I Can’t Stop This Feeling-A Democrat shares his thoughts on the RNC

Frontpagemagazine ^ | Aug 28, 2020 | Liel Leibovitz

[SJackson]

A Democrat shares his thoughts on the RNC -- and makes an intriguing prediction.

I watched the second night of the Republican National Convention the same way you fall in love or go bankrupt: gradually, but then suddenly stricken by a strange and somewhat inexplicable premonition. It was this: Donald John Trump is going to win in November, and win big.

Yeah, I know all about the polls. I understand the deep distaste many Americans, including some traditional Republican voters, feel for the president. I am well aware of the criticism of his conduct in handling COVID-19, or the riots following George Floyd’s death, or any number of issues. And yet, as Trump’s first surprise election ought to have taught us by now, when it comes to modern American politics, the only principle that truly matters is the Ooga Chaka principle: We vote for the candidate who gets us hooked on a feeling and high on believing.

Last week, the Democrats used their convention to deliver three key messages: Joe Biden is a very decent person; Joe Biden is not Donald Trump, who is not a very decent person; and, being both a very decent person and not-Donald-Trump, Joe Biden is passionate about amplifying the voices of women and minorities, which is one important way to prove both your decency and your not-Trumpiness.

Who, precisely, might get hooked by these messages, and on what feeling? That Biden is a decent person is indisputable anywhere outside the airless quarters of the most quarrelsome partisans. That he shares little with the man he hopes to defeat is obvious—by now, Trump’s fans and detractors alike have very few misconceptions about the man’s character. That leaves us with the DNC’s heavy schmear of identity politics, a sentiment that doubtless resonates with the party’s educated, affluent base but says very little to those weary Americans who wonder why their cities are burning and why on earth anyone would ever want to defund the police.

The RNC, on the other hand, had a much more hearty offering on hand. It had no actors, singers, comedians, billionaires, academics, or former presidents present to offer perfectly polished paeans to character. Instead, it had people of faith affirming the singular importance of safeguarding the freedom of religion; immigrants affirming the notion, not controversial until very recently, that an American citizenship was an exceptional honor, not a universal right; blue-collar workers affirming the all-American reliance on small businesses, not tech behemoths; law enforcement officials affirming the foundational truth that, in America, when we disagree, we talk things over, not burn things down; and African Americans affirming the belief, central to the thinking of Martin Luther King Jr. and entirely alien to the current crop of race hustlers, that it’s the content of one’s character, not the color of one’s skin, that ought to matter.

In other words, whereas one party had the same narrow dogma repeated verbatim with very little variation, the other had—dare we say it?—diversity: of gender and of race and of experience, but also, more importantly, of interests and ideas.

This is not to say that watching both conventions will get a sizable number of voters to stop worrying and learn to love Donald Trump. But it is to say that it’s becoming increasingly more clear that the Democrats’ real problem isn’t the party’s aging candidate or its rambunctious left flank but, rather, its relationship with reality itself.

A party seriously interested in recapturing the White House would’ve done well to launch its bid by drafting a road map that roughly corresponds to America’s territory. It would’ve benefited from going long on big ideas and short on big personalities. It would’ve sought to vigorously court the millions who rejected it last time around, choosing instead to bet on an imperfect upstart. The Democrats orated, emoted, and fixated on nothing but the orange-haired object of their obsession.

To make matters worse, if you were watching the convention on TV—as fewer and fewer Americans do these handheld, device-driven days—you were treated to the dizzying but not altogether unpleasant experience of seeing the talking heads on cable news ask you to believe them rather than your own lying eyes. To hear the pundits tell it, the RNC is one part Thunderdome, one part plantation owners’ meeting, a series of dark and stormy nights dedicated to hating anyone or anything that isn’t white, rich, and smug. Examples are plentiful and sordid, but here’s one: After suing CNN and settling for an undisclosed sum, Nicholas Sandmann, the Kentucky high school student who was portrayed as a baby Grand-Wizard-in-training by our malicious media, appeared last night to tell his story. He was polite, earnest, and engaging but that didn’t stop our moral and intellectual betters from once again telling a very different story. Sandmann, sneered one cable news stalwart, was a “snot nose entitled kid” who was best ignored. That stalwart? Joe Lockhart, of CNN. There’s no better way to describe the last four years of American journalism than the mantra coined decades ago by Seinfeld’s showrunners: No hugging, no learning. And, like Seinfeld, all MSNBC, CNN, and their likes can produce these days are shows about nothing.

For better or worse, Americans want something—anything—else. Many dislike Donald Trump, and so will not vote for him no matter what. But many more, when in the privacy of the voting booth, will do what voters so often do and vote for the party that looks—and feels—more like them, and that can get them high on believing in an America that looks like the one they know and love—an imperfect but good nation ever slouching toward a brighter tomorrow. These last two nights, the RNC has made a very convincing case why that party may very well be the party of Abraham Lincoln and Donald Trump.

[rlmorel]

"...That Biden is a decent person is indisputable anywhere outside the airless quarters of the most quarrelsome partisans..."

Oh, really? Joe Biden is a decent person? In what twisted, perverted, universe is that steaming, pile of pap, that "Joe Biden is a decent person" true?

