Wednesday, April 10, 2019

The Sorry State of the Democratic Party


And, a sorry bunch they are. OK, you probably suspected that today’s Democrats are weak and pathetic. Their septuagenarian leaders cannot even stand up to bigots and idiots in their ranks. They pledge obeisance to AOC, to Rashida Tlaib and to Ilhan Omar.

Now, the pathetic band of Democratic presidential candidates has been falling all over themselves apologizing. Taking a page from Mao’s Cultural Revolution they are bowing their heads in shame and apologizing, for themselves, for their past politically incorrect thoughts, for their nation, for whatever.

Even if they did nothing wrong, they assume an abject posture. Unfortunately, in many cases it suits them.

Of course, if their apologies were sincere, and not mere lip service, they would need to withdraw their candidacies. Apologies unaccompanied by an altruistic act of removing oneself from office are empty rhetoric. And, as Kathleen Parker explained in the Washington Post, all of these apologies are making these Democrats look weak… and stupid.

In her words, addressed to Beto O’Rourke:

Note to Beto: This will never end. Once you start apologizing, especially for things over which you had no control, you are more likely to be perceived as weak — and not real smart.

And of course, the shame ridden  white Democrats are so totally on board with the effort to scapegoat white people for everything that everyone else has done wrong, and are so filled with shame for their race, that they ignore many of America’s singular achievements.

Parker writes:

Additionally, Biden is very upset about what he terms “white man’s culture,” referring to the environment in which women have been afraid to speak up in cases of sexual harassment. Well, okay, but if we’re going to blame White Man’s Culture for all of that, then we ought to add a footnote about the genius of the Founders, the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and, if we’re still allowed to use the term, Western civilization.

Parker seems mostly to believe that the apology tour strategy—where did they get that idea?—is going to lead to electoral defeat:

If Democrats want to woo renegade Republicans and independents — and evict Trump from the White House — they had best focus on uniting their constituents under a banner of shared values rather than encouraging good men to apologize for being born.

Besides, as most men know, saying you’re sorry is never enough.

Kyle Smith picks up the same points and declares that the Democrats have become the sorry party. Having lost to Donald Trump because they electorate had tired of Obama’s weakness, the Democrats are doubling down on weakness. And they are doubling down on stupid.

Smith has collected a few of their greatest hits:

The Democrats have been in a sorry state for much of the last 2¹/ years, but lately theyve become the sorry party. Elizabeth Warren, Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders and Beto ORourke are all trying to apologize their way to the White House.

Sanders has apologized for what an aide called “an entire wave of rotten sexual harassment” in his 2016 campaign.

Gillibrand apologized for doing her job when she was a congresswoman representing a moderate constituency, mainly because a reputation for being moderate is now the leprosy of the Democratic Party. (“I was only focused on the needs of my upstate district. But I really should’ve been focused on the needs of everyone,” she said.)

She also apologized for previously being “callous” about immigration, meaning that she used to be mindful of the political center before she started ranting about abolishing ICE.

They are not apologizing for their moral failings. They are apologizing for doing their jobs. Shades of the cultural revolution. Besides, it’s not just that apologizing makes you look weak. It makes you look like a loser. Winners do not apologize.

Some of these apologies (like Warren’s and Sanders’) were necessary and some weren’t. But, politically speaking, they’re self-defeating. If you’re apologizing, you’re losing, and America doesn’t like losers.

Of course, Donald Trump never apologizes. Democrats who despise Trump must have concluded that if Trump doesn’t apologize, the way to show their moral superiority is to apologize for everything, all the time. This makes their apologies insincere and fake:

President Trump has done a lot of things most would agree merits an apology, but then again you do project a certain aura of strength when you never back down from any dispute, no matter how trivial.

At some point in most campaigns, voters get a jarring reminder that the world is a dangerous place and that toughness and confidence are more reassuring in a difficult moment than cringing, blanching and begging. The Democrats sometimes act as though they’re ashamed of their country. They can’t afford to seem as though they’re also ashamed of themselves.

Democrats have consumed themselves with their own rage. They have turned into a party of whiners. We shall see how that one works out.

3 comments:

Sam L. said...

I am surprised and amazed that the WaPoo would allow Ms. Parker to write this column and would subsequently publish it.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

The (V) Victim Party

sestamibi said...

But it's been working out pretty well for them, nevertheless. They did win control of the House, picked up a handful of governorships, and flipped a couple of state legislative houses. The unpleasant reality is that they represent the majority opinion in America today. They intend that it be the only opinion permitted to be expressed, and are ready to destroy the lives of any dissenters utterly (cf. Michelle Goldberg vs Kristjen Neilsen in previous post).