The Candy-Coated Hypocrisy of the Left

By now you're well aware that Donald Trump Jr tweeted an outrageous, deeply offensive message that was ultimately evil, vile, Satanic, Hitlerian, and kitten-offending in it's outrageousness. How do we know it was all of those things? The mainstream media told us so. If you haven't seen the tweeted image, here it is:

Was it an oversimplification of a problem? Perhaps. Was it wrong? That's debatable. But the Left pounced on this, demanding an apology, a retraction, Trump Jr's head, the election of Clinton, all manner of unreasonable demands. Instead of sparking a conversation about refugees and the different policies the two main candidates have on the Syrian crisis, the Leftist media did what it always does: deflect the issue at hand so that Hillary Clinton's terrible policy doesn't have attention brought to it. It's obvious that the media is part of the Clinton campaign.

But the hypocrisy comes in the form of Leftist ugly tweets. Trump's tweet is modeled after this gem, tweeted by a feminist who'll remain nameless. Her claim, that women should be scared of men because (so she claims) 10% are rapists (an evil claim if there ever was one). How this is in any way an acceptable claim to make is unknown to me but then again I'm just a humble anti-feminist and am not fluent in femenese. Here's the tweet:

Is there a substantive difference? Why is it okay when feminists engage in this hyperbole but when a presidential campaign makes a nearly identical claim it's not okay? If you have an idea please let me know because I don't understand why saying that 10% of men are monsters is okay but saying that terrorists are coming in with the Syrian refugees isn't.

The only thing that makes her tweet okay is that, as we all know, men are all evil and must be killed. At least, all white men, Syrian men are exempt because, according to Sally Kohn, Sharia Law is progressive. Because Muslims are 'oppressed' they must be protected from evil, evil white men who must be killed. That must be it.  

Safe Spaces and the Cult of Anti-Trump

Typical college dorm

A friend of mine is a student at a major public university. He has the misfortune of living in the residence halls (dorms). Recently, his RA left a note on his door and the door of every one of his neighbors asking questions like 'what's your favorite kind of music?' 'what's your favorite food', and the creme de la creme, 'what's your preferred gender pronoun?' As I've written endlessly about here and elsewhere, the universities are the breeding ground for the leftist lunacy that denies basic truths, beginning with denying that there are only two genders.


But it goes far beyond that. Here is a basic list of insane ideas taught at universities:

• Gender is a social construct. There are as many genders as there are people. Assuming that 'male' and 'female' are the only options makes you a bigoted oppressive shitlord.
• Safe spaces are essential. We must be protected from wrong opinions that might challenge our way of thinking and 'trigger' us.
• Speaking of wrong thinking, conservatives, and especially Trump and his deplorable supporters, are racists who should be silenced. They can be silenced using free speech.
• Free speech isn't free. While true on its face Leftists mean that free speech is offensive and the best way to silence public speech is to make it impossible for someone to speak publicly using something they call 'no-platforming'. 
• Men, while being a social construct, have special privileges that all other genders don't have. This is especially true of white men. 
• Trump is a fascist. By fascist they mean 'not leftist' because he has the insane idea that government isn't the solution to all problems.
• All social problems can be solved with more multiculturalism and fewer white people.

I just included this to trigger SJWs

The Cult of Anti-Trump opposes Trump because he is anti-political correctness...and because ultimately he objects to socialism. Make no mistake: if Ted Cruz had been the nominee, or John Kasich, the charge that Republicans are racist fascists would be leveled at conservatives with the same level of vitriol that Leftists level against the GOP and especially Trump supporters now.

While the presidential election is drawing near and it appears that Trump might win, the university year is just beginning. On college campuses now professors are proselytizing to students, spreading the anti-Gospel lies of socialism. While that is going on the student government associations and their state-wide partners are registering students to vote in 'non-partisan' voter registration campaigns while actively promoting Leftist ideas like the Israeli Disinvestment movement, Black Lives Matter, and free college for illegal immigrants. These are the future leaders of America, and the only way to stop them is to remove all federal funding from universities until they stop being Leftist seminaries (to borrow a phrase from Dennis Prager). 

Religion of Peace Update: August 2016

It's been a busy month in the Religion of Peace. Let's see what isn't being widely reported by the Sharia-lovin' media:

• Remember that $400 million ransom payment to Iran for hostages? It turns out that the number is closer to $1.7 billion to be paid, with the $400 million being only the first installment. According to Jihad Watch: 

The administration agreed to pay Iran $1.7 billion to compensate that country for its payment to the U.S. in 1979 for military equipment. That deal fell through after Iran’s government was overthrown, and the Obama administration has said it owes Iran this money, plus interest.

Courtesy of Jihad Watch: This guy knows its all about the Benjamins...and Allah

• According to the Daily Star a machete-wielding woman shouted 'Allahu Akbar' and attacked people in Brussels. But authorities quickly remind us that it had nothing to do with [redacted] but was just a case of mental illness.

• Also from Jihad Watch, the Commonwealth of Virginia experienced some cultural enrichment when a Muslim named Wasil Farooqui stabbed two people while screaming 'Allahu Akbar.' While the police have not told us that it has nothing to do with [redacted] we know that already because the trustworthy media already told us so.  

Investigators believe that this was a random attack, and Farooqui had no connection to the two victims.

• Infowars correspondent dares to defy the narrative about 'Islamophobia.' Apparently no belief system is above scrutiny. Watch and note the peaceful responses he gets from the Emissaries of the Religion of Peace:

• Finally, in a bit of good news, ISIS kidnapped a 12 year old child in Iraq, forced him into a suicide vest, and told him to bomb civilians, according to the child after he was helped out of his vest by Iraqi security forces:

College Protests and Political Riots: Is This the 60s?

You may have noticed that we live in unstable times in the west. College campuses are melting down. Political riots masked as protests are common.The Religion of Peace continues to bless us with cultural enrichment in the form of shootings and bombings. In a lot of ways the times are like a more violent 1960s.

The Left LOVES The 1960s

A cheater and a warmonger. Not much has changed for the Left.

While the rest of the population remembers the 60s as producing some good music and a lot of drug use, the Left remembers the 60s fondly:

• Big Government was KING. The Great Society was fighting poverty directly...except that it actually undermined the family, especially the families of black Americans.
• The Civil Rights movement began the end of the racism institutionalized by Democrats who later blamed Republicans for political racism.
• Sex was free! Regardless of the consequences. Like STDs and skyrocketing divorce rates.
• The Student Movement of the 60s fought the good fight against racism and a war that was being fought against a brutally oppressive Vietnamese government and their oppressive paymasters in the Soviet Union.

