up.

“She done good,” he said.

What you have here is not Trump voters abandoning the candidate who has revitalized their State’s sagging economy; instead, it’s Trump voters enthusiastic that others are taking note of the opioid crisis gripping their community.  As Fire Chief Preece said in the quotation above, the town of Kermit, West Virginia, is willing to host anyone wanting to discuss the opioid crisis.

Still, this trip to MAGA Country was a smart move for Warren.  It also suggests that voters are increasingly attracted to any populist message, be it from the Left or Right.  Remember, Senator Bernie Sanders won 51.41% of the votes in the Democratic primary election in West Virginia.  Voters in rural America seem eager to embrace populist figures who will at least pay lip service to their struggles.

Trump will easily win West Virginia and its five electoral votes in 2020—as he will the electoral votes of many rural States—but he shouldn’t let up on his populist message, especially in difficult swing States like Pennsylvania (and—dare I consider them swings?—Wisconsin and Michigan).

Bernie’s (Cell) Bloc Voting

The Portly Politico3 Comments

Blogger jonolan at Reflections from a Murky Pond has a post about Bernie Sanders’s recent suggestion that convicted, incarcerated prisoners should be able to vote. The piece, “Bernie’s Folsom Pledge,” points out not just the absurdity of such a position, but the devastating political outcomes it would have.

We all understand the former implicitly: incarcerated felons are paying their debt to society, so their usual rights—freedom of movement (now “arrested”), the ability to vote, etc.—are forfeit. There is a fruitful discussion to be had about when, and under what circumstances, former convicts might be restored their right to vote, but the notion that inmates should be able to cast ballots undermines the very concept of punitive imprisonment.

The latter point—what would the political impact be if we allowed prisoners to vote—is not considered as frequently. In part, that’s because the idea was, until relatively recently, completely ridiculous. But we live in an age in which what was once decent, traditional, and commonsensical (and, therefore, never seriously questioned or in need of articulate defense) is challenged constantly, if not already destroyed utterly, so we have to engage in mental exercises that were once entirely abstract and academic.

jonolan does a great service here in a very succinct post way. Here he details the terrifying impact a prison population could have on local elections:

Focus on the State, County, and Local elections.

Imagine, if you will, the great harm that incarcerated felons could do in those elections, especially ones for: Police Chiefs, Sheriffs, District Attorneys, Prosecutors, and/or Judges. Remember, these are elections with a much smaller electorate and, hence, the population of a prison there could and likely would greatly impact the outcome(s).

Convicted felons voting for their jailers and captors: only slightly removed from the old cliche of the insane running the asylum. Turnout in these county elections (as sheriffs are usually elected at the county level) is so low that sometimes even a dozen (or fewer) votes can swing the outcome.

According to World Prison Brief, the prison population in the United States is around 2,121,600. I couldn’t find the average population of a typical American prison—perhaps a more patient and enterprising reader can—but imagine in a rural, low-population county what impact the prison population could have. Granted, prisoners might not even be registered to vote in the county in which they find themselves incarcerated (opening up another question: where, how, and in what precinct would prisoners be registered to vote?), but if they were, they could easily elect ne’er-do-wells to key law enforcement positions.

jonolan also points out the constitutional error implicit in extending voting rights to criminals:

Voting, be it for offices within each state or for elected federal offices is a matter that is wholly within the purview of each state. The federal government can only step in to prevent certain broad abuses, e.g., denying the “right” to vote based on race (15th Amendment), sex (19th Amendment), or advanced age (26th Amendment). As such, it is grossly inappropriate for any Presidential candidate to weigh in on this matter and to use it as a plank in his campaign’s platform.

As such, Bernie’s pro-prisoner proposal would require a constitutional amendment. That would mean proposal by 2/3rds of both chambers of Congress, then ratification by 3/4ths of the States. Of course, that’s Bernie’s shield: he knows it’s insane (and, as jonolan argues, it’s probably an attempt to shore up his iffy support among black voters), but he can call for it, virtually risk-free, while gaining some brownie points with progressives.

