The Great Divide

For years I’ve been of the mind that the divisions we identify as political are not really “political” at all, but have a deeper tectonic foundation than questions of tax rates, regulations and redistribution of wealth.

You and I and the media use expressions like “left and right”, “red and blue”, “conservative and liberal”, but I believe these terms are utterly inadequate to express the true differences that are manifesting at this time. They do not address the deeper divide that separates us.

I’ve come to the conclusion, without pretending to understand every component of this division, that the primary and determinate difference in these two positions is character and temperament.

Indeed, I believe that what we are seeing in the” Left” is the entire disintegration of character and underlying that, a breathtaking spiritual demoralization that is taking on the character of something demonic.

Let me use a simple example that has appeared lately.

The President advocates taking hydroxychloroquine as a prophylactic against possible coronavirus infection. The media and the democrats attack the President and the drug itself as dangerous, when any effort to discover the truth shows that the drugs and its side effects are well known in the medical community.

Let us for the sake of argument presume that hydroxychloroquine has only a negligible effect on the virus. Why would the media attack the drug so vociferously? Why would the “Left” make war against even the “hope” of it being helpful?

But in reality, according to many testimonials, HCQ does work. In fact, it may explain why the death rate from COVID-19 is relatively low in Africa, where HCQ is readily available.

Once upon a time, the “political” divide would have looked something like this: if millions of people rush to get prescriptions for hydroxychloroquine, will this negatively impact those persons who need it for lupus? What should the government do to prevent those dependent on the drug from being unable to get it?

That is a political question.

The discussion and political positions that would emerge would be valid. No matter what your position, people can argue about it.

What is not arguable is whether hydroxychloroquine is safe. Without diving into the weeds, it is. No question. With some preliminary medical screening it’s safe.

What has happened to the “Left”? Why would they be “exorcized” by even the hope of the drug working?

That isn’t just odd. It is evil.

There are differences in interpreting facts that are properly the domain of the political. But something has happened on the “Left” that now compels them to simply lie and make up facts.

The distinction between those who interpret facts and those who lie is not a political divide. It is the difference between good and evil.

In a democracy, opposing parties must work with each other. If they can’t, then government is impossible and the only recourse is civil war.

The political forum which is protected by free speech relies upon an adversarial tension that keeps parties accountable. But this does not legitimize the liar, the slanderer, the defamer, the party that tells you falsehood in order to manipulate the weak-minded and the fearful.

That difference is ILLEGITIMATE!

In law, all parties must tell the truth as they understand it. The adversarial system is not one of truth verse falsehood. Properly understood, it is a contention of opposing interpretations of law and facts. And these are undertaken if made in good faith in a court that applies the law justly.

This is also true in the political sphere. Lies are not a political position. They are not somehow legitimized when they put on the color of red or blue. A lie is a lie. It is not a different interpretation. It is a despicable violence against self-government, as surely as perjury is violence against the legal process.

The “Left” has passed beyond the realm of the political divide. They have become something demonic in hatred and lies. Almost everything the mainstream media says or writes today is a palpable lie if it touches on power or politics.

Defamations, outright lies, subornations, criminality, obstructions, slanders, falsehoods, collusions with China and Russia, corruption and bribes—this has all become standard fare for what we used to call “the Left”.

But this is not what the left is, properly understood. The left has an agenda. If you’re a communist, you believe in state ownership of property. You can believe this without being a liar. You can’t advocate for communism and at the same time tell people it isn’t about state ownership. That would be a lie.

If you’re a socialist you can believe in national health care. You can advocate that everyone has a right to medical care. What you don’t have the right to do is tell everyone you can keep your doctor when you know that’s not true. You can’t tell them that if you add 30 million unpaying patients the cost will go down. That’s a lie.

If you’re a feminist and you believe in “choice” you can oppose Kavanaugh, but you cannot invent slanders to destroy him. That is a lie.

You can be pro-choice, but you cannot morally tell people that unborn babies are not persons or human. That’s a lie.

What I am getting at here, is that the “Left” has become ILLEGITIMATE.