The 1960s STRIKE BACK

The Ultimate Irony: Leftists At Twitter Oppress Gay Men

Today the Left has seized control of universities, the media, and the halls of power. To that end they protest:

• The Left fights against homophobia and discrimination by discriminating against gay and Jewish speakers on college campuses.
• Institutionalized racism in cities run by black Democrats and in a country run by a black Democrat.
• They push Marxist ideology in the name of peace and 'social justice' despite Marxism being diametrically opposed to true social justice.
• The Left polices sex more than any church or religion in history.
• The student movement today protects Islam, which is opposed to everything the Left actually stands for.

The Consequences, Then and Now

Nixon and Reagan were the result of Leftist overreach. 

What the Left doesn't realize is that by mimicking the movements of the 60s the outcome will be exactly the same as it was then: the rise of a new conservatism that will come to power on the tide of the public demanding a restoration of public order. But that won't be enough this time. Democrats must become a politically ostracized party for years to come as a result of their racist pandering to identity politics. Universities must be restructured to prevent racist Marxist ideas being taught as a sort of secular Gospel. Donald Trump is currently trailing in every poll but that won't last as Americans continue to grow tired of stagnant Leftist economics and the racism built into the ideology that fuels the Democratic party. 

The New Silent Majority Can't Remain Silent

Fighting against the controlled media and the controlled universities is the job of everyone in the West. Will you sit silently by while our culture is destroyed in the name of multiculturalism and Marxism? Or will you RESIST?

Hillary Clinton Thinks You're Stupid

By now it's all over the media: Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), under the leadership of one Debbie Wasserman Shultz, conspired to rig the Democratic Primary against Sanders, crafted a false narrative about Donald Trump, and conspired with the media to guarantee Clinton the presidency. For the 5 biggest takeaways from the leaked DNC emails I highly recommend Mike Cernovich's coverage.

Over the weekend, DWS stepped down as DNC chair...and was immediately hired by Hillary Clinton for a senior post in her campaign. Clinton thinks you're an idiot. She believes that you won't hold her accountable for cheating in the Democratic primary. Clinton believes that you will vote for her because Trump is just awful, relying on that same narrative crafted by the DNC and parroted by the corporate media. Clinton thinks you and the rest of America are too stupid to figure out that she and her party are stricken with cancer.

Courtesy of Mike Cernovich. Seriously, this is The Narrative

Maybe you don't like Donald Trump. That's fine and that's your right as an American. Explore your options but I implore you to at least watch Trump's speeches for yourself with an open mind. Don't buy The Narrative crafted by the DNC and repeated mindlessly by CNN, MSNBC, CBS, The Washington Post, Politico and countless other organizations.

Clinton and the Democrats have demonstrated a willingness to achieve power by any means necessary. While Donald Trump is painted as evil by the likes of Jon Stewart, the mainstream media, and social media, Clinton conspires to win by cheating. The leaked emails prove that beyond a shadow of doubt.

If the Democratic party continues on the path DWS and Clinton put them on then they think you're stupid. They will demonstrate what leaked emails reveal: that their voters are a commodity. Most galling, the DNC calls Donald Trump a racist while at the same time calling Latino voters a 'commodity' to be reached out to via a 'taco bowl' strategy.

Don't let DWS and the DNC coronate Hillary Clinton. The results of a person using lawlessness and naked corruption to achieve the highest office in the land will only bring disaster to the United States and to the West. Given the state of law and order issues today, allowing a person to become president who flaunts the law and has said they believe there is a 'Hillary standard and a standard for everyone else' would be incredibly dangerous.

The cancer in the DNC is a unique form of cancer. It is contagious and could spread through the body politic if not treated. The only treatment is at the ballot box in November. Clinton must be stopped in order to preserve the values that make the American republic possible in the first place. Without law and order the US has no foundation to stand upon.

This Week In The Religion of Peace

This has been a doozy of a week when it comes to the Religion of Peace. Let's have a quick look at the, um, highlights:


First, of course, is the attack in Nice, France. As of this writing there are 84 dead and 200 wounded. The attack was reported as a 'truck attack' by the mainstream media, with little to no mention given of the fact that the terrorist involved was an adherent of the Religion of Peace. Even better, there's been a terror attack in France every two months for the last 18 months. There's a lot the media and western governments aren't telling you about Islamic terrorism but Paul Joseph Watson of Infowars is happy to tell you:

When adherents of the Religion of Peace struck the Bataclan club earlier this year, it turns out they were torturing their victims while waiting for the raid that eventually killed them...and governments covered it up.   This is yet another example of the Stockholm Syndrome that the Left and European governments are experiencing. The effort to avoid offending their actual oppressors and invading hordes would be astonishing if it wasn't already obvious that western leaders lack the spine to deal with this existential threat to western civilization.

Moving on, in Pakistan adherents of the Religion of Peace followed their pedophile 'prophet's' commands to mutilate those who refuse to convert by chopping off the arms of a Christian man who refused to turn his back on Christ. According to Christian Today: "A Christian man in Lahore reportedly had his arms chopped off after refusing to denounce Jesus and convert to Islam while in the hands of fanatics.

According to Legal Evangelical Association Development (LEAD), a Christian organisation in Pakistan, Aqeel Masih, who worked at a petrol station in the LDA quarter area of Lahore, was kidnapped by Islamists before having his armed severed...[The] extremists exerted pressure on him to abandon Christianity and convert to Islam,” LEAD said. “Aqeel however, did not give up on his Christian faith and refused to comply with their demand. Notwithstanding…his rebuttal, they chopped off his both arms, and absconded.”

Finally, a machete attack at the Nice vigil was thwarted by French police. As JihadWatch reports, mourners were gathered for the memorial for the 84 dead and 200 injured when an Islamic man arrived with a machete. Obviously he was there to provide the cultural enrichment only Islam can afford, but the law enforcement stepped in and arrested him. No one was injured, even the would-be attacker.

Have any news on the Religion of Peace? If so leave a link in the comments or tweet them to @PontificatorMax . Also, follow me on Twitter and subscribe.

What the Heck is the Convention of States?

Recently I went on a spree of adding new followers on Twitter. Specifically, I sought out supporters of Donald Trump, the GOP nominee for President of the United States. I did this for a variety of reasons but in the end that doesn't matter as much as what I found along the way: something called the Convention of States is brewing on social media.

A convention of states is often called an Article V convention (for the process is briefly mentioned in Article V of the Constitution), which requires two-thirds of the US state legislatures to call (today, 34). Once convened, three-fourths of the states (38) must vote in affirmative to amend the constitution...or perhaps to scrap the document and begin with a new one. That is one danger of the proposed Convention of States. If supporters of the CS disagree just look at the history of the US constitutional convention, whose participants were convened to fix the Articles of Confederation and instead chose to write a whole new document.