The whole proposal is yet another tiresome example of the destructive ideology of progressivism. In its endless thirst for new “rights” to grant and extend—always at the behest of government, of course—the Left forever pushes beyond any semblance of an orderly, sane society. It would be humorous if they weren’t so effective.

Beto Antoinette

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Today’s post is some low-hanging fruit (or free-range chicken?), but it’s too good to pass up:  arm-flailing weirdo and rat-faced rich kid Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke, the Democrats’ favorite Hispanic Irishman, when asked about combating poor nutrition in poor rural communities, called for the establishment of trendy farm-to-table restaurants in those communities.

Commentators have been quick to pounce on O’Rourke’s out-of-touch policy prescription, comparing it immediately to Marie Antoinette’s infamous solution for French peasants who couldn’t afford bread:  “let them eat cake.”

The only difference is that the poor, much-maligned Queen of France never said it.  O’Rourke—after a fashion—did.  If there was any doubt that O’Rourke is an out-of-touch pseudo-hippie, this proposal destroys it.  Remember, this presidential candidate literally ate dirt after losing to Senator Ted Cruz.

As I was reading up on this amusing example of elitist cluelessness, I stumbled an interesting, instructive sideshow:  some policing on the Left.  The Washington Examiner piece linked above includes the following tweet from Washington Post reporter Annie Linskey, who live-tweeted O’Rourke’s Nevada town hall:

That’s a perfectly innocuous example of reporting.  O’Rourke said it, Linskey reported it.  Now, notice this tweet from the editor of Wonkette (her Twitter handle is “commiegirl1,” for crying out loud), a far-Left “news” site that seems to favor snark over substance (if you want your stomach to turn, just read through their headlines—these people have lost their way):

Schoenkopf is referencing a tweet from David Weigel (who wrote a great book about prog rock), another Post reporter, who writes vaguely about O’Rourke’s remarks about “food deserts.”  She then follows up with a nasty tweet, writing that “I would literally fire you if you pulled that sh[*]t at Wonkette, about ANYONE.”

So, Linskey accurately—and in more detail than her colleague—tweeted a simple fact, and this Leftist wacko ostentatiously, hysterically said she would fire this poor woman—if only she had the power to do so.

Two takeaways:

1.) That mentality—“I would destroy you given the power”—is indicative of the Left.  It must crush any opposition, perceived or real, which leads to my second observation:

2.) Even the slightest implication of opposition to a Leftist sacred cow (which, it seems, O’Rourke is at the moment) is punished, swiftly and ferociously.  The very fact that Linskey had the gall to report on O’Rourke’s gaffe was enough to condemn her.

I don’t know Linskey’s politics, but if she writes for the Post, she’s probably left-of-center.  Even if that’s true, the progressives won’t hesitate to devour their own.

O’Rourke’s star seems to be falling as Democrats turn to a more flamboyant nobody, but progressives still like him because he could possibly win them Texas.  Hopefully, voters of a populist stripe will realize this man cares nothing for them or their struggles.

Trump’s Economy and 2020

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There’s been a spate of good economic news lately, largely thanks to President Trump’s economic policies.  US GPD grew 3.2% for the first quarter of 2019, blowing away economists’ projected 2.5% growth.  Of the 231 companies in the S&P 500 to report their Q1 earnings so far, 77.5% of them have exceeded analysts’ expectations.  US consumer spending increased 0.9% (0.7% when adjusted for inflation) during a quarter that is usually slower after the Christmastime rush.  All of that growth has occurred without a substantial increase in inflation.

That economic news is good for President Trump, but it might not be enough in and of itself.  In better times, any president with those economic numbers would breeze into a second term, but the perception among Democrats (no surprise) and some independents (more troubling) is that the economic growth we’re witnessing isn’t benefiting everyone, but instead favors the rich and powerful.

To be clear, Trump is in a strong position at the moment.  Having emerged battered but unbeaten from the Mueller investigation, he’s bested the greatest existential threat to his presidency.  Construction on the border wall has begun, and even progressive economist Thomas Friedman endorsing a “high wall” on the border.  And loony freshman Congress members like Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez continue to commit bone-headed, unforced errors.

