53percenter's Blog

This past weekend, Alexandria Ocasio Cortez endorsed Sen. Bernie Sanders before a rally in Queens.  One couldn’t help thinking: How racist and sexist of her to endorse an old white guy to be the Democratic nominee.  As per the left’s woke philosophy, AOC should have endorsed, in sisterly solidarity, the female frontrunner Elizabeth Warren, or gone with the African-American female, Kamala Harris, or the African-American male, Corey Booker.

Outside the realm of woke philosophy, the above is all ridiculous, of course.  One likes and votes for a candidate based on a number of factors which don’t usually have to do with gender and race, and Sandy O obviously endorsed Sanders because she considers him a true democratic socialist.

But the left doesn’t understand that, or pretends not to, when it comes to voters and voting.  In 2016, you were somehow a traitor to your gender if you were a female Democrat and couldn’t stand Hillary Clinton, or favored Bernie Sanders over Hillary.  Remember Madeleine Albright scolding female voters in 2016 that “there’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other.”

For many of us female Democrats (I was one in 2016, but no longer), you couldn’t have paid us to vote for Hillary because we (correctly) viewed her as dishonest and corrupt.  And it was galling to hear mainstream media elites trying to shame us into voting for their favored establishment candidate.

The reality is that voting is a complex calculus, and voters come at it from a hundred different angles.  Take Joe Biden’s frontrunner status in the Democratic race for several months, for instance.   There are a dozen reasons why Biden shouldn’t be the Democratic frontrunner to today’s hyper-woke left:  he is a white male, a much older one to boot, and one seemingly stuck in the past.  Plus, he has undeniably lost a step and often has memory-and-cognition lapses that are only politely called “gaffes.”  Yet, many Democratic primary voters, especially African-American voters, are sticking with him, no matter what.

Again, the reasons for that are all over the place:  Biden is a known entity to many older voters; he is perceived to be electable; most importantly, he is the moderate, centrist candidate against candidates that’ve veered into far-left, crazy territory on many issues.

To paraphrase another noted political figure, until fairly recently it seemed Joe Biden could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot someone and still be the frontrunner in the Democratic race.  That has changed as the race progressed, of course.

The idea that voting choices often have complex underpinnings especially needs to be said in the context of Donald Trump’s 2016 election victory.  The left and the mainstream media painted the victory in only one possible way: as a bevy of deplorables — racists, sexists, bigots, nativists, white nationalists — voting for the supposedly racist Trump who pushed supposedly racist policies.  

Never mind that Trump won 29 percent of the Latino vote, and roughly 29 percent of Asian-American votes.  Were these voters racist and white nationalist too for voting for Trump?  

And let’s not forget the left’s continued tarring of evangelical voters for voting for Trump.  As per their flawed logic, voters can only vote for a candidate who perfectly aligns with their values and lifestyle.

By all accounts, the left and the media are doing it again in advance of the 2020 race: attacking and painting Trump supporters or anyone thinking of voting for him as “racist.”

But the thing about attacking too much and too often is that the attacks lose their power and become white noise. 

Meanwhile, the left, and especially media elites need to understand some truths about voting choices and methods:  When it comes to voting, the heart wants what it wants.  Voters are a savvy bunch — they may not have gone to Ivy League colleges, but in the game of life they’ve been around the block a few times and can size up a presidential candidate pretty efficiently, no matter how much the nattering nabobs in the media try to push this or that establishment candidate.

And especially in 2019, voters have become savvier still.  They may not even go for a conventional, charismatic candidate if he/she is seen to be favored by wealthy donors and media elites.

The reality is that presidential candidates have to work harder than ever to earn voters’ liking and trust.  The days of the media building up and pushing a candidate on voters is over. Race, gender, and other superficial check-your-box preferences have never worked and never will.