At present there is an organized attempt to convene just such a convention. While it's been ongoing for several years it seems to have pick up steam after the GOP primary elections began to go Donald Trump's way. Many, many of the supporters I've seen on Twitter for the Convention were Cruz supporters or outright #NeverTrump proponents, or both.This is anecdotal, as I've only seen this on Twitter, but the point stands. At a quick appearance there is the veneer of partisan politics at play, fueled by the same fear for the future of the United States currently being ruled by a government that cares little for the citizens and future of the republic.

This guy is a strong proponent of the Article V convention.

Prior to the primaries in 2015, prospective candidates endorsed the proposed Article V convention. Donald Trump has either not been asked the question or has remained silent on the issue. At a glance it would appear that #NeverTrump types are all-in for a convention of states to circumvent the process and change America on their own terms instead of on the terms of the popular electorate. This is an oversimplification, as is evident by this piece by one blogger calling for a convention while hinting that he may support Trump given time.

So, how would an Article V convention work? The Constitution gives few hints:

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.

The questions I am left with are these: who would be permitted to participate? What role would lobbyists play? Would the process be open to the public? The Constitution says little to answer these questions. What we know we know from history. Lobbyists as they exist today didn't exist in 1787, and that convention was closed to the public due to the participants overstepping their authority and original mission, which was to reform the Articles of Confederation.

I think calling an Article V convention is a deeply dangerous idea. State legislatures are just as beholden to lobbyists and special interests as is the Congress. As few, if any rules exist governing an Article V convention we can be sure that lobbyists will be in FULL FORCE at such a convention. Imagine Planned Parenthood, George Soros, and the big energy combines meeting with convention goers and you begin to see my concerns with the proposed convention. In short, a convention would be at risk of being high jacked by the interests who control our government. The potential for disaster is enormous.

There is no agreement in scholarly circles as to whether a limited convention is possible, either. Current proposals call for a convention to be called to limit judicial power, mandate a balanced federal budget, and limit executive power. But another real concern is that the convention could in itself scrap the entire existing US constitution and craft a new one from scratch. This happened in the convention of 1787. It could happen again.

Would a convention be accepted by the people of the United States? In the US we engage in something that can only be called idolatry of the Constitution. People treat the Constitution as if it were the Holy Bible: the inspired and inerrant Word of God. My suspicion is that if major changes to the Constitution were made the general public would not be in support.

Finally, I doubt the Courts would accept an Article V convention. Likely the Courts would reject such a convention on some technical grounds in order to protect the status quo.  The federal courts are incredibly partisan and corrupt and will do anything to protect the power they possess.

So, what do you think? Is an Article V convention something to support and push for?

Leftists LOVE Islam

If you listen to Leftists they'll tell you that they stand for women's rights, rights for LGBT+ persons, and secular non-religious values including the separation of Church and State. Whether you agree or not with these goals you can understand why Leftists support them, fight for them, and stand with people they see as oppressed.

What you probably can't understand is why Leftists stand with Muslims. Islam stands against all of these values, Muslims use violence against supporters of these values in their societies and ours, as evident in a 2013 Pew Research Poll of Muslims in the Muslim world as well as in the US and Europe. Let's have a look at the issue of homosexuality, which is especially relevant in the aftermath of the horrifying Orlando murders of 50 gays in a nightclub.

As the  poll illustrates, the majority of Muslims everywhere in the world views homosexuality as immoral. So what, right? Christians do too.  A recent poll of British Muslims found that homosexuality should be illegal. ILLEGAL. Christians believe in free will and the freedom to choose to reject sin out of free will. Islam calls for the institutionalization of not only religious values but punishment for breaking religious law.

The Left values diversity of race and skin but the Muslims they love so much do not, according to that same poll. “But on specific issues – families, sexuality, gender, attitudes towards Jews, and on questions of violence and terrorism, the centre of gravity of British Muslim opinion is some distance away from the centre of gravity of everyone else’s opinion.” In simple English that means that Muslims on average hold incredibly regressive views on these issues.

But the Left has a well-documented streak of antisemitism, judging from the recent push for disinvestment of universities from Israel. To summarize the issue, Social Justice Warriors at universities across the United States have been pushing for their universities to withdraw financial support and investments from companies based in Israel or those who operate in Israel to protest the treatment of Palestinians. Little protest is made by these same SJWs when Palestinian rockets kill civilians in Israel.

Leftists love Islam because in the US Americans have had a negative view of Muslims, especially after the 9/11 terror attacks. They love Muslims because, in their mind, Muslims are at the top of what some call the 'Progressive Stack,' which describes those who have relative levels of lack of privilege. Apparently in the US Muslims occupy the top of the list of most-oppressed people, above even LGBT people. Justifying this worldview requires mental gymnastics of a magnitude that it has earned the label 'Oppression Olympics,' which I'll let this Youtube personality describe:

My suspicion is that the Left loves Islam because
Islam stands in stark opposition to Christianity.
The modern Left detests Christianity due to the Atheism being the dominant worldview among members of the American Left.  Yet the mental gymnastics required to reconcile allying themselves with people who stand against literally everything they support is staggering, especially when you consider that many, if not most Christians support some or all of the values of the American Left. The end result of this unholy alliance is that the alliance between Islam and the Left has left Europe on the brink of becoming Eurabia.

What Are You Doing?

What are you doing to restore sanity in America? I wanted to ask 'what are you doing to elect Donald Trump President' but to be completely candid Trump is merely the vehicle for desperately needed change. If asked I'd venture that most Trump supporters are willing to give Mr Trump a shot at at least trying to fix the many ills our great nation faces yet would say if prompted that if Mr Trump doesn't fight for us then he'll be abandoned like any other politician. So, I ask again, what are you doing to restore sanity to America?

The stakes are enormous. America is still being targeted by terrorists. In November the FBI confirmed that terrorists are using the unsecured southern border to cross into the US. This is on top of record numbers of illegals coming across the border seeking work and the American lifestyle while enough of them bring criminal intent that it causes serious concern for law enforcement in many places in the border states.

The US national debt is, at the time of writing, $19.2 trillion and climbing. That's around $160,000 per person. The US federal deficit is $511 billion and climbing. Americans want both limited government and the handouts that only big government can provide. It's a cognitive dissonance on a massive scale, one that can only indicate the political and cultural sickness that undermines our social and political cohesion.

Then there's the US jobs report. In May only 38,000 jobs were added to the US economy, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But to go deeper, the signs of a troubling economy can't be ignored. Construction employment is sliding, as is both full time and temporary employment.

