Conservatives are dangerous, well that is according to a recent New York Times Op-ed piece by David Leonhardt. The accusations against conservatives comes not long after Esquire magazine suggested that opposing Democrats was dangerous. Apparently, unless you are completely woke, you are a threat to society. Leonhardt’s article is one of two opinion articles at The NY Times discussing this subject.
In The NY Times article, Leonhardt suggests that the majority of killings by political extremists have come at the hand of white supremacists. White supremacist has become the new catch phrase for anyone on the left since they have effectively killed any definition or meaning of racism due to overuse.
Leonhardt was unable to differentiate his story from the typical left-wing rhetoric that we discussed in our post yesterday. He fell into the trap of using quotes from others to justify his story blaming President Trump and Republicans support of President Trump. Very little of the article discusses left-wing violence and generally lumps anyone that acts out of bias towards a religion or race in the “right-wing” column. This simply isn’t the case at all and is extremely misleading.
Take into account this story from the NY Post. A mass shooting was thwarted by a grandmother in Texas for a teen that was suicidal. Death by cop is a real thing and exists in many of these instances. These people are set out to die and see these acts as a way to be remembered.
I think Liz Wheeler had a great response to some of the news outlets who would like to blame all of this on the right. The truth of the matter is that there are crazy individuals on both sides that need to be addressed as part of the issue. It’s not solely a right wing issue, but an AMERICAN issue.
I would disagree that video games are the only cause of mass shootings as has been suggested by some in Congress. I do believe that they may play a role, but there is a larger role at play here of mental illness and a society that does not understand the value of a human life anymore. AOC was quick to jump on that yesterday in a tweet where she blamed all shootings on white supremacy. As has been said many times, this is simply misleading and not true as these violent extremists exist on both sides.
So what do we do? We have to address the issues on both sides of the aisle. I think we have to consider the common sense legislation I wrote about yesterday. There is a lot of information discussing how these people are advertising their plans online and we must look for those things. Just like we are watchful for terrorism at airports and other mass gatherings, we have to be vigilant in our everyday lives anywhere we are.
The world we live in is a different place now, not specifically because of Republicans, Democrats, Trump or anyone else. There are a lot of contributing factors that have led to the state of our nation. It’s time to stop with the blaming each other’s party and start becoming Americans once again. We must realize we are each different, but the value of life should be a common shared goal.
You can contact JD through the Liberty Loft website or by Twitter.