Saritha Prabhu is a freelance writer

This past weekend, Alexandria Ocasio Cortez endorsed Sen. Bernie Sanders before a rally in Queens.  One couldn’t help thinking: How racist and sexist of her to endorse an old white guy to be the Democratic nominee.  As per the left’s woke philosophy, AOC should have endorsed, in sisterly solidarity, the female frontrunner Elizabeth Warren, or gone with the African-American female, Kamala Harris, or the African-American male, Corey Booker.

Outside the realm of woke philosophy, the above is all ridiculous, of course.  One likes and votes for a candidate based on a number of factors which don’t usually have to do with gender and race, and Sandy O obviously endorsed Sanders because she considers him a true democratic socialist.

But the left doesn’t understand that, or pretends not to, when it comes to voters and voting.  In 2016, you were somehow a traitor to your gender if you were a female Democrat and couldn’t stand Hillary Clinton, or favored Bernie Sanders over Hillary.  Remember Madeleine Albright scolding female voters in 2016 that “there’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other.”

For many of us female Democrats (I was one in 2016, but no longer), you couldn’t have paid us to vote for Hillary because we (correctly) viewed her as dishonest and corrupt.  And it was galling to hear mainstream media elites trying to shame us into voting for their favored establishment candidate.

The reality is that voting is a complex calculus, and voters come at it from a hundred different angles.  Take Joe Biden’s frontrunner status in the Democratic race for several months, for instance.   There are a dozen reasons why Biden shouldn’t be the Democratic frontrunner to today’s hyper-woke left:  he is a white male, a much older one to boot, and one seemingly stuck in the past.  Plus, he has undeniably lost a step and often has memory-and-cognition lapses that are only politely called “gaffes.”  Yet, many Democratic primary voters, especially African-American voters, are sticking with him, no matter what.

Again, the reasons for that are all over the place:  Biden is a known entity to many older voters; he is perceived to be electable; most importantly, he is the moderate, centrist candidate against candidates that’ve veered into far-left, crazy territory on many issues.

To paraphrase another noted political figure, until fairly recently it seemed Joe Biden could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot someone and still be the frontrunner in the Democratic race.  That has changed as the race progressed, of course.

The idea that voting choices often have complex underpinnings especially needs to be said in the context of Donald Trump’s 2016 election victory.  The left and the mainstream media painted the victory in only one possible way: as a bevy of deplorables — racists, sexists, bigots, nativists, white nationalists — voting for the supposedly racist Trump who pushed supposedly racist policies.  

Never mind that Trump won 29 percent of the Latino vote, and roughly 29 percent of Asian-American votes.  Were these voters racist and white nationalist too for voting for Trump?  

And let’s not forget the left’s continued tarring of evangelical voters for voting for Trump.  As per their flawed logic, voters can only vote for a candidate who perfectly aligns with their values and lifestyle.

By all accounts, the left and the media are doing it again in advance of the 2020 race: attacking and painting Trump supporters or anyone thinking of voting for him as “racist.”

But the thing about attacking too much and too often is that the attacks lose their power and become white noise. 

Meanwhile, the left, and especially media elites need to understand some truths about voting choices and methods:  When it comes to voting, the heart wants what it wants.  Voters are a savvy bunch — they may not have gone to Ivy League colleges, but in the game of life they’ve been around the block a few times and can size up a presidential candidate pretty efficiently, no matter how much the nattering nabobs in the media try to push this or that establishment candidate.

And especially in 2019, voters have become savvier still.  They may not even go for a conventional, charismatic candidate if he/she is seen to be favored by wealthy donors and media elites.

The reality is that presidential candidates have to work harder than ever to earn voters’ liking and trust.  The days of the media building up and pushing a candidate on voters is over. Race, gender, and other superficial check-your-box preferences have never worked and never will.

Saritha Prabhu is a freelance writer

“We become what we hate” is an old yoga maxim. I would extend this expression to include fear, because it isn’t just hatred that drives certain actions, fear does as well. Fear and hate are two points on a continuum. It seems we hate what we fear, implying we must feel fear first. If one accepts that premise, we progress toward a paradox of opposites where we first become what we fear and then we become what we hate, a phenomenology in which it is part and parcel of the very nature of passionate conflict to turn one into his own enemy.