Courtesy of Bloomberg

Temporary employment is the stopgap for many people during economic downturns. Yet temporary employment is slowing down. The temporary sector is where many employees who have poor skills learn new skills. Employers can bring new people at low cost and low risk into their organizations. When things align properly the end result is a mutual win for both employer and employee, with the goal of permanent long term employment for both parties. Yet the jobs situation in that sector is declining, a truly ominous sign for an already stagnant economy. Again, what are you doing to restore sanity to the United States?

Courtesy of Bloomberg

Then there's the violence of campus activists. Milo Yiannopoulos is embarking on his Dangerous Faggot tour of American college and university campuses. His message? That college professors and administrators are lying to students, creating paranoid cultural Marxists, and otherwise undermining American democracy. Because Yiannopoulos has dared to say inflammatory things like 'feminism is cancer' near riots have broken out at most of his university stops. Protesters are a constant presence. Agitators always try to shut the event down, using the unAmerican tactic of 'no platforming.' Yiannopoulos's crime is being one of the New Conservatives and as such he is guilty of ThoughtCrime. Dissenting opinions are not tolerated on American campuses anymore.

The logic of this isn't reserved for college campuses, however. San Jose erupted into riots when Donald Trump dared to campaign in the city. American flags were burned, Mexican flags raised and waved, and 'protesters' declared California to be illegally occupied by the United States. Trump supporters were assaulted by protesters and the police were ordered to stand down by the mayor of San Jose. Supporting Trump is now a crime in some parts of America, with mob justice replacing the Rule of Law.

Trump can secure the presidency by campaigning to restore law and order. But the fundamental issue is that Americans must stand up for themselves and demand a return to sanity. Our society has cancer and only hard choices can save the body politic. So....what are you doing to restore sanity?

Ralph Nader Loves Donald Trump

I call my blog 'Confessions of a Former Social Justice Warrior' because I used to be an SJW. I was, at best, an uncommited SJW who didn't identify with socialism and all that junk but I was more or less on the team. I was suspicious of American exceptionalism, distrustful of law enforcement and totally trusted Big Government. I was a Leftist. Maybe not as extreme as many I knew but a Leftist. This changed when I encountered Jesus Christ in the Catholic Church, became Catholic, and challenged all of my preconceived notions about every aspect of my world view. My politics changed and now see socialism for what it is. As Pope Leo XIII said of socialism in his 1878 encyclical Quod Apostolici Muneris (On Socialism), socialism distorts the social justice nature of the Gospel, divides men and women, and is a plague on society by assaulting the God-given right to private property.

When I was a social justice warrior I was sympathetic to the socialist concern. Sympathetic but not generally supportive. I trusted big government but didn't want big government running the economy, owning private property, and, as a leftist pundit I used to like was fond of saying 'I don't want the government making my shoes.' I was fine with the government providing health care and education but not actual goods and services. The pundit in question was Thom Hartmann, who now I can see is nothing but a fraud. In those days Senator Bernie Sanders was a regular guest of his on Hartmann's nationally syndicated radio show. Ralph Nader was a rare guest as well. I distinctly remember an interview Nader did with Hartmann about a book he had written and released in 2009 with the curious title Only the Super Rich Can Save Us!

The title is curious because Nader is a known leftist with hostility to the wealthy. The plot runs something like this: a wealthy member of the "1%" notices that America is on the wrong track, together with a handful of other members of the super rich, form a political cabal bent on remodeling America...through typical Leftist methods of regulation, redistribution of wealth and a reprioritization of American interests in the model of western Europe. Why Nader thinks the super rich are going to do this is beyond my understanding. The candidate for president who transforms America is modeled after Warren Buffett, whom the Left loves to prop up as a model of what the rich should be like, despite numerous criminal accusations made against him.

The funny thing about this is that Nader is getting his wish with one small exception: instead of a Warren Buffett wealthy Leftist America is on the verge of being transformed by Donald J Trump, who is not a left winger despite what the likes of Ben Shapiro say about him. Trump's slogan and his general approach are eerily similar to those used in by the cabal of Leftist 'heroes' in Nader's book, though Trump's approach lacks the blinding naivety inherent in thinking the American people will swallow a socialist agenda wrapped in red, white, and blue progressivism.

I recommend reading Nader's book because it illustrates the delusion of the modern Left in all it's glory. However, what I recommend instead is Trump's campaign book, Crippled America: How to Make America Great Again. Unlike Nader, Trump's approach is grounded in reality and far more in line with mainstream American values. Purchasing Trump's book is money better spent (if you support him) and will support his campaign for President.

If you want to know more about Nader's book read the Wall Street Journal book review. It's hilarious and does an even better job of showing the difference in thinking between the two approaches to fixing the problems that we as Americans presently face.  Comparing the ideas side by side will show the stark ideological differences between the Left and the rest of us.

A Rundown of the Major Polls for Trump V Clinton

This blog will have multiple focuses in the coming months. While I plan to continue talking about concepts and happenings involving Cultural Marxists and what turns them on, I'll be trying to use my political science training for something useful. To that end I'll be doing frequent commentary on the state of the 2016 presidential election between Donald J Trump and Hillary R Clinton. To kick it off, here's a round up of the latest public opinion polls.

First, the Fox News poll: As of today, Trump leads by 3, though that's within the margin of error.





According to Rasmussen, Trump now holds a 42-37 lead over Clinton. At the start of the month Trum was leading with by a paltry 41-39.





Quinnipiac released a poll a week ago showing Clinton and Trump in a 'neck and neck' contest in the three critical swing states of Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania. So goes Ohio, so goes the nation, as the saying goes (giving some credence to the thought that Kasich may be the VP, though I doubt it). No national numbers from Quinnipiac are available yet, but I'll keep an eye out for them.

Historically the polls tighten up after the conventions. Each nominee traditionally gets a bump in support after the conventions. Whether that happens this time or not is up in the air. There are far too many factors to consider, including Trump's willingness to fight a no-holds-barred cage match against Clinton.

I'll finish off for now on this thought: I've seen various numbers showing 44% of Sanders supporters being willing to vote for Trump against Clinton. I'm suspicious of that claim, though I do think maybe up to 25% will do so, which is still significant. Key factors that big named analysts don't seem to be factoring in include the increasing likelihood of a chaotic Democratic National Convention (a la the Nevada Convention) and Sanders continuing to be marginalized by the party establishment. If the DNC continues on the path that it presently walks then the potential for mass defections of Sanders supporters is very real.

This Little Republic

America is special. At a glance, the statistics don't reflect that. Presently there are about 322 million people. Americans are estimated to use 20% or more of the world's resources while only occupying only about 7% of the land mass. One in 20 people in the world is an American. In the grand scheme of things it would appear that America isn't that special. There are people in this country that desperately want you to believe that, too.

