Around the U.S., voters have led the backlash against the overreach of the extreme left since ousting Donald Trump from office.
The latest example was last week when San Francisco voters, arguably the home to the American left, recalled three school board members in a race where issues included the attempts to rename 44 schools that carried the names such as George Washington and Paul Revere.
New Jersey saw this same type of voter energy in 2021 with a closer-than-expected governor’s election and State Sen. Steve Sweeney losing his seat after 20 years, including the last 10 as being arguably the most powerful Senate President in the history of the Garden State. Republicans were able to make gains in large part due to harnessing the energy of voters who were tired of COVID restrictions such as school masks and vaccine mandates.
But schools and COVID have not been the only issues used against Democrats the past couple of election cycles. In Minneapolis, voters rejected a ballot measure to replace the city’s Police Department with an agency that would have focused less on law enforcement. And in Seattle voters elected Ann Davison—a lawyer who left the Democratic Party due to a move too far left in her opinion— as the city’s top prosecutor to a candidate who wanted to abolish the police.
Across the Hudson River, New York City chose Eric Adams, a Democrat who promised to crack down on crime and has been willing to take a second look at health policies put in place during the pandemic.
President Joe Biden defeated Trump with the most votes ever by a candidate by running on a platform of returning to the center. President Biden’s biggest victories, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill and the American Rescue Plan, were policies that appealed to both sides of the aisle. His missteps, the Build Back Better Act most notably, were filled with well-intentioned policies pushed by the left flank of the party beyond a point of garnering enough support to pass.
But do not be mistaken—the overreach on the extreme right is alive and well as it ever has been. While leaders such as U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) are attempting to work behind the scenes to take back the extremists that Trump promoted, how many rallies that resonate with conservatives feature and embrace symbols of hate and racism favored by White Nationalists, such as the Confederate Flag or Nazi symbols?
And when Republicans do gain power, they are using it just as badly. For example, a Texas law that offers a $10,000 bounty for turning in anyone who helps a pregnant woman get an abortion or legislation in Tennessee advocating the removal of obscene materials in schools that results in books being taken off the shelves centering around racism or the Holocaust, such as To Kill A Mockingbird and Maus.
School board meetings in New Jersey and across the U S have gone from sleepy meetings where the biggest issue was cafeteria offerings to just another venue for anti-vaxxers to spew their unsubstantiated and dangerous beliefs.
Within the overreach, there are legitimate issues that need to be addressed. Reforms are needed and being enacted to get a fuller picture of the history of our founding fathers and the leaders who came after them, re-examining what were and weren’t effective policies during the pandemic, and how far to go with police reforms. The United States is always at its best when it is moving forward and shining a light to fix the injustices and shortcomings we have as a society.
Both parties need to reclaim their center and lessen the influence of the extremists in their party. But let us make it clear, the extreme of the right has a much larger influence in the Republican Party than Democrats. Look no further than the Republican National Committee actions surrounding the failed insurrection on Jan 6, looking to place more punishment on Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for their bipartisan work on the House Select Committee than Trump supporters who stormed the U.S. Capitol is what they believe as partaking in “legitimate political discourse.”
Leaders of both parties would be smart to get back to the basics of their parties and of Americans. After all, voters have been telling them to do that for the last two years.
0H YES!! The-voters have been telling 0ur Elected Lackey’s what they wanted for the last 50 plus years!! AND; It’s always felled 0n Deef hearing!! The Electee’s seem more committed to driving their Benefactor’s agendas to ascending heights!! American’s & the People’s 0f the World know NOW that Big Money & Their Big money agendas have Invaded 0ur Gov’ts!! AND; If’n that Ain’t A Totalitarian Take 0ver, then it mite be closer termed as Terrorism; Since that word has bin so freely Miss-Used lately!!//
I commend North-JerseyNews for putting up this opinion piece, but the title is a bit misleading — it doesn’t get at the genuine, deserved outrage festering over the Republican Party’s embrace of manufactured falsehoods and deceptions around critical race theory, covid, and sex education — playing in school board races, across media and the Internet. All voters suffer the wildly absurd claims, defamations and deceptions of Republican candidates embracing Trump, QAnon, FOX entertainment and conspiracy groups.
These are severe threats to our liberty and freedom of conscience, our greater good and our political stability. They have crossed the line from free speech into libel, defamation and insurrection. They seek to cross the Rubicon between our democratic republic and our embrace of the rights of the individual and an offshore world of grift, inequality, abuse of religion for political gain.