Supposed anti-fascist forces utilize fascist tactics in their fights. People decry others as Nazis while emulating Nazi methods. Corrupt politicians fight corruption with corrupt practices. People think the path to non-discrimination is through targeted discrimination and the most effective way to secure individual freedom is to initiate total control over the lives of every citizen.

One could deduce that this inversion of identities is facilitated by a loss of sense of propriety in the pursuit of a goal. That would seem to argue that the adoption of an “ends justifies the means” ideology that allows a person or group to believe that bad actions, even evil ones, are acceptable if the goal is achieved.

Propriety is that set of unwritten rules by which mutually understood limits are observed, limits which are necessary to the preservation of a society, the protection of a culture, a respect for, and awareness of, precedent and the maintenance of the institution of civil government.

In short, propriety is the process by which we each ask ourselves this question: “If just because we are not forbidden from doing a thing, should we do it?”

As Albert Camus noted, “’Everything is permitted’ does not mean that nothing is forbidden.”

When one observes the actions of the political right, one can see at least a modicum of respect for boundaries, a minimum attention to propriety. There is a respect for the constitutional “guardrails” Democrats profess exist (but only for their opposition) and a willingness to stay within those boundaries has been a “win” in a philosophical sense but a loss from a practical and political sense.

When one observes the actions of the contemporary Democratic Party toward an unexpected president (at least unexpected in their minds), one can see the evidence of the fear and the hatred — and the process by which they have sought (and continue to seek) his removal. In many ways, they have exhibited – and are exhibiting — characteristics far worse than those of which they accuse President Trump.

Nowhere is this more evident that Democrats have dispensed with propriety (and adopted the scorched earth principles of the end justifying the means), than in the phony “impeachment” process.

The evidence is legion that Democrats have finally become that which they profess to hate.

“We become what we hate” is an old yoga maxim. I would extend this expression to include fear, because it isn’t just hatred that drives certain actions, fear does as well. Fear and hate are two points on a continuum. It seems we hate what we fear, implying we must feel fear first. If one accepts that premise, we progress toward a paradox of opposites where we first become what we fear and then we become what we hate, a phenomenology in which it is part and parcel of the very nature of passionate conflict to turn one into his own enemy.

Supposed anti-fascist forces utilize fascist tactics in their fights. People decry others as Nazis while emulating Nazi methods. Corrupt politicians fight corruption with corrupt practices. People think the path to non-discrimination is through targeted discrimination and the most effective way to secure individual freedom is to initiate total control over the lives of every citizen.

One could deduce that this inversion of identities is facilitated by a loss of sense of propriety in the pursuit of a goal. That would seem to argue that the adoption of an “ends justifies the means” ideology that allows a person or group to believe that bad actions, even evil ones, are acceptable if the goal is achieved.

Propriety is that set of unwritten rules by which mutually understood limits are observed, limits which are necessary to the preservation of a society, the protection of a culture, a respect for, and awareness of, precedent and the maintenance of the institution of civil government.

In short, propriety is the process by which we each ask ourselves this question: “If just because we are not forbidden from doing a thing, should we do it?”

As Albert Camus noted, “’Everything is permitted’ does not mean that nothing is forbidden.”

When one observes the actions of the political right, one can see at least a modicum of respect for boundaries, a minimum attention to propriety. There is a respect for the constitutional “guardrails” Democrats profess exist (but only for their opposition) and a willingness to stay within those boundaries has been a “win” in a philosophical sense but a loss from a practical and political sense.

When one observes the actions of the contemporary Democratic Party toward an unexpected president (at least unexpected in their minds), one can see the evidence of the fear and the hatred — and the process by which they have sought (and continue to seek) his removal. In many ways, they have exhibited – and are exhibiting — characteristics far worse than those of which they accuse President Trump.

Nowhere is this more evident that Democrats have dispensed with propriety (and adopted the scorched earth principles of the end justifying the means), than in the phony “impeachment” process.

The evidence is legion that Democrats have finally become that which they profess to hate.