US GDP is $16.8 Trillion, with an average income of about $53,000. Our affluence is reflected in our cultural influence, as is seen in the impact of American popular culture. America's biggest export may well be popular culture, which has widespread influence. For better or worse, Beyonce is being listened to somewhere in Iran at the moment. Our artists and films are viewed and plagiarized the world over. Presently Metallica are preparing for a world tour. Last summer Lady Gaga toured Europe. Our popular culture has a huge influence everywhere in the world. No country can truly keep this export out despite their best efforts.  America has a huge influence in the world, which is itself not a profound statement to make, except that people often forget that America is in fact not just another country.

The best illustration of this is the tendency of the world to look to America to fix geopolitical problems wherever they occur. It's US forces that lead multilateral military campaigns against truly repressive regimes. It's the US that gets blamed when we choose not to intervene in terrible tragedies like Rwanda, or when our political leadership screws up by sending forces into places ill-prepared, as in Haiti. When tragedy strikes on a massive scale, be it an earthquake, volcanic eruption, or genocide, it's a safe bet that America will provide humanitarian aide. It's what we do.

People forget that all too frequently. America is exceptional. There is simply something different about us that separates us from our Canadian neighbors or European cousins. Americans used to be proud of that, too....until we weren't anymore. Whether it was the public turning against the war in Iraq or President Obama continuing to give faint praise to America and what we stand for, something has changed, and not for the better. You see it all around us. The only Americans that seem proud of America are conservatives. Progressives will continue to talk about America's failings, but conservatives will praise America as a place where anyone can change their lives, find opportunity, and even shake up the system. It's why so many people emigrate to America in the first place.

People wonder why Donald Trump is so popular. It's rather simple. First, he's actually masculine. The most masculine thing we've seen President Obama do is shoot a few hoops. Otherwise, President Obama comes off soft. In this day and age masculinity is under attack, as is the family itself. Donald Trump is masculine and that speaks volumes to people. We can argue about whether his masculinity is distorted or not, but regardless, he comes across as tough. Few would think President Obama is tough. Hell, I think Hillary Clinton is tougher than Obama.

Second, it's pretty clear that Donald Trump loves America. Where else could a real estate mogul turn into a TV and film star? Only in the United States. Trump honestly loves this country and, whether or not you agree with his methods, wants to take care of the biggest threats (as he sees them) to America. While I have no doubt that most of his competitors in the GOP field loved America as well, Trump absolutely does. It's why we've seen crossover appeal from people outside the conservative movement who've grown tired of the blame-America-first mentality that is increasingly part of the Progressive agenda. I know this for a fact because I used to be a Progressive and blaming America was something I did far more often than I realized. It makes me nauseous to think about.

Part of the rise of Trump is the social meltdown we're witnessing in some quarters, all part of the influence of the universities and their social justice agendas they allow to flourish in some departments. Trump is the backlash, which came in the form of a boisterous, humorous and angry person who wasn't going to sit by and let America get smeared anymore. Disagree with his approach if you want but don't doubt his love of America. Those forces coming out of universities are profoundly anti-American, with their Marxist ideologies and radical race-baiting agenda. Mark my words: if radical groups continue to push their weird unAmerican agenda you will see more moderates back Trump. Clinton hasn't stood up to these forces, and Obama has in some ways egged them on. Trump won't. He loves America too much for that.

Freedom of Speech

Original photo courtesy of the PSU Vanguard

I don't keep it a secret that I am still a student attending university. If you read my Twitter profile (Yes, follow me) you'll see that I'm a graduate student finishing a doctorate in public policy. I attend Portland State University, the site of two recent Trump rallies that turned into riots instigated by communists on the #RegressiveLeft. Everything I learned about the #RegressiveLeft was from my time as a social justice warrior.

One of the things I've learned is that the far left is hostile to freedom of speech.  This isn't a profound observation now but in my time in the far left I and my peers believed that we were stalwart defenders of free speech. Only the Right was hostile to speech, in our view, as evident by their opposition to pornography, video games and music they didn't like. Today opposition to those things is the sole province of the left, not the right, with maybe the exception of pornography. When I was a leftist I would've agreed with the idea that 'speech is free but it comes with consequences,' though I wasn't a supporter of no-platforming, which is itself not a new phenomenon.

There is a stock line that Leftists remember and recite without thinking: "freedom of speech only applies to the government." By this they mean that freedom of speech is only guaranteed against government censorship. This is of course absurd, as they love the Heckler's Veto. This is by definition a a redefinition of free speech because freedom of speech isn't only a value enshrined in the US Bill of Rights. No, freedom of speech is a cultural value that any democratic society requires to remain free. Yet many societies don't have free speech. One only has to look to what the leftists in Europe have done to see the effect of restricting free speech.

Power is not just in the hands of the state. There is a contextual side to power that these regressives purposefully overlook when they organize mobs to take over events and turn them into propagandizing sessions. In short, mobs have a lot of power and when mobs move to silence opposition they fail the most basic test of free speech. Freedom of speech includes the right to be heard. The purpose of free speech is to promote a dialogue. If you watch the video above you'll see heckler's using noise to silence those they disagree with at the PSU Trump rally in April.Some mocked the Trump supports with sarcastic 'I can't hear you' while banging on drums. It is only through the unhindered expression of unpopular ideas that our own ideas are challenged.

Of course, the typical Social Justice Warrior doesn't want their ideas challenged. As I've written about endlessly here, they are authoritarians (scroll through the articles to see what I've said on that subject). At its core, contemporary Leftism is a utopian movement and to achieve this utopia, like past attempts, they will stop at nothing. Even their own claimed non-violent views are malleable, as can be seen at the recent Trump rallies in California, where Trump supporters were assaulted by Sanders supporters.

This from the Catholic Herald sums up the authoritarian nature of the #RegressiveLeft beautifully:

The generic name for the well-organized leftist gangs is “antifas,” short for anti-fascists—an Orwellian irony if ever there was one, seeing that the antifas’ tactics are thoroughly fascist. When anti-Islamization groups such as PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the West) hold peaceful rallies or candle-lit “evening strolls,” they are often met by much larger gangs of antifa thugs intent on shutting them down and shutting them up. If they’re lucky, the peaceful protesters are protected by the police, and, if they’re not lucky, they get beaten up.

