The Angry Left and Its Adversaries
WASHINGTON -- Has it been noted that the country's political disagreements are becoming increasingly violent? About 15 years ago, the "angry left" appeared on the scene, and its indignant members got a lot of attention from the media. The enormous volume of press attention signaled the media's manifest approval, if sotto voce. Next came the Occupiers' movement, and again, these ruffians came with the media's approval, at least sotto voce. Then, gun-toting cowards began shooting people for humanitarian reasons, and the media did not know what to think. The assassination attempt on Rep. Steve Scalise and his colleagues comes to mind.
The right, too, has its violent practitioners. It has the "alt-right," neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan. The violence at Charlottesville, Virginia, was a high-water mark for these creeps. The alt-right and its competitors seem to have faded a bit as of late, but it is still out there. It is kept in the news, oddly enough, by its criminality, though the media never approves of it, even sotto voce. Yet the media never misses an opportunity to report on its malevolent behavior, often with inflated figures. As I have noted for years, without the media's attention, these creeps would be mere curiosities. Even the left-wing practitioners of violence are pretty much marginal, though they have snappier slogans.
Meanwhile, the theater of operations has shifted to cable television, where the violence is more gentlemanly and ladylike. In fact, it is not even violence. It is only rhetoric: insults exchanged, vituperations heaved and occasional syllogisms deposited. On one side, the left is posing as a mainstream host. On the other side are the self-proclaimed conservatives. The left calls us intolerable extremists, racists, and its members intimate that some of us are the prosopopoeia of the alt-right. We on the right remain gentlemen and ladies. We do not call those on the left socialists, cranks and mentally unbalanced, unless we have to.
Recently, the left escalated things. It threatened the right's advertisers. With typical bluster, it threatened to unleash its hoards, and the more timorous corporate titans bowed to the left, or at least temporarily bowed to the left. When they found that the left's threats were mostly hollow, they returned. Some such as the noble CEO Mike Lindell of MyPillow never left. I bought two of his pillows, and I may buy a third for pillow fights with my grandson.
The left began threatening the right back in 2012 when it called upon radio host Rush Limbaugh's advertisers to cancel their ads on his show. He had allegedly slandered then-Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke. Remember her? Rush held fast. Jeff Lord, the commentator, printed the cowardly advertisers' names, and they crept back to Rush, though Rush was very discerning about who he would take back.
Now the left, notwithstanding its guff about free speech, has turned on Fox News hosts Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham. Again the left threatens their advertisers. Yet this time, Sean and Laura have the support of a real champion of the First Amendment, and a pretty good businessman, too: Rupert Murdoch. He is the one person in America who has broken the left's monopoly on media with his Fox News. Bravo once again, Rupert!
About 20 years ago, as Fox gained influence, I noticed the battle lines forming. I sensed that there would be an attack on Fox advertisers. After all, the left had turned on newspapers some years before for running conservative columnists. It had been pretty successful at influencing newspapers in Los Angeles, San Francisco and other left-wing havens to drop their conservative columnists. So much for the newspapers' claptrap in defense of the First Amendment. There is only one Rupert Murdoch. The result was fewer readers of newspapers. Now those boring newspapers are going out of business.
At the time, I told the media watchdog Reed Irvine that he ought to expand his army of monitors and encourage them to write letters to the editors of their hometown newspapers praising them for publishing both sides. Surely, the editors would appreciate an occasional pat on the back. They could not possibly be happy with the growing acrimony on their pages -- could they? Quite possibly, and certainly, many of the editors are happy with things as they are today. Most are members of today's mainstream media. They would rather travel with the herd than be controversial.
At any rate, Irvine did not take my advice. The media became angrier and angrier, and now audiences are hoping other media entrepreneurs will follow Murdoch's lead. Once again, bravo, Rupert! https://townhall.com/columnists/emmetttyrrell/2018/04/26/the-angry-left-and-its-adversaries-n2474671
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Left wingers ARE getting increasingly angry and completely fed up with the insanity of the modern day American right. Good for them; angry people vote.
an·ger
NOUN
a strong feeling of annoyance, displeasure, or hostility.
"the colonel's anger at his daughter's disobedience"
synonyms: annoyance · vexation · exasperation · irritation irritability · indignation displeasure
As the world changes and progresses forward it’s no wonder that naturally liberal minded people are irritated, exasperated and frustrated by the conservative mindset of trying to stop the natural progression of change.
con·ser·va·tism
NOUN
As the world changes and progresses forward it’s no wonder that conservative minded people try to hold onto the status quo, it's in their nature as well.
certainly two competing forces
In my opinion THAT IS WHAT MAKES AMERICA REALLY GREAT !! GOD help us if we all become robots.
America needs a mix of all ideologies:
“United we stand, divided we fall”
Does Anyone remember this is still AMERICA ?