Joe Biden's wife and daughter were killed in an accident in which she pulled into a roadway in the path of an oncoming farm truck loaded down with farm product, which tipped over and crashed trying to avoid her but she and her daughter died nonetheless.

Sometime around 2000, Biden made public comments about how the driver of the truck drank his lunch.

I don't know about this website, and other parts of it may or may not be accurate, but the part about the accident itself is. It is widely accepted the guy was NOT drinking, and the daughter says Biden called her in 2009 to apologize, but not after dozens of stories from large media outlets had run for years trumpeting Biden's slanderous lie.

Story here about Biden Accident

So Biden didn't issue a public apology.

Yeah, a real decent, stand-up guy, who slandered a dead man for a self-perceived political gain.

Scum.

[nwrep]

That does not sound like something written by a Democrat. It has many sympathetic phrases that reveal some preference for the right side of the political spectrum. Not sure how much we can conclude from such an article other than someone who is suspicious of the Democrats, and has right-leaning sympathies wishes for Trump to win.

[shelterguy]

“””I do not understand how so many career politicians can be such awful speakers. It is actually incredible. “””

Most of them are morons.

[rlmorel]

Coming back for that later!

[aquila48]

“The Democrat’s real problem... is its relationship with reality itself.”

Yes, that in a nutshell defines the left. They simply cannot abide with reality itself and they constantly are on the warpath to change it, to reshape to their ideal - Egalitarianism.

They cannot stand the fact that we’re not all “equal”, that all races are not all equal, that all 76 genders are not all equal, that all cultures are not equal...

These “inequalities” eat away at their visceral sense of “fairness”. It consumes them day and night to the point that they will riot, burn, kill - anything to relieve themselves of that sense of “unfairness”.

Conservatives on the other hand accept reality and live by the golden rule, the serenity prayer and truly enjoy the diversity of the human race and make the most of it. We’re mostly at peace with creation.

Vive la difference!

[Spirochete]

The GOP has stood by and let us get robbed, beaten, insulted, and see our children put at risk. They’ve stood by and allowed the entire education system, including universities, to become expensive re-education camps.

Do-nothing has been their strategy since the days of Carter. Allow/encourage the Democrats to overreach, and ride the wave of voter dissatisfaction to victory.

[BroJoeK]

"I have to say, I totally agree with the author’s statement here.
The mainstream GOP, the party itself, would rather kill Donald Trump than support him.
I fully believe that."

Nonsense.
The worst you can say about any politician is they want to win elections, at all costs, and with (what is it?) 95%+ of Republican voters supporting the President, no sane Republican politician is going to pick unnecessary fights with him.

And what, exactly, is different about the "Trump doctrine"?
Only this: he is in your face about putting Americans first and he just doesn't like the old Bush-McCain-Romney-Kasich-etc. style of "leadership".
But who does?
No real Republican voters I know of.

Today's Republican never-Trumpers are like that wicked Witch of the East after Dorothy threw MAGA water on her -- disappearing into a puddle of... unpleasantness.

[ZOOKER]

Damn!
Now that stupid song will be repeating in my head all day...

[Hojczyk]

The GOP was the useless party...and still is...If Trump wins he needs to take over in a big way and get new leadership in the GOP and change the parties name..

When the average person sees GOP he thinks there useless..all talk

[aquila48]

“Biden is a “decent person?!” This guy is an idiot. Biden is a weapons-grade asshole.”

A child molester, a sexual predator, a criminal-level influence peddler, a plagiarizer, and an incompetent fool.

[dfwgator]

Oooga Ooooga Ooooga Shaka Oooga Ooooga Ooooga Shaka Oooga Ooooga Ooooga Shaka Oooga Ooooga Ooooga Shaka Oooga Ooooga Ooooga Shaka

[TexasGator]

“That Biden is a decent person is indisputable”

Drinking the kool-aid

[dfwgator]

Let ‘em think he’s decent. Also let ‘em think he’s a wimp. And that’s the worst possible thing to be as a Presidential candidate.

Remember GHWB was labelled a ‘wimp’ at one time.

[aquila48]

“Hence they will activate “Operation Daley”. Stop the rioting and begin the ballot harvesting. Rig elections by any means necessary in battleground states and close Congressional races. Mayor Daley changed history when his open Chicago fraud delivered Illinois and the Presidency in the 1960 election to Kennedy.”

Yes, that is their next step. Trump and Republicans better be be able to aggressively counter it.

[MayflowerMadam]

That song is gonna be my ear worm for the rest of the day. Thank you SO much. (Good think I like it.)

[billyboy15]

“But many of those silent voters from ‘16 are hurting now...thanks to Rat Party Governors and Rat Party “experts”.They’re not likely to vote for Plugs but some of them could stay home this year.”

Perhaps but then you have to consider the “new” silent voters who after actually looking at Trumps record AND looking at the violence from the Left want nothing to do with them but are frightened to publicly say anything.

[BroJoeK]

"That’s so funny. The Ooga Chaka Principle."

That was going to be my post too, so I'll just up you one: how about the MAGA-Chaka Principle?

[MayflowerMadam]

“MAGA-Chaka Principle?”

It could catch on!

[goodnesswins]

BIDEN IS A PERVERT....There are public pictures of him being a pervert.

[fireman15]

Most of them are morons.

After personally meeting dozens... I can state unequivically that your assessment is completely accurate.