At Portland State during the first attempt at a Students for Trump meeting, the campus police refused to show up, leaving the small group of pro-Trump supporters at the hands of the mob. Thankfully that didn't turn violent, unlike the second attempt at a meeting. The media and leftists say that Trump and others bear responsibility for violence at his rallies, which is utter nonsense. This view was beautifully destroyed by Robert Spencer, noted educator on Islam who is often targeted by the Left because he dares tell the truth about that 'religion of peace.' What the Left, especially younger Leftists, fails to grasp is that people are accountable for their actions. If someone is 'triggered' by speech into doing something violent the guilty party is the person who engaged in violent behavior, not the speaker. Rarely can someone be legally held to account for speech because the nature of action is that an actor has to make the decision to engage in behavior. Disagreeable speech cannot be used to justify violence regardless of what is said because in the end we are all responsible for our actions.

As an aside I can guarantee everyone reading this: if Ted Cruz were the front runner there would be a similar reaction to him. Why? Because the Left does not want the left-wing establishment governance of America challenged. That is the truth. A front running Ted Cruz would be met with violence for his opposition to gay marriage, transgendered bathroom access, or any number of other positions. Trump is the front runner and likely nominee and as such is the target of the Left despite his general moderate positions on most policy issues.

When violence is a hallmark of a political movement that movement is authoritarian by definition. Whether it was the Bolsheviks in Russia, the Nazis in Germany, or the myriad movements in South America against foreign occupation, these movements all have in common an outcome of authoritarian dictatorship. I doubt this will play out in the US and UK in a similar manner simply because culturally these forces are so far outside the mainstream that they are already being soundly rejected by the population. But it is a cautionary note that in this we may see similarities from other regressive movements from history.

The Future is Alt-Right.....

I know the title is provocative and many who read it will assume that I'm an alt-right blogger. I'm not. I'm a moderate Catholic in the United States who does not in any way identify with the alt-right. However, I am savvy enough to read the signs of our times and those signs point to a future in the West that is either Islamic or alt-right. Some might think that I'd be more concerned about a quasi-social democracy springing up in the US but I don't believe that to be likely in the least because the Regressive Left is all but done; they still hold a great deal of power but the resistance against the authoritarianism of social justice warriors guarantees that.

First, what is the alt-right? I'm not going to spend a great deal of time defining the alt-right because others have done a very good job of doing so and being reasonably fair in their assessment. For those interested, see GotNews definition or Sargon of Akkad's piece on the alt-right. For those who like a simplistic definition the one from Wikipedia does an okay job, though I think the concept of the alt-right is far more complicated and more international than they give credit for:










For starters, I became interested in the alt-right as a political phenomenon because I'm a political scientist and the birth of any new political movement is academically interesting. But I first heard about what could be called the alt-right not in American politics but in European politics. The European variation is evidence that the west my be moving in the direction of a new, populist, and possibly authoritarian direction as a result of internationalist policies that include the erasing of borders, the harboring of immigrants, and the labeling anyone who takes issue with the behavior of Muslim migrants as Islamophobic. This despite many Muslims in Britain, Belgium and Germany bragging openly that those countries will be under Sharia law by mid-century. In Germany this has taken the form of a new segregation in some quarters, with train cars being assigned to men and women exclusively in at least one case. The cases of Rotherham and the New Years attacks across Europe that lead to many cases of sexual assault conducted by Muslims across Europe create fertile conditions for the rise of 'far right' political parties, as in the results of the recent Austrian elections. In the UK, moderates and conservatives have been trickling out of the Tory party for UKIP, a party focused on Britain leaving the EU and halting migration.

There has been an obvious rise in far right political parties in Europe since the advent of the Great Recession. At the time much of the success of these parties was blamed on the various currency and employment crises. John Oliver did a bit about this and reiterated this line on his national broadcast. Yet a driving force for the rise of these parties was the influx of immigrants from non-European countries. To be nakedly and brutally honest, these immigrants were largely Muslims from authoritarian countries with hideously illiberal cultures. Combined with an economic downturn and incompetent political response, an environment was created that has traditionally allowed 'far right' parties to emerge.

Maybe I'm speaking in generalities so here are a few concrete examples. In Hungary Jobbik has risen to power amidst rising immigration and economic stagnation. Like virtually every other 'radical right' party, Jobbik calls for national sovereignty and self determination. The European models are often if not always strikingly anti-EU, and strongly in favor of halting immigration. Jobbik's official website cite the demographic decline of Europe and the official remedy through limitless immigration as the source of increased tensions in Europe. "'"We urge the government to take immediate action, zero tolerance is needed and the overly liberal immigration system must be limited." pointed out Z. Kárpát Dániel. Jobbik wants to know how much of Hungarian taxpayers' money is spent on the maintenance of the non-restricted or semi-restricted refugee camps, on their health care services as well as what security risks Hungarian citizens are subjected to."

Hungary is the poster child for right wing race-based politics but other places, including Greece, have become prominent in far-right politics with the rise of Golden Dawn. The party gets labeled as 'Neo Nazi,' which may be fair given the obsession with Nazi imagery and 1930s Greek rightist nationalism. To their credit, Golden Dawn leadership openly calls for a return to military dictatorship in Greece instead of masking their intentions in some kind of call to traditionalism.

What's this have to do with the US alt-right? Honestly, not much. Social Justice Warriors have mindlessly repeated the charge that Donald Trump is an alt-right candidate, partially because the alt-right supports him despite his generally moderate position on most issues. His most closely-aligned positions are calls for restricting access to the US for Muslims (even an outright ban) and the building of the Great Wall of Trump. This, however, is a far cry from traditional extreme rightist positions. Trump is called a nationalist despite his pro-America rhetoric being in-line with previous Republican presidents who spoke about the greatness of America. Perhaps his rhetoric seems out of place because the current administration rarely engages in American exceptionalism.

The American alt-right is a hodgepodge of anti-Semites, intellectual racists (those racists who claim scientific legitimacy in racism), as well as more extreme anti-feminists such as Men's Rights Activists and other groups opposed to the radical agenda of the extreme feminist left. One extreme, it seems, breeds another. This is why I repeatedly say that Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump are very, very similar candidates, as both are populists that appeal to voters outside the traditional mainstream of American politics.

It is this rising tide of populism that concerns me. I do think the future will be, at least briefly, alt-right....especially if Donald Trump is kept out of the White House using weird electoral tricks like the recent alliance between Ted Cruz and John Kasich. The next demagogue, either right or left, will be a far different beast than either Trump or Sanders. To quote a great piece from the American Thinker, Aristotle warned about the dangers of democracy and how, inevitably, they fell into despotism at the hands of a demagogue. ""Democracies, says Aristotle, tend to be pulled in one direction: toward a vilification of everything involving merit, hierarchy, inequality, proportion, and worth. For Aristotle, this type of democratic "energy" actually begins at birth: "People are prone to think that the fact of their all being equally free-born means that they are all absolutely equal."" Quoting Aristotle directly is this warning about private property: "In democracies the rich should be spared. Not only should their estates be safe from the threat of redistribution: the produce of the estates should be equally secure; and the practice of sharing it out, which has insensibly developed under some constitutions, should not be allowed." Both Trump and Sanders have targeted property through higher taxation based on class. 