Brutal regime authoritarianism, one party rule, manufactured lies and issues, fascist propaganda, patriarchy and the machinery of false, trickle down corporatism have no place in the land of the free and the home if the brave
These staged messages are propagated to mislead and seed nonissues, to gin up voter outrage and turnout.
It is my perception that the “extremism” is on the right, willing to do and say anything with vast amounts of money to sponsor and seed fear, confusionand chaos, blaming and defaming the left.
The extreme economics we have allowed these last four decades has never trickled down and our capacity to educate and fund our future generations has never bern so undermined and broken. It is truly negligent to divest from the real value creators — We the People — and our vision for our lives, meaning, and the future. We leave pure talent, ingenuity and dreams on the table in exchange for lockstep madness, pollution, rigged markets and political corruption.
We suffer endless conspiracy theories and underhanded tactics that sustain chaos, deception, corporatism, inequality and use of excessive force — including inciting the deadly January 6 insurrection.
The policy platform politics within each party also seem a bit misunderstood. There is no real radicalism or extremism on the “left.” There is however, constant effort to curtail the worst extremism and violence of the right.
The progressive protests seek to redirect flow of some funds to repair and redress gross societal inequality and the vestiges of slavery, overly aggressive, politicized policing, injustice on the side of the road, mass incarceration and economic exploitation.
These valid concerns are blatantly mischaracterized in the media and by “conservative” pundits as “defund the police” radicalism. This could not be farther from the truth, and is truly the biggest lie and most radical, far-reaching political strategy in human history.
This spin deception is dangerous political propaganda to defame, deceived, confuse and outrage voters.
It is wrong, it has no integrity, it is un-American and it must not be ignored or allowed to thrive.
I commend North-Jersey News for putting up this opinion piece, but the title is a bit misleading — it doesn’t get at the genuine, deserved outrage festering over the Republican Party’s embrace of manufactured falsehoods and deceptions around critical race theory, covid, and sex education playing in school board races, across media and the Internet. All voters suffer the wildly absurd claims, defamations and deceptions of Republican candidates embracing Trump, QAnon, FOX entertainment and conspiracy groups.
These are severe threats to our liberty and freedom of conscience, our greater good and our political stability. They have crossed the line from free speech into libel, defamation and insurrection. They seek to cross the Rubicon between our democratic republic and embrace of the rights of the individual from an offshore dustopia of grift, inequality, and abuse of religion for political gain.
Brutal regime authoritarianism, one party rule, manufactured lies and issues, fascist propaganda, patriarchy and the machinery of false, trickle down corporatism have no place in the land of the free and the home of the brave
These staged messages are propagated to mislead and seed nonissues, to gin up voter outrage and turnout.
It is my perception that the “extremism” is on the right, willing to do and say anything with vast amounts of money to sponsor and seed fear, confusion and chaos, blaming and defaming the left, trying to set them back on their heels and wasting everyone’s wealth, time and resources. Trumpism 101. Putin’s Playlist.
The extreme economics we have allowed these last four decades has never trickled down and our capacity to educate and fund our future generations has never been so undermined and broken. It is truly negligent to divest from nurturing the real value creators — We the People — and our vision for our lives, meaning, and the future. We leave pure talent, ingenuity and dreams on the table in exchange for lockstep madness, pollution, rigged markets, sinister, shady characters and political corruption.
We suffer endless conspiracy theories and underhanded tactics that seed chaos, deception, corporatism, inequality and use of excessive force — including inciting the deadly January 6 insurrection.
The policy platform politics within each party also seems a bit misunderstood. There is no real radicalism or extremism on the “left.” There is however, constant effort to assure liberty, justice, public safety and stable economic policy — to curtail the worst extremism, wild abandon, cruelty and violence of the right.
The progressive protests seek to redirect flow of some funds to repair and redress gross societal inequality and the vestiges of slavery, overly aggressive, politicized policing, injustice on the side of the road, mass incarceration and economic exploitation.
These valid concerns are blatantly mischaracterized in the media and by “conservative” pundits as “defund the police” radicalism. This could not be farther from the truth, and is truly the biggest lie and most radical, far-reaching political strategy in human history.
This spin deception is dangerous political propaganda to defame genuine candidates by deceiving, dyseducating and provoking voters.
It is wrong, it has no integrity, it is un-American and it must not be ignored or allowed to thrive.