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Leftists Scratch Their Heads As More Abandon Their Ranks
Issues & Insights ^ | 27 Dec, 2023 | I&I Editorial Board

Posted on 12/27/2023 7:12:29 AM PST by MtnClimber

The only thing more uplifting than watching several prominent liberals drift rightward is the cluelessness of those on the left as to why it’s happening.

This drift is obvious enough, since it includes journalists once heralded by the left such as Matt Taibbi (who won a Young America’s Foundation award) and Glenn Greenwald, and Democratic politicians, including Tulsi Gabbard, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (whose speech at a Daily Caller award ceremony drew many loud cheers from the conservative audience), and Sen. John Fetterman (who recently declared that “I am not a progressive”).

Celebrities such as Russell Brand, David Chappelle, and Bill Maher (who “has been riding an asphalt roller over the far left,” according to Townhall) are part of the shift, as are a handful of prominent business leaders, Elon Musk for instance.

That’s to say nothing of the fact that surveys show once tried-and-true liberal constituencies – Hispanics, Asians, blacks, working class, and the young – are abandoning the Democratic party.

It’s not as though these people are suddenly small-government conservatives. They just are waking up to the fact that the left is a cesspool of hatred and intolerance and are looking for the exits.

All of which has caused a lot of confusion on the left. Case in point is a commentary by the New York Times’ Michelle Goldberg, who manages to come up with some theories to explain the realignment.

One is that “celebrity defectors … lurched right after a cancellation or public humiliation.” (In other words, for petty reasons.)

Another is that “the culture of the left is simply less welcoming,” and “people go where people accept them, or are nice to them, and away from people who are mean to them.” (An incredibly odd admission given that the left is supposedly all about “diversity” and “inclusion.”)

But then Goldberg settles on the notion that “Liberals and leftists have lots of excellent policy ideas, but rarely articulate a plausible vision of the future.”

Translation: Even though the left controls every major institution in the country, most notably the news media, it just needs better public relations.

Goldberg’s column was inspired by a 5,700-word behemoth by Kathryn Joyce and Jeff Sharlet in the far-left In These Times about the same topic.

These two start by saying that “It’s easy to dismiss many of these high-profile defectors as crackpots or spotlight-seekers, as never truly serious in their political principles or as plain grifters.”

But, after much mental exertion they decide that “Maybe there’s a kind of gravity to the slide, the black hole of fascism sucking toward it all the loose particles of those whose commitments were never complex or whose convictions were snapped by despair.

“That’s what makes fascism so scary when it genuinely flares. It consumes. It grows.”

When in doubt, the left always invokes fascism, ignorant of the fact that national socialism is a leftist dream, not a conservative one.

In any case, the reason the left is puzzled is because it’s so completely blind to the poisonous fruit of its own ideology, something that is finally dawning on common-sense Americans.

For some, it was the totalitarianism of the COVID apparatchiks, who, among countless other wrongs, forced a solidly liberal top executive, Jennifer Sey, out of Levi Strauss because she dared to say that schools shouldn’t remain closed. Sey later noted Levi’s is “trapped trying to please the mob — and silencing any dissent within the organization. In this, it is like so many other American companies: held hostage by intolerant ideologues who do not believe in genuine inclusion or diversity.”

For others, it was the coordinated silencing of dissent by big government and Big Tech (which, by the way, is the very definition of fascism), and the fact that so many on the left, including “democracy dies in darkness” journalists, were cheering it on.

For many in liberal cities such as San Francisco or New York or Chicago, it’s skyrocketing crime, abandoned storefronts, sidewalks full of homeless tents and human waste, and legions of illegal immigrants housed in bus stations, hotels, and abandoned schools. All of it the result of leftist policies.

For still others, it is the many forms of brutal intolerance the left shows toward anyone who doesn’t fall in line with whatever that day’s dogma happens to be, whether it’s school shutdowns, “transgender rights,” the climate “crisis,” or critical race theory. The left is constantly burning former friends at the stake for being heretics.