That said, the scuttlebutt on the Dissident Right is that economic success alone won’t secure Trump’s reelection, and that excessive focus on it might actually alienate the blue-collar workers that delivered Trump victory in 2016.  The general argument is that, unless Trump doesn’t come down hard on immigration, even economic growth won’t save him.

I don’t fully buy this argument, but there might be some truth to it.  When the economy is already good, voters begin looking at other issues more closely.  If a worker loses his job to an illegal immigrant, or if the plant moves to Mexico, it doesn’t matter how good the economy as a whole is doing.

One alarming sign of trouble:  former Vice President Joe Biden and Texan weirdo Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke both are competitive against Trump—in Texas!  Granted, it’s very early in this process—the 2020 election is an eternity away, politically speaking—and the media loves to trumpet Democratic victories in historically deep-red States.  But the situation in Texas, like other border and high-growth States, illustrates the importance of the immigration issue.

A quick summary:  ultra-progressive California taxes and regulates its most productive citizens out of the State, while importing cheap labor illegally (supporting it with sanctuary cities, etc.) so the uber-wealthy Silicon Valley tech titans have gardeners and nannies at slave wages.  Enough Lefties bleed out into Arizona, Texas, and other reddish States with low taxes and good law enforcement.  Those States also struggle with illegal immigration, and are demonized for trying to protect their borders.  The result:  the purpling of Texas.

To clarify:  I think President Trump is well-positioned to win in 2020, especially if the Democrats nominate a wacko or a blatant race-baiter (like Kamala Harris).  He’s got a tougher fight against a perceived moderate like Biden or Pete Buttigieg, but momentum and incumbency are on his side.

Regardless, it is vital that President Trump return to his key campaign promise from 2016:  securing the border.  Not only is that crucial for tapping into the populist discontent that catapulted him into the Oval Office, it’s the only way to preserve the United States we know and love.

Bland and Gay

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The Democratic field for 2020 is a circus of tribal interests. Each candidate represents some special interest group in the rainbow coalition of the Democratic Party: Kamala Harris is the Queen of Black Voters; Cory Booker is the closeted, melodramatic homosexual; Elizabeth Warren is the shrill, angry white lady; Joe Biden is the Old Obama Perv; Tulsi Gabbard is the ethnically-ambiguous babe (and the least bad of all of them).

But the candidate that has everyone all a-titter is South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, the platitudinous gay man. Everyone seems to love this guy, notably upper-middle class white people and the tech industry. Breitbart‘s Allum Bokhari has a piece attempting to explain Buttigieg’s appeal to Big Tech and the closeted Leftists of the Never Trump movement.

Bokhari’s takeaway is this: Mayor Buttigieg is the kind of bland, copy-cat politician that the Establishments of both parties preferred prior to the 2016 election. He hearkens back to a time when the Establishment dominated politics with impunity.

There’s something to this analysis, I think. I’m continually frustrated with alleged conservatives who say they like President Trump’s policies, but cannot support him “on principle” because he’s “morally reprehensible.”

I recall a conversation with a friend and his wife—both devout Catholics—who dislike President Trump, largely (I perceived) for rhetorical reasons. The husband is given to virtue-signalling to the pieties of the day, but the wife is a bit more based. I pleaded with her to get over her distaste for Trump’s “meanness” and to cast her vote for him in 2020, as he’s the only candidate who is going to fight against abortion and for religious liberty. She told me she did not oppose the president for being a “meanie,” but because she finds him “morally reprehensible.”

I thought about that comment, and realized it’s nonsense. Saying the president is “morally reprehensible”—and, therefore, you’re not going to vote for him—is the same thing as saying you won’t support him because he’s a meanie; it just sounds better to frame it in moral tones.

Yes, yes, President Trump has done some immoral stuff, things many of us would shudder to contemplate. But who among us isn’t a sinner? What I care about are results. Cyrus the Great wasn’t a God-fearing man, but he restored the Jewish people to their homeland and paid to rebuild the Temple.

It’s a shame we have to keep reminding other Christians that a.) God uses all people to achieve His ends and b.) God forgives—and, as Christians, we believe in forgiveness!