But the appeal of populism always tends in this direction. The populist must appeal to the rational self interest of each voter to get their support. Thus we see, in every election, every presidential candidate promising to cut taxes for the middle class. Obama did it, Clinton did it, Trump and Sanders promise the same thing, as does Hilary Clinton. Many armchair pundits, mostly on Youtube, have posited the idea that we are undergoing a political realignment in the west between authority and libertarianism, instead of between Left and Right. Their observation typically revolves around the resistance movement rising against feminism and the religion of social justice. Yet this is simplistic in that it doesn't account for the ability of the populist to lay claims on both sides. Thus we see the weird reports of Sanders supporters being willing to vote for Trump when Sanders inevitably concedes to Clinton. I'm not sure I believe that myself but then again many of the same people I know who previously backed Ron Paul now back Sanders.

I believe the West to move in the direction of the alt-right for two principle reasons: first, the utter and total failure of the governments of Europe and the United States to respond to increasing calls by their citizens to deal with immigration and refugee crises. Many of these governments brag about their official feminist positions and could all be painted as social justice warriors if one were not feeling charitable. The failure to respond combined with economic stagnation shows the failure of left wing economics opens the policy window for the rise of right wing organizations.

The second reason I think the future may belong to the alt-right is the continued decentralization of media, including social media, as well as the rise of right wing blogs, vlogs, and their associated social movements. The means of communication is now decentralized to the point that few can control it, though Twitter has tried by implementing their Orwellian-named 'Trust and Safety Council' comprised exclusively of left wing groups including radical feminist organizations, which has already been charged with censoring conservative voices.

If the future belongs to the alt-right then the western Left has itself to blame. My evidence for this will be the subject of my next piece. The subject will be why freedom of speech isn't simply a government prohibition but also a cultural value that democracy itself rests on. I attend Portland State University, which was the site of two recent Students for Trump rallies that members of the Regressive Left shut down in a defiant act of authoritarian censorship, all the while claiming that no one's free speech rights were being infringed. I'll explain why that view is not only wrong but dangerous for the health of a free society.

Emergency Culture and the Left

When your alma mater makes international news for violent
illiberal values you know you're in trouble.

Perhaps you've noticed that we live in a state of perpetual crisis. In the US it's a fixed part of our experience: after 9/11 we were in a constant state of vigilance against Islamic terrorism. In the Cold War it was a constant culture of emergency because of the threat of communism. Today our cultural emergencies are numerous, to which the left has added to crisis of 'rape culture' on college campuses as well as the shocking idea that some students at these same colleges in fact support Donald Trump (oh the horror). In comparison to the Cold War these 'emergencies' are trifling at best, or at worst non-existent.

My best example of this are the now two student radical protests against the Portland State University Students for Trump. I'm a grad student at PSU and I know from experience that the student radicals at my university don't care that they do not represent students. They believe themselves to be the revolutionary vanguard in the purest Marxist sense. The student newspaper ran the headline in all-caps "SUPPORT FOR TRUMP POLARIZES CAMPUS CLIMATE," which is nonsense because the vast majority of students just don't care about the political opinions of other students. The students who crashed the Students for Trump rally declared it an emergency to motivate their members and those students who sympathize with them (ie, the easily triggered) that there is a problem with white supremacists being on campus. The underlying assumptions are revealing too: that Trump supporters are white supremacists, the idea that it's okay to silence those students you disagree with because they say things that offend some identity-based group, and that freedom of speech only applies to the government.

In a state of emergency the government will curtail liberty. In the context of an earthquake, riot, invasion, plague or any horrible event you can think of it makes total sense for the government to temporarily use methods that in a democracy would otherwise never be accepted. But when talking about individual action and social justice warriors in particular this is a much more murky issue. I've been told many, many times in relation to the PSU Students for Trump fiasco that freedom of speech only applies to the government and that when you support hate speech you should expect consequences. Freedom of speech is a cultural value essential to a functional democracy that the population must respect, for without that the government will not respect freedom of speech. A democracy cannot function when the response to 'offensive' speech is censorship by the population, especially in the form of mob justice.

The emergency culture permits egregious violations of civil liberties. The best example is the warrantless wiretapping that began in the Bush administration and continued (and was expanded) under the Obama administration. Social justice warriors have either directly taken advantage of this climate or stumbled into this phenomenon through creating a climate of fear and perceived emergency by using classrooms and social media to suggest that there are institutionalized racist, sexist, and transphobic systems of oppression that cannot be proven yet are widely accepted in SJW circles as an article of faith. These founding religious myths of the social justice movement are believed with the fervor and certitude that Christians recite and believe the Apostles Creed, or perhaps a little closer to the truth, with the same obdurate fortitude that Islamists believe the most violent parts of the Qu'ran.

These myths, when combined with the air of emergency, combine to create a toxic environment that is hostile to liberty. Authoritarian movements ALWAYS have foundational myths. For the communists in Russia it was the proletarian struggle and the dialectic of history. The Nazis had bizarre racial theories about the 'Aryan' race. Social justice warriors have institutionalized systems of oppression that target women, people of color, and those who live the LGBTQ lifestyle. This toxic soup is a real threat to the culture of democracy in the US, for without a vibrant love of democracy and liberal values a liberal republican democracy cannot survive. It isn't enough for the state to respect our critical liberties, as we've seen the Congress, the Courts, and the President disrespect liberties. The people, regardless of political loyalties, must respect first the values that make a culture of democracy possible.

SJWs and the Culture of Comfort

The rise of the #RegressiveLeft in recent years in the West has left many regular people confused about how this happened in the first place. I'm about to make a couple of ugly comparisons to prove a point, so consider this your 'trigger warning' if you're easily offended. We've been trained to think that authoritarian movements gain purchase during times of economic upheaval and unrest. Case in point, see the rise of the Bolsheviks in the Soviet Union, which was caused by a confluence of economic problems including agrarian and labor issues, as well as issues related to the educated class, among others that were not solved in the 1905 revolution; Russian activity in WWI would be the catalyst that allowed the authoritarian movement to win final victory and found the USSR.

The second example is the uglier one, the rise of the Nazism in Germany. As is well document, the rise of Nazism can directly be linked to the economic conditions imposed on Germany after losing WWI. Unemployment was rampant, the currency was worthless, and the government inept to fix conditions imposed by unfair treaty conditions that left the country helpless to fix its condition. The political environment was fertile for the rise of a demagogue.