For many parents, it’s having the government call them domestic terrorists because they complained about lockdowns and gay pornography in their school libraries.

Now, it’s the left’s virulent antisemitism that was always there but only became glaringly apparent in the wake of Hamas’ genocidal attack on Israel.

The intolerance, bitterness and hate, the unquenchable desire for control, disdain for free speech, and fanaticism have always been features – not bugs – of the left, something we’ve been saying here for years.

The only reason leftists have been able to pretend otherwise is that they had better PR. But that, too, is failing them.

We can only hope those on the left continue to scratch their collective heads about why people are leaving their ranks, until one day they end up in the dustbin of history. Where they belong.


TOPICS: Society
KEYWORDS: democrats; marxism
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1 posted on 12/27/2023 7:12:29 AM PST by MtnClimber
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To: MtnClimber

I see some cracks, but I don’t see a flood yet. This is amazing considering the damage the left is doing.


2 posted on 12/27/2023 7:13:29 AM PST by MtnClimber (For photos of Colorado scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber

It’s the enemy infiltrating our ranks. Don’t be fooled. ;)


3 posted on 12/27/2023 7:17:04 AM PST by Diana in Wisconsin (I don't have, 'Hobbies.' I'm developing a robust Post-Apocalyptic skill set. )
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To: MtnClimber

Leftism is a cult.


4 posted on 12/27/2023 7:17:18 AM PST by ChuckHam
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

Exactly. I’m not convinced of this big right ward shift.


5 posted on 12/27/2023 7:18:00 AM PST by Mermaid Girl
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To: MtnClimber

Nope. This isn’t happening. I hate to be a pessimist but the leftists do not recognize how twisted and vile they have become. I’ve seen these types of articles before and they never amount to anything.


6 posted on 12/27/2023 7:19:30 AM PST by Gary from Dayton (Army Vet 1986-1991)
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To: MtnClimber
.... They will be replaced..................
7 posted on 12/27/2023 7:20:39 AM PST by Red Badger (Homeless veterans camp in the streets while l aliens are put up in hotels.....................)
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To: Red Badger

They don’t need to be replaced. The machines can change their votes.


8 posted on 12/27/2023 7:22:51 AM PST by MtnClimber (For photos of Colorado scenery and wildlife, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber

I know some who have figured out that the RATs only enrich their rich buddies.

So does the GOPe, but at least our side became aware of that quite awhile ago and of course, the GOPe really doesn’t pretend to be anything but self serving.


9 posted on 12/27/2023 7:23:41 AM PST by dforest
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To: MtnClimber

Leftist Luddites are starting to complain that their compatriots abandoning their causes don’t understand that they are “winning”.

It’s difficult for Leftists when the NIMBY effect of crime, arson, riots, bidenomics, ecodisasters, and illegal invasion brings actual violence and destruction and chaos to their Front door.


10 posted on 12/27/2023 7:26:17 AM PST by drSteve78 (Je suis Deplorable. Even more so)
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To: MtnClimber

A vote for a Democrat anywhere at anytime, is a vote to destroy the American nation. Slowly more people are coming to realize this every day.


11 posted on 12/27/2023 7:27:52 AM PST by allendale
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To: MtnClimber

“Liberals and leftists have lots of excellent policy ideas,...”

I’ve been in political activism for over 50 years and haven’t come across a good idea from the left going back to the Vietnam War era. (note my tagline of 20 years also)


12 posted on 12/27/2023 7:32:43 AM PST by quantim (Victory is not relative, it is absolute. )
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To: drSteve78; All

I still fondly remember a Conservative
News Service article after the 04
election with a title of “Kerry Party
Turns to Tears, Bitterness”.
“A woman began to openly weep at the prospect
of a Kerry loss”
“Can you tell me what went wrong??”
“Can someone shut up those idiots?”
(when some Campus Republicans showed up).
The fledgling Air America network had
Al Franken do shows from Boston
in anticipation of a big blowout.
Afterwards, they sounded half asleep
and mournful.