I am not advocating taking free speech away from Nancy Pelosi and her coven. But what I am advocating is that we who understand these differences, these moral and substantive distinctions, refuse to give legitimacy to these liars and demonic presences. They must not be accepted as merely having a different political opinion. Their positions are gross moral depravities advanced under color of free speech, in grotesque bad faith. They are engaged in a wicked attempt to destroy our political institutions, the power of reason, and undermine the antecedent of law and order—a moral view of the universe.

These strategies and techniques, the idea that it is acceptable to murder, lie, steal, and defame in order to gain power entered politics with Lenin and Stalin, the Frankfurt School, and Saul Alinsky. Lies have become a tool, perhaps the tool, of political change in our democracy.

I am saying, flatly, that lies are not political differences. They are actionable so far as they defame and misrepresent the truth about people. Our laws need to be changed. Defamation must not be tolerated. Lies, manufactured with intent to destroy reputations and financial interests, are not political. They are criminal.

And now I will get to the second part of this idea that the Great Divide is about character and temperament.

There are many demagogues and wicked people at the top of our government, in our intelligence agencies, and in the media. They are corrupt, despicable liars.

They have learned the age-old ugly truth about human fallenness and weakness—they need to be needed.
They need to be important because there is something fundamentally wrong with them spiritually. They need the moral order of God. But instead, they manufacture an identity out of the dumb, breathless matter of an absurd universe. Without God, one becomes important only by self-promotion, greed, slavery, and lies and placing oneself over others. You either bow before God or you try to elevate yourself above God—you need to become God. Behold Pharaoh! Behold Caesar and Hitler and you know the rest.

But there is another aspect of this elevation of falsehood into the politically acceptable. Caesar needs his will read. Pharaoh needs his Pyramid, The Kaiser needs an army. And this is where the events surrounding the Corona Virus offer us a tell in the game that is being played by the “Left”.

There is no divide of red or blue in our common desire to eradicate this disease. A virus cannot properly divide us politically, because no one in their right mind is rooting for the virus.

And yet the “Left” is rooting for the virus.

I see fear, horrible fear in the eyes of people. Fear manipulated intentionally to gain the submission of the weak.

And here is the symbiosis of wickedness and weakness, this gets to temperament.

I have reasonable faith in my ability to assess dangers. I am willing to accept risks. And I am somewhat self-reliant. I don’t as a rule need to the intervention of others for identity, for meaningful work, for self-protection. This is part of my legacy as a rational human made in the image of God. I’m not a stupid animal.

But there are many, many who temperamentally are naturally insecure, weak-minded, emotionally dislocated, and fearful. There are millions of people who temperamentally abhor risk. And it is these people who are the fertile political ground for the demagogues and demons of the “Left”.

I live in Washington DC. I commute often to Montgomery County in Maryland. I am telling you that there is more fear in these places than in the Georgia or Florida. Why is that? Is there something about being in a blue state or county that makes one more fearful?

No.

And now I get to the thesis.

People who are afraid by temperament want a prince or a king or a bureaucrat to create a perfectly safe world for them. There is a natural correlation between fear and blue. Fear need someone to rescue them. Fear follows because it is not confident enough to makes its own way. Fear is the hallmark of those who do not or cannot negotiate a future. They are dependent. They need.

And that is what Pelosi and Schumer and Schiff need. They need to be needed.

The “Left” is not a political agenda anymore. It is a technique of emotional manipulation. It is a disease that feeds on the fear of the weak, the emotionally helpless, the physical vulnerabilities of those who are temperamentally insecure. Just like any predator—or for that matter, virus—the “Left” feeds on the weak.

The “Left” is not a political position anymore. It has become akin to Munchausen-by-Proxy (look it up). It is a moral disfiguration of the soul and the mind.

We must not legitimize it by pretending that it is a merely a political difference. It is an evil that preys on human insecurities.

Try to train yourself to think more in these terms. Break out of the red and blue paradigm. The “Left” is totalitarian, antinomian, nihilist and anti-human.

Stop giving the monster the dignity of a political party.

It has become demonic.