But I digress. I intuit that what these cosmopolitan, upper-middle class whites want is, simply, a blandly non-offensive guy to say nice things and to appear “presidential.” In the current mix, the only figure that really fits that “Platonic ideal” of a president is Pete Buttigieg.

Add in a splash of mildly exotic gayness, and he pushes all the right buttons for these folks: they get to virtue-signal their support for a now-acceptable “alternative lifestyle,” while bowing to a vapid, clean-cut nice guy.

Pathetic. In a better age, we’d reject Mayor Pete for his Wildean antics. Instead, we’re elevating a Midwestern mayor with a slim record to presidential heights because it makes country club types feel good about themselves. “He’s nice—oooh, and gay! I like that combination.” Please.

Given the hysterical, limp-wristed lengths to which loafer-lighteners have gone to force their lifestyle on the general public, it seems like we’d want to keep them away from the highest office in the land. Pete Buttigieg’s twisting of God’s Word to endorse his flamboyant lifestyle is far more dangerous than Trump saying his favorite verse is “Two Corinthians.”

Get a grip, folks. MAGA MAGA MAGA!

The State of the Right, Part II: Dissident Right and Civic Nationalists

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Last week I wrote a piece about “The State of the Right.”  It’s inspiration were two essays, one from edgelord Gavin McInnes, the other from fellow blogger photog of Orion’s Cold Fire.  photog has done real yeoman’s work on teasing out the strands of the Right today, and he’s followed up that effort with a prescient essay, “Identity Politics and Civic Nationalism – Part 1.”  It’s the first in an interesting series exploring the friction between two major factions of the Right, broadly-defined, too:  the increasingly race realist Dissident Right, and the more traditional “BoomerCon” civic nationalist Right.

The former group has been very active since the 2015-2016 Trump Ascendancy, reading various intentions and motivations into the Trump campaign’s tough stance on immigration and border control.  As photog points out, the Dissident Right is the group that had the guts to call out neocons as Leftists-in-Conservative’s-Clothing.  Essentially, Bush-era neocons were playing into the progressive’s frame:  embrace massive and/or illegal immigration, dole out protections or favors to our preferred tribal interests, and we’ll give token conservatives a few crumbs from the dinner table.

The latter group, which photog defines well in his essay “What’s Right,” is not as active online as the Dissident Right, but is far more numerous.  These are the folks who love God and country, and want to see America strong and secure.  Civic nationalists believe that race and biology are not essential barriers to achieving the American Dream; rather, anyone who works hard, assimilates, and respects the Constitution can do well.  That understanding dominated postwar America, and when Leftists have pushed identity politics too far, the “Silent Majority” has risen up to push back.

In photog’s reading, Trump’s election was not, then, the triumph of the Dissident Right race realists; instead, it was the triumph of the silent CivNats pushing back against progressive tribalism.  Just like Nixon in 1968 and 1972 and Reagan in 1980 and 1984, millions of normal, traditional Americans rose up in 2016 against looming Leftist disorder and chaos.

The argument of the Dissident Right is that all the racial division and social breakdown we’ve seen in America is proof that different races and cultures cannot long function together in a healthy body politic.

Civic Nationalist, on the other hand, argue that government policies like affirmative action and paternalistic welfare systems encourage tribalist, racialist thinking, essentially ghettoizing certain groups (often along racial lines).  America is nation of ideas, not blood.  A key example is how the “post-racialist” Obama Administration exacerbated racial tensions through its policies.

President Obama’s Justice Department, headed by racemonger Attorney General Eric Holder, significantly worsened race relations in the United States every time “police violence” claimed a black man’s life:  rather than treating such incidences on a case-by-case basis, the Obama DOJ aggressively, publicly supported the view that “systemic racism” was the cause of the attacks.  A compliant media spun narratives like “hands up, don’t shoot.”  With cops second-guessing their every interaction with a potential black suspect, many just stopped doing their jobs effectively, breeding more criminality in black neighborhoods—further “proof” that the system was “rigged” against blacks.

Most Americans reacted to these shootings with sympathy, naturally, but as the details began to trickle out, many of them were not as they appeared.  Michael Brown of Ferguson, Missouri was not the “gentle giant” the media portrayed, but a dangerous felon.  The police shooting in Charleston, however, was a legitimate example where police went too far, though it’s not, logically, proof in and of itself of “systemic racism,” or even individual racism.