Could you imagine..
President Michael S Dukakis
President Albert Gore
President John Kerry (...reporting
for duty!)
President Hillary Rodham Clinton


13 posted on 12/27/2023 7:36:08 AM PST by raccoonradio
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To: raccoonradio

Brings back memories of the Air America Radio Network.

As I recall , that network was established specifically to espouse liberal opinions, to counterbalance talk radio being mostly conservative.

And Air America eventually went out of business.

The Operators of Air America found that there just isn’t a big market for Liberal talk radio.

They also learn some lessons about capitalism in that business venture that failed.


14 posted on 12/27/2023 7:50:40 AM PST by Dilbert San Diego
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To: MtnClimber
Brandon Straka is a liberal who finally could not take the intolerance of the Left anymore and created the #walkaway movement. He was outside Congress but did not go inside on J6. That was enough to get him arrested anyways. That in turn gave Facebook the excuse to shut down his web page which had over half a million followers.

The more that Americans witness such obvious tyranny the more they too are walking away.

15 posted on 12/27/2023 7:54:31 AM PST by Nateman (If the Pedo Profit Mad Moe (pig pee upon him!) was not the Antichrist then he comes in second.)
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To: MtnClimber

Note that most of these “defectors” are single issue sorts. Glenn Greenwald, for instance, is now posting strongly anti-Israel stuff (also, he’s gay).


16 posted on 12/27/2023 7:56:47 AM PST by Demiurge2 (Define your terms!)
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To: MtnClimber
They are not "drifting rightward" they are the same as they have always been. Little leftist dreamers who occasionally have some interaction with reality.

The problem is the left has gone guano crazy.

So people who think that maybe there is such a thing as having a sex or that if you attack someone they are allowed to shoot your murdering butt are finding themselves being abandon by their fellow lunatics.

Some on the right want to pick them up and cuddle them.

I do not advise it, leftist are all rabid but do as you like.

17 posted on 12/27/2023 8:00:41 AM PST by Harmless Teddy Bear ( In a quaint alleyway, they graciously signaled for a vehicle on the main road to lead the way. )
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To: MtnClimber

tagline...


18 posted on 12/27/2023 8:08:28 AM PST by SaxxonWoods (Are you ready for Black Lives MAGA? It's coming.)
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To: MtnClimber

I’ve lived in liberal/progressive New England for almost all my life. It’s never been “cool” to be a conservative here. I was a lib when I was a kid.

And yes, every major institution is not only far left, but they are also nearly 100% far left. The University of Vermont still has a couple of conservatives in their faculty. Soon, even they will be gone. Even elementary schools here invite the gay and transgender collective to school auditoriums to brainwash the kids into gender ideology.

But there are some signs that young people do not want to live in an outright socialist, one-party state. Someday soon it’s going to dawn on many of them that they themselves are allied with real oppression. Then, being an adjunct of the oppressive state will no longer be cool.


19 posted on 12/27/2023 8:10:08 AM PST by Combat_Liberalism
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To: MtnClimber

David Chappelle hit the nail on the head. The “T’s” don’t get along with the “L’s and G’s”. It isn’t a singular “community” they’d like you to believe it is.

This “community” rules the left - but it is without a rudder at this point. There will be no more gay men, young boys will be told they’re ‘trans’. Gay men don’t want ‘trans men’...that ‘thing’ (fake penis) isn’t real. Same with lesbians. The whole thing is just evil with the most-evil ones having the largest influence (e.g. going after kids).

It also has no end and will devolve into the most absurd debauchery being lauded as ‘normal’, requiring the kids to learn all about it. So it ultimately burns itself out.


20 posted on 12/27/2023 8:11:51 AM PST by fuzzylogic (welfare state = sharing of poor moral choices among everybody)
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