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How the Dems can lose 2018
Jewish Journal ^ | July 12, 2017 | Ben Shapiro

Posted on 07/13/2017 8:14:08 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

Last week, the Democrats released a new bumper sticker for their 2018 Congressional campaign: “I mean, have you seen the other guys?”

It’s not a bad political notion so far as it goes — opposition in politics is an effective tool, as Democrats learned from Republicans, who campaigned against Obamacare and Democratic spending policies to the tune of 1,000 state legislature seats, 12 governorships (including in states such as Michigan and Massachusetts), 10 Senate seats and 63 House seats. Now Democrats hope to reverse the math.

But there’s something else going on here, too. Democrats hope that campaigning as #TheResistance will suffice to prevent voters from looking too hard at their own moral and political shortcomings. That’s because for all the talk by Democrats about Republican extremism, Republicans actually have moved closer to the center on policy, while Democrats have embraced an ugly combination of Bernie Sanders-style socialism and college campus-style intersectionality.

Leave aside the boorish antics of President Donald Trump and the incompetence of Congressional Republicans. Here is the fact: Trump is the most moderate Republican president since Richard Nixon. He has successfully passed almost no major policy in seven months. His foreign policy on North Korea and Syria is barely distinguishable from former President Barack Obama’s. His approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been praised by Palestinians and former Obama officials. He’s the most pro-LGBT Republican in presidential history; his stance on abortion has been vague; his White House chief strategist has openly embraced higher taxes on upper-income earners, as well as a massive infrastructure spending program; he has embraced the central premises of Obamacare. Trump may act in ridiculous ways that defy rationality — his Twitter feed is littered with stupidity and aggression, of course — but on policy, Trump is closer to Bill Clinton of 1997 than President Obama was.

Democrats, meanwhile, are moving hard to the left. When former Clinton adviser Mark Penn wrote an op-ed for The New York Times calling for Democrats to move back to the center, he was roundly excoriated by the leading thinkers in the Democratic Party. He was an emissary of the past; he had to embrace the new vision of the leftist future. That leftist future involved radical tax increases, fully nationalized health care, and — most of all — the divisive politics of intersectionality. Sens. Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) may own the policy side of the Democratic coalition, but the heart of the Democratic coalition lies in polarization by race, sex and sexual orientation. Forget a cohesive national message that appeals to Americans regardless of tribal identity: The new Democratic Party cares only about uniting disparate identity factions under the banner of opposing Republicanism.

The clearest evidence for that alliance of convenience came earlier this month, when Democratic darling and Women’s March organizer Linda Sarsour was caught on tape promoting “jihad” against Trump. Sarsour said that the sort of “jihad” she liked was “a word of truth in front of a tyrant or leader.” But she deliberately used the word “jihad” because of its ambiguity, not in spite of it: Sarsour has stated that pro-Israel women cannot be feminists; she supports the imposition of “Shariah law” in Muslim countries; she has stated of dissident and female genital mutilation victim Ayaan Hirsi Ali that she wishes she could take her “vagina away”; she has long associated with the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood; she opened her “jihad” speech by thanking Siraj Wajjah, an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing who has repeatedly advocated for a violent form of “jihad.”

Democrats rushed to her defense nonetheless, hoping to preserve the intersectional concerns that animate their base. Never mind that Sarsour is no ally to LGBT rights, or that she blames “Zionists” for her problems. She represents an important constituency for Democrats, and so she must be protected. More than that, she speaks anti-Trumpese fluently, and thus is an important figure for Democrats.

This isn’t rare on the left anymore. Much of the Democratic establishment supported Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), a longtime Nation of Islam acolyte who spent years defending that group’s most extreme anti-Semitic rhetoric — a man so radical that he openly associated with the Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, which recently labeled Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) an “Israel Firster.”

Even as the Democratic Party embraced Sarsour and defended her ambiguous use of the word “jihad” — after all, she was opposing Trump the Impaler — leftist spokespeople rushed to microphones to denounce President Trump’s speech in Poland, in which he called for a defense of “the West” and “our civilization.” Leftist columnist Peter Beinart labeled the speech racist. As Jonah Goldberg of National Review points out, we now have a Democratic Party that spends its time defending the use of the word “jihad” against the president but labeling the phrase “the West” a problem.

Bold strategy, Cotton. Let’s see how it works out.

And so Democrats must focus on President Trump. They must hope that he smacks himself in the face with a frying pan. They must bank on some sort of Trump-Russia collusion revelation. They must pray that the focus stays on Republicans rather than turning back to Democrats. After all, Sanders-Sarsour doesn’t sound like a winning combination.


TOPICS: Campaign News; Issues; Parties; State and Local
KEYWORDS: 2018; 2018issues; 2018midterms; benshapiro; democrats; republicans; trump

1 posted on 07/13/2017 8:14:08 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

....How the Dems can lose 2018...

Simply by putting candidates up for election.


2 posted on 07/13/2017 8:17:46 PM PDT by Sasparilla ( I'm Not Tired of Winning.)
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To: Sasparilla

The Rats are an arm of the Venezuelian Government.


3 posted on 07/13/2017 8:29:20 PM PDT by Paladin2 (No spelchk nor wrong word auto substition on mobile dev. Please be intelligent and deal with it....)
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To: Paladin2

Will we snatch defeat from the jaws of victory?


4 posted on 07/13/2017 8:42:44 PM PDT by DIRTYSECRET (urope. Why do they put up with this.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

What could Trump do legislatively with an RNC that’s collective head is so far up its ass that it thinks acting like Democrat-Lites is the proper course of action?