In comparison, the rise of the Regressive Left is mystifying. The concept of a Social Justice Warrior hadn't taken hold prior to the Great Recession, though conservatives were warning the rest of us about the worst tendencies in the left for decades running. Even so, the Great Recession was not even remotely on the same scale of economic instability as the other mentioned periods were. Instead, Regressives have risen amidst a condition of plenty and material comfort. The rise of the Regressive Left bears all the hallmarks of a bourgeoisie movement, coming from the sheltered ranks of the colleges and middle classes in the US and UK.

I use the 'b' word on purpose. George Orwell described the middle classes as the shock absorbers for the bourgeoisie, as the middle class would take the brunt of the negative consequences of economics and political disorder while the upper crust would fare fine. In Orwell's time it was the elites who lead the leftist movement. Today, as in the leadership of 'Black Lives Matter' and the rise of the Regressive Left on college campuses, again we see the children of the elite fighting against perceived privilege. One wonders if they've ever looked into a mirror.

When I was growing up in the 90s I distinctly recall spanking being a hot button social issue. Parents were admonished to put their kids in 'time out' (a sort of precursor to the safe space today) to punish them instead of giving a few well-measured swats on the butt. This was the first coddling that people my age and younger received from society and it's only gotten worse since. Poor kids weren't coddled, at least at home, but the children of the middle class certainly were.

The Social Justice Warrior culture is the direct result of this coddling. When you attend college you take your first steps into something like the real world. You encounter ideas that are different than the ones you were raised with, you gain a modicum of responsibility and you come face to face with the specter of crushing debt. Add in the propaganda administered in many classrooms by cultural Marxist professors and the result is a toxic environment that brainwashes people at a very impressionable age. The comfort has been altered – not even removed, just altered – and the result is a troubling environment that is always hostile to the mind that had previously been coddled. President Obama famously and rightly said that we shouldn't coddle college students. The problem is that we are talking about people who have been coddled their entire lives. The merest reduction in coddling has left these people unhinged, especially when radical political ideas that prey on the biases their parents raised them with have been hammered into their heads.

This is the result of comfort and a society that hasn't challenged people in a meaningful way in the lifetimes of the youngest people identifying as SJWs. There hasn't been a real conflict in the US since the Vietnam era. The Cold War and its accompanying threat of annihilation is as real to them as the Civil War – that is, things they read about in school and nothing more than that. Even 9/11 is historical, as it and the war in Iraq happened when they were children. Many SJWs barely remember George W Bush and the culture of terror fear that gripped the US from 2002-2006.

The lack of existential conflict has lead to really watered down social movements that are themselves vehicles for authoritarianism. To be sure, the Regressive Left promotes authoritarianism through raging activism that shows that the SJW-on-the-street thinks they are the member of the Revolutionary Vanguard, when really they are merely the shock absorbers for people like the privileged leaders of BLM. The irony would be funny if the results weren't terrifying. My only consolation is that the Regressive Left is failing. The growing movement against the authoritarian movement they represent illustrates that.

Threatening to End Friendships Over Political Opinions

Back in the 2004 election cycle I remember the proto-SJW media machine Air America Radio reporting that somewhere in the South a guy had the misfortune of driving with a Kerry/Edwards bumper sticker on his car. The locals took umbrage with his poor choice in candidates and shot at him. The left-wing online media went nuts but little came from it.

The 2004 election was the grossest one I remember. Bush was called Hitler by the Left, Kerry effeminate by the Right, and the election was The Most Important Election of Our Lifetime. The 2008 election was also The Most Important Election of Our Lifetime, as was 2012, though the fascist terminology wasn't thrown around much. Now, in the Current Year, Trump is called Hitler by the Left, the Right calls Sanders a Communist, and Clinton is a criminal. Little changes, it seems. For the record I don't have a candidate in the election and haven't any idea how I'll vote in the fall. I'm an independent and a moderate, which makes this election really depressing for voters like me.

Regardless, a good friend of mine whose friendship I value today told me that she, for the sake of keeping our friendship, wouldn't talk about the Democratic Primaries with me. My crime? Repeating statistics and reporting that Sanders has no chance of winning the election. I'd link a piece to Nate Silver's work but go find it for yourself if you want to know the truth. Again, I have no dog in this race though I do reject the 'Trump is Hitler' or 'Trump is a racist' or 'Trump is the most evil thing EVAR' propaganda because I've looked into his positions and find them fairly moderate, save for his boneheaded rhetoric.

I distinctly recall a conversation I had in my undergraduate program with a conservative classmate of mine. The topic was religion in politics and how the Left were largely atheistic. His retort? Politics is the religion of the Left. At the time I disagreed but now understand him to be correct. To be sure, no SJW has an alter in their home with political symbols on it where they make sacrifices to Sanders or whatever. But the political is held in the same esteem as religion is by most people. Political opinions are taken as a matter of faith, a practice which is irrational to say the least. Obama isn't God, nor was Reagan and neither should be treated as such. Political opinions should always be subject to scrutiny. When held as an article of faith, political opinions become sacrosanct and cannot be challenged.

Analyzing political contests is a favorite past time of mine. I'm a political scientist and a PHD-ABD in an interdisciplinary field that includes political science. I've studied American political and governmental systems, including the electoral process. I'm confident that Sanders has no path to victory. I understand basic statistics and numbers. But this isn't about facts. This is about emotion. The friend of mine in question is an SJW and self-declared feminist. As has been reported endlessly in the anti-feminist, pro-egalitarian, pro-traditional liberal resistance movement, the mindset of the Social Justice Warrior is hostile to facts and relies heavily on emotion to make sense of the world. Facts contrary to the narrative elicit a hostile reaction. See the reaction to Ben Shapiro and Milo Yiannopoluos talks at colleges across the US for evidence.

Now, to be fair, my friend isn't likely to go to a protest to silence people she disagrees with. What worries me is that I have to censor myself in my belief that Bernie Sanders is just as dangerous as people say Trump is. I'd go into details about my opinions of Sanders but I'll save them for later in case he pulls off some kind of Hail Mary kind of miracle come back against Clinton. I detest self censorship, especially when an otherwise reasonable opinion (dislike of a political candidate) can't be expressed for fear of eliciting an irrational emotional response. This is what you have to do with Social Justice Warriors on every issue it seems.

Thankfully, the Democratic primaries will be finished soon enough. Sanders may take his campaign to the convention but it'll be symbolic. Hopefully at that point I'll be able to express opinions based in both observation and data without fear of reprisal. I've come to hate the presidential election season, and this is one good reason.