Regardless, the CivNat argument is that race is incidental, not a determining factor in one’s ability to participate in the grand experiment in self-government.

So, who is correct?  Like most things, there is truth to be found among both groups.  The Civic Nationalist wing of conservatism is often slow to react and is generally complacent in its slumber, but it won’t abide consistent tomfoolery or wickedness for long.

The Dissident Right, on the other hand, is willing to come out swinging at the myriad problems facing the nation today, particularly immigration.  They argue—I think, correctly—that we can’t swamp our nation with millions of unassimilated Third Worlders from peasant cultures that have no interest in, or even thoughtfulness about, our nation or its values.  Like it or not, Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence came out of, well, Anglo-Saxons, and it took hundreds of years to develop ideas like constitutionalism, rule of law, self-governance, separation of powers, etc.

That said, I don’t think the Dissident Right is correct that only white Anglo-Saxons can enjoy the fruits of the grand British tradition (although such patrimony seems better equipped to avoid tribalism).  The history of America suggests otherwise.  Millions of Americans of every skin color and culture have managed to assimilate into American culture (if anything, black Americans are the biggest example of the failure to assimilate, but that’s for complicated historical and cultural reasons, not to mention persistent legal action to separate blacks from the rest of American society for a hundred years after emancipation).

Tribalism, however, is a very real phenomenon, and a dangerous one.  The Dissident Right gets this correct as well.  If you transported all of El Salvador to Kansas today, the people wouldn’t suddenly become restrained corn farmers participating in quilting bees and box socials; they’d be El Salvadorans, their distinct cultural and national rivalries still playing out in bloody gang violence.  Take ten El Salvadorans, however, and spread them throughout the country, and they’ll have no choice but to assimilate.

What photog and I both reject, then, is the Dissident Right’s solution to our problems, which is, simply, to embrace identity politics and tribalism for whites—use the same tactics of the Left to get carve-outs and special favors for white Americans.  That seems like a surefire way to increase, not decrease, racial tension.

To close out this lengthy, meandering post, here is photog himself, on asking “Are [the Dissident Right] right?”:

I prefer to think that they’re not.  My read on this is that the situation has been exacerbated by Republican “leaders” who actually seem to buy into the fairness of minority identity politics out of some kind of ancestral guilt or because they see electoral advantage in joining the progressives.  The proof of this can be seen in the success of a civic nationalist like Trump who isn’t guilted into kowtowing to illegal immigration out of fear of being called a racist.  Once you disarm the Progressives of that weapon you find out that the majority of Americans, even in Blue States, want immigration laws to be obeyed.

I contend if the Right forcefully advocates for full enforcement of immigration laws and the elimination of reverse discrimination policies by the government and other entities, it will go a long way toward lowering tensions between the various groups living in the United States and will allow people to start thinking of each other as neighbors and not potential enemies.

photog and I, like many Americans, are walking a fine line between the truthful claims of the Dissident Right and the Civic Nationalists.  Both camps have much to offer, and the Dissident Right has been on the front lines of the Culture Wars the past three or four years.  The two factions can work together to reinvigorate conservative thought, to shake it loose from the dogma that’s dominated it since the end of the Second World War.

That said, that dogma, too, contains useful bits.  The point, then, seems to be that we should always be pondering what is truthful, good, and useful.  The neocons tossed fuel to the fire when they endorsed increase immigration and turned a blind eye to illegal immigration.  The Dissident Right and the Civic Nationalists can both agree that rolling back illegal immigration and limiting legal immigration, at least for a time, will be beneficial for the nation as a whole.

TBT: Six Long Years

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I’m still indulging in the unrealistic decadence of Spring Break’s unlimited freedom.  After a long Wednesday painting, I decided to go with an unorthodox pick for this week’s TBT.  Indeed, I’ve mined out the best of the old TPP blog; pretty soon I’ll be reposting pieces from this iteration of it, what I call “TPP 3.0.”  The benefit of daily posts is that I have a good bit of windbaggery to pull from.