America needs a mix of all, conservatives, liberals and progressives.
A good blend will move America forward at a reasonable speed.
Too many of any one ideology is bad for America.
America needs to move forward as the world progresses.
Too many cons = little to no forward movement.
Too many liberals = move too fast forward.
Too many Independents = well you can’t have too many….lol (I’m one) LOL
Please research ALL candidates before you VOTE
The more Americans that research all the candidates for all the offices before they vote and vote for the most qualified, the better our government and country will be.
Well said.
Thanks
I agree.
Ditto here.
I think all of us here on NT needs to read these words and, to understand what it is they represent, especially today.
I find it funny that a very right leaning opinion piece is acting as if the left becoming angry is a bad thing. This is actually a very positive development. It is the one thing that we've learned from the right that has worked very well for them.
For too many years, the left has used an academic, erudite approach toward "selling" our brand of governance. During the same period of time, the conservatives of the republican party were eschewing the left as the "academic elite" and began demonstrating a visceral anger with the direction this nation was headed in. Whether that position was accurate or not {and many political scientists, economists, and historians} they found out that this approach worked. People reacted to anger and became energized to vote. They took over state governments, congress, and finally the presidency. It was never based on policy, it was based on anger.
Now the liberals are on the other side. They disagree politically with just about everything the conservatives say and do, but they have been smart enough to recognize that anger is a way to motivate your voters. It is showing now. Elections in the last twelve months are swinging 12-18 points toward the more liberal side. It is happening because of voter anger and the stoking of that anger.
The reader has to laugh when the author and seeder see this "angry left" as a negative. It is the one thing that they did right on their side and we are now moving off our ivory towers and getting down into the weeds with them. The big difference is that we are angry and we know how to govern. I look forward to November 6 and the blue tsunami that is on it's way.
I had read where Dr. Paul Ekman indicates it can be very harmful to both your physical and mental health. Mentally he claims when a person is feeling negative emotions their thoughts block out all the positive aspects of an issue. When their mind is consumed with negative thoughts this can cloud good judgment. Physically it can be linked to many problems such as heart disease and other stress related ailments. Usually it hurts the person with the anger more than the people they are angry at.
“Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.” Buddha
smart? I think not.
check any leftwing talking points site and you will find the same trend
(traffic falling off a cliff starting feb 2017 thru today)]
the constant bs from the left is driving their own supporters away in droves
Have any of you guys followed any election results through 2017 and so far into 2018? Every one, with only one exception had a 12 to 18 point swing toward the democrats. Whatever is motivating them is certainly working.
yepp... remember pennsylvania?
lamb won because he supported trumps trade plans and hates the likes of pelosi
as an old school liberal... I would have voted for him also.
unless the left has more lambs up their sleeves they are not going to do as well as they think in midterms
and if they take the house? democrats like lamb will not impeach trump
Lamb won because he represented that district's values. He was actually a mixed candidate with some views that were more liberal and some that were more conservative. That is not a bad thing. One of the things that I've learned over the years is that all politics are local. The democrats did a good job in that district.
There are many {if not a majority of liberals who actually like some of Trump's trade policies} democrats who support Trump in the area of trade. I've actually written that this is the one area of Trump's stated policies during the campaign that I most agreed with. I also found Clinton's stance on trade to be the greatest failure of her husband's administration.
We'll see what happens with Pelosi. I, personally, would like to see a younger speaker who will appeal to a wider base. I do understand, however, that from a leadership and organizational standpoint, she was the most effective speaker in my lifetime. I would like to see the speakership change because she has become a lightening rod for the right.
What Lamb has taught the democrats is that candidates have to reflect the views of the district they are running in. What the republicans seem to have learned, is support Trump or not, there is so much anger out there directed at their party because of Trump, voters are running away from them at record clips. They can hold the base, but they are losing everyone else.
there is censorship here - but i don't think it was the "liberals" who complained about words like "cult" or "Nazi", do you ?
The Angry Left and Its Adversaries
The Left?
Every American should be angry, if you are not then you simply have not been paying attention. When History revisits the past twenty five to forty years of our History, they will wonder what madness griped our Nation while the Citizenry slept.
If one cares to be angry then direct it towards the deserved, the GOP, the Dems, the media and also our collective selves.
I'm tired of this fake concern about 'the angry left'. The RIGHT has been championing Trump's anger (and the teaparty was full of it too) for YEARS! And now republicans get the vapors that the left has passion and energy? How exactly do you reconcile your love of Trump's mean and hateful anger and outbursts and this fake outrage at the left, which doesn't even come close to Trump himself? It's like republicans started a war and get surprised when their target fights back.
Bingo.
Plus the article's author seems to be whining about things which the right wing popularized like the boycott of advertisers.
Stop acting that way and you won't have to worry about it anymore.