But Trump has been far from inactive. His activity as an administrator, with respect to EOs in particular, have not been as I would personally prefer: to be like an axe wielding maniac hewing down whole swaths of code; however, he has been far from inactive.

While recognizing the metaphor has limits it seems like he’s playing Jinga with the regulatory state, pulling out pegs at a somewhat steady pace but not so whole functions collapse (I’d like to see progressivism collapse, personally, everything from FDR forward). He’s doing more than making scalpel cuts and acting like he’s marched through Georgia as other presidents have done (or so it has seemed to me). If that can be kept up for even 4 years, 8 plus Pence and then some would be better, he will have done a lot even without having accomplished much with Congress.

Remember the so-called “Clinton Surplus” that only existed because the Contract With America changed us back to zero-BLB rather than the form of BLB that assumed across the board increases (that Democrats introduced just before Reagan too office)?

Not doing much can still accomplish much if “not much” is even merely slowed growth of government.


5 posted on 07/13/2017 8:43:34 PM PDT by Rurudyne (Standup Philosopher)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

In a real #RustyIrony, DemWits don’t understand President Trump and his supporters ARE #TheResistance! DemWits seem stuck on “when insulting the voters don’t work... insult them more”. A winning 2018 strategy for sure! #LOL


6 posted on 07/13/2017 8:44:09 PM PDT by FiddlePig (Who needs Truth & facts when you have narrative?)
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To: DIRTYSECRET

Republicans do have a penchant for that, don’t they?

Chief of which is the assumption that some in the media now seen to be trying to push: that Republicans won’t pay a price for acting like Democrats.

How foolish an assertion unless you were trying to convince Republicans it’s true! It is Democrats who’ll stand with anything the DNC does. Republicans hold grudges and easily get discouraged so they stay home.

But look for nitwits in the RNC to act like they CAN assume republican voters ... they’ve done it before and they can do’ed it again! The same result will happen too.


7 posted on 07/13/2017 8:48:33 PM PDT by Rurudyne (Standup Philosopher)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
How the Dems can lose 2018

The Senate. The 2018 Senate class is overloaded with Democrats. If the states go in the same direction they did in the 2016 presidential election, the Republicans should pick up 9 seats, leaving the Senate 61R - 39 D+I.

If the Republicans have a filibuster proof majority in January 2019, what will their next excuse for surrender be?

8 posted on 07/13/2017 8:51:00 PM PDT by KarlInOhio (a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity - Pres. Eisenhower)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

You mean the Democrats did NOT win both the House and Senate in 2016?

Coulda fooled me.


9 posted on 07/13/2017 8:53:38 PM PDT by BuddhaBrown (Path to enlightenment: Four right turns, then go straight until you see the Light!)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“His foreign policy on North Korea and Syria is barerly distinguishable from former President Barack Obama’s.”

Hey Shapiro: FU and the neverTrump horse you rode in on. You are a waste of talent.


10 posted on 07/13/2017 8:55:00 PM PDT by map
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Democrats 2018: More anti-Russian than Joseph McCarthy.


11 posted on 07/14/2017 12:39:07 AM PDT by OrangeHoof (Get used to it - President Donald J. Trump)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

MSM will say they win by losing.
In a Great position for Dem Presidential win bringing in House & Senate majority.


12 posted on 07/14/2017 2:21:18 AM PDT by SMGFan (Sarah Michelle Gellar is on twitter @SarahMGellar)
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To: KarlInOhio
If the Republicans have a filibuster proof majority in January 2019, what will their next excuse for surrender be?

I can't wait for senile McStain to have a senior moment and blurt out the truth:

"Look, the lobbyists have video of us having sex with kids--now just leave us alone."
13 posted on 07/14/2017 2:29:40 AM PDT by cgbg (Hidden behind the social justice warrior mask is corruption and sexual deviance.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Democrats, meanwhile, are moving hard to the left.

YES!! It's about time. I've been posting this for a while now - they need to go hard left, so hard left that Karl Marx would object that they're extremists. Once they do that, EVERYONE will vote for them. I know I sure will. It's the only way to ensure the survival of America and the rest of the world.

14 posted on 07/14/2017 3:54:17 AM PDT by Hardastarboard (Three most annoying words on the internet - "Watch the Video")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Frikken Shapiro at it again.


15 posted on 07/14/2017 4:58:15 AM PDT by kanawa (Trump Loves a Great Deal)
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Eugene Delgaudio Retweeted KatieB‏ @RavenNightMyst 18h18 hours ago

🇺🇸These Are #Democratic Senators In States @POTUS Won Coming Up For Re-Election In 2018-VOTE THEM OUT & Replace With #MAGA Patriots🇺🇸 🚂🇺🇸❤️

16 posted on 07/14/2017 8:02:23 AM PDT by HokieMom (Pacepa : Can the U.S. afford a president who can't recognize anti-Americanism?)
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To: HokieMom

I was just about to post this great graphic, of the vulnerable Dem Senators up for re-election, in 2018.

Thanks and BTTT!!


17 posted on 07/14/2017 8:04:51 AM PDT by Jane Long (Praise God, from whom ALL blessings flow.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Agenda for 2018:

1) Primary RINOs with conservatives

2)Tell your friends about Dems being anti-American.

3)VOTE!!!

18 posted on 07/14/2017 8:02:17 PM PDT by ConservaTeen (Islam is Not the Religion of Peace, but The religion of Pedophilia...)
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