Today’s TBT hearkens back to the dawn of the TPP 2.0 era, when I relaunched the blog after a six- (in reality, a seven-) year hiatus.  I was down on Fripp Island, a place that always seems to get the literary juices flowing.  There’s something about sitting at a dark, wooden desk in a study at the beach that channels some Pat Conroy-esque inspirado.

Anyway, it was there that I decided to do thrice-weekly posts for the duration of the summer.  The posts then were much longer than the average posts now.  These days, I average around 600 words on a post.  In those days, I was churning out 1200-1500 words three times a week.  There’s a reason I started the TBT weekly feature:  I wrote some quality content back in those days.

The post you’re about to read, “Six Long Years,” was a quick set of reflections on the very eventful years that passed from 2010-2016.  The world changed rapidly during the Obama Administration; we often forget how quickly and how much.  I can still remember, vividly, when many States—including deep blue ones!—voted against legalizing same-sex marriage.  Now, even suggesting what was the norm less than ten years ago would be grounds for deplatforming, doxxing, and SJW Twitter (and real) mobs otherwise destroying your life.

Now, even 2016 seems like an eternity ago.  Trump’s election that November was a “through-the-looking-glass” moment.  Who knows what the next six years might hold?

There’s no way to know.  Regardless, here is 2016’s “Six Long Years“:

A lot can happen in six years.

When I last posted on this blog, I announce that Nikki Haley had been elected Governor of South Carolina.

That was November of 2010.  Think about what was going on at that time:

– Democrats still controlled the Senate, but had just lost the House to the rising T.E.A. Party insurgency.

– The Affordable Care Act had been passed, but would not go into effect until 2013 (2014, as it turned out, due to the executive fiat of the Department of Health and Human Services).

– The Great Recession was, from a technically economic standpoint, over, but the much-vaunted Obama recovery was still frustratingly anemic at best, and virtually invisible to many Americans.

– President Barack Obama hadn’t completely divided the country along race, class, and gender lines, and his disastrous foreign policy hadn’t completely crippled American power and prestige abroad.

What a difference six years make.  Here are some highlights:

– Nikki Haley not only began her first gubernatorial term in 2011; she handily won reelection in 2014 in a landslide victory against her 2010 opponent, Vincent Sheheen.  The relatively unknown upstart from Bamberg made good on her promise to grow the State economically.  She guided the state through the horrible Charleston Nine massacre in 2015; adroitly handled the resultant push to remove the Confederate Flag from the Statehouse grounds; and entered VP buzz for the carnival-like 2015-2016 presidential election season.

– The Democrats lost control of the Senate after an unexpected Republican surge in the 2014 midterm elections, which cemented the gains of 2010 and showed Americans’ growing dissatisfaction with the Affordable Care Act in particular and the Obama administration’s equivocating in general.  This victory came despite an unpopular government shut-down (led by the brilliant Senator Ted Cruz of Texas) in 2013 and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s drubbing in the 2012 presidential election.

– Racial wounds that had mostly scabbed over were ripped open once again–this time with the president dumping plenty of salt on them.  Alleged police misconduct in Ferguson, Missouri and beyond brought out protestors in droves… despite the fact that many of these unfortunate events were not racially motivated (although some, such as the death of Eric Garner in New York City, highlighted the perils of excessive force and regulations).  Baltimore caught fire, Ferguson was ablaze, and the big losers were small black business owners who saw their stores looted amid cries for racial and social justice.

– The American college campus, always a training school for Leftist ideologues, became a breeding ground for illiberal Progressives, those who loudly (and sometimes violently) suppressed freedom of speech if such speech was deemed unacceptable or “hateful” (the latter often taking a rather protean definition).  Dovetailing with the rise in identity politics (see the previous bullet point), campus multiculturalism took on a dangerously Balkanized flavor, one that denounced the First Amendment and, in the process, heterosexual white men in favor of a vague commitment to skin-deep “diversity” (unless you’re transgender, in which case you can be whatever you feel like at any given moment).

– Out of all this craziness came the largest, most talented field of Republican presidential hopefuls in the nation’s history.  With seventeen (!) candidates, Republicans were treated to a wealth of talent—but also a great deal of muckraking, mudslinging, and intense political maneuvering.  From this crowded field emerged an unlikely victor:  business mogul Donald J. Trump.  In one of the biggest twists in American political history, a non-ideological, brash, gutsy-but-not-very-detail-oriented, and always-controversial reality television star won the nomination of an increasingly conservative Republican Party.  Put another way, a thrice-married, formerly-pro-Clinton, formerly-pro-choice New Yorker beat out a born-again, pro-life Texan.

Needless to say, it’s been pretty crazy.

With everything that’s happened, I realized that it’s time to get back into this world of political commentary.  The unique character of the 2016 presidential election alone has me salivating (be on the lookout for my brief overview of the 2015-2016 presidential nomination process).  There are so many questions:  what will become of the Republican Party?  Can Trump win the election (for what it’s worth, I think he can)?  Will Hillary manage to hold off socialist Bernie Sanders?  How will Trump and Clinton go after each other?  Should conservatives support Trump, or back a third-party candidate (for reasons I’ll explain in a future post, I’ll say “yes, with some caveats” to the first part and “no” to the second)?  What would a viable third-party candidacy look like—if such a thing is possible?

There’s a lot to talk about.

So, strap in and brace yourself—it’s going to be one heck of a ride.

All the best,

The Portly Politico

New Criterion on Principles in Politics

The Portly Politico6 Comments

Principles are, at bottom, what our politics are founded upon.  But that doesn’t mean that principles are inviolate, or that they should come at the cost of common sense or self-preservation.

That seems to be the crux of the debate occurring on the Right at the moment.  A dwindling faction of Never Trumpers argue that “decorum” and principles must be preserved at all costs, even if it means perpetual political defeat, if it means we’re on a higher road than our enemies to the Left.

The Trumpist and Dissident Rights, on the other hand, argue that we should jettison the Marques of Queensbury rules and noodle-wristed, David Frenchian hand-wringing over decorum and process to fight our opponents like backstreet scrappers.  Since the other side doesn’t follow any rules, the argument goes, the Right can at least loosen up a bit, and not stress out so much about policing its own side, when the Left steadfastly refuses to do the same.

This difference in approach suggests, of course, the different philosophies underpinning the Left and the Right.  The Left is motivated by nihilism and lust for power.  The Right is largely motivated by maintaining strong families, strong faith, and a strong nation.  In the West, the Right is, philosophically if not always theologically, Christian, so it’s natural that it treats its ideological opponents with tolerance, respect, restraint.

The progressive Left—ironically descended, in part, from the Puritan impulse to eliminate, rather than hem in, evil—prefers total destruction of its enemies, and constantly redefines what constitutes heresy to achieve ever greater degrees of “social justice” and “purity.”

The New Criterion had a piece I’ve been sitting on for awhile, waiting for a slow news week.  While it’s been eventful, nothing today really caught my eye.  I’m in the middle of my glorious, late-in-coming Spring Break this week, and there’s something about being out of the normal routine that has my mind working more sluggishly than usual.

“‘Principle’ Parts” by James Bowman is about the Brexit process, and Theresa May’s disastrous performance thereof.  Rather than just ripping off the Band-Aid—what America did when we declared independence from a frosty, overbearing, overseas power—the Prime Minister has equivocated, betraying the will of the British people, trying to work out a deal rather than a—gasp!—“no deal” Brexit.

As Mark Steyn presciently points out in another piece, “Exit Brexit,” taking a “no deal” Brexit off the table undermines all of Britain’s leverage in negotiations.  Theresa May, like so many other polite “conservatives,” invested more in being the good schoolgirl going through the process than fighting for the interests of her country.  The end result:  selling out to a supranational tyranny that lacks the military ability to enforce its odious bureaucratic despotism.

Principles are important, but they mean nothing if we’re not allowed to defend them out loud in the pubic square.  The state of the battlefield at present requires tooth-and-nail battles.  The Right should spend less effort policing itself—and thereby limiting its effectiveness to a token “loyal opposition”—and should instead doggedly go after Leftists and their nihilistic, lethal ideology.