Mugged by reality

[Jackpine Savage]

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2023/10/mugged-by-reality.php

MUGGED BY REALITY

Bari Weiss is one of America’s top independent journalists, with a popular podcast. We have followed her work here for a while. The Gazan invasion of Israel, with its attendant horrors, seems to have pushed her over the edge. Read the whole thing; it is eloquent:

Journalist Bari Weiss, a Jewish liberal who quit the New York Times over its anti-Semitism, writes:

”As a Democrat who has been left homeless, who is now definitely in the center but probably leaning increasingly right, I am left yet again with an appreciation, despite the messenger, of the message of the Trump administration because what those guys did was pretty incredible in hindsight.”

“So much of the work that happened in that [Trump] administration turns out to have been right. And that’s what is so frustrating for me. The work on the border wall? We didn’t like the messenger, so we killed the message. Turned out it was right. Issuing long-term debt to refinance when rates were at zero? We didn’t like the messenger, so we killed the message. A structural peace in the Middle East? We didn’t like the messenger, so we killed the message.”

“When are we gonna stop shooting ourselves in the foot? And when are we going to actually see and take the time to look past who is saying things and actually listen to them word for word?”

“If it’s clear that the last two weeks have been a wake-up call, the next question is: Why?”

“Part of the answer is the sheer depravity of Hamas’s terrorism. That depravity has made the justification and celebration of their acts by those who police pronouns that much starker. The contradictions and moral bankruptcy of a worldview that spends years worrying about microaggressions and tone policing, but can’t decide what side it is on after the beheading of babies, aren’t exactly difficult to spot.”

“To put it another way: when Black Lives Matter organizations are lionizing Islamist terrorists by posting a paraglider logo, you’d be a fool not to reassess things.”

“The events of the last week have shattered the illusion that wokeness is about protecting victims and standing up for persecuted minorities. This ideology is and has always been about the one thing many of us have told you it is about for years: power.

“And after the last two weeks, there can be no doubt about how these people will use any power they seize: they will seek to destroy, in any way they can, those who disagree.”

[Lumpy]

This ideology is and has always been about the one thing many of us have told you it is about for years: power.

Or "we don't want justice, we want victory".

[Jackpine Savage]

Here's another probably former Democrat that was mugged by the IRS.

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2023/10/why-should-i-ever-vote-for-a-democrat-again.php

WHY SHOULD I EVER VOTE FOR A DEMOCRAT AGAIN?”
Matt Taibbi is one of a group of honest liberals who are not blind to the contemporary Left’s faults. At Racket News, he writes about his testimony before Jim Jordan’s House Weaponization of Government Committee, which apparently prompted a visit to his home by the IRS. Jordan’s House committee investigated, with the result that the IRS has announced a new policy on home visits.

The substance of the investigation is related in more detail in a separate Racket News post, but for now I want to focus on Matt’s conclusion in the post linked above, which is titled “Thanks, to a Politician Who Did His Job”:

Sincere thanks are due to Chairman Jordan, whose staff not only demanded and got answers in my case, but achieved a concrete policy change, as IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel announced in July new procedures that would “end most” home visits.

Anticipating criticism for expressing public thanks to a Republican congressman, I’d like to ask Democratic Party partisans: to which elected Democrat should I have appealed for help in this matter? The one who called me a “so-called journalist” on the House floor? The one who told me to take off my “tinfoil hat” and put greater trust in intelligence services? The ones in leadership who threatened me with jail time? I gave votes to the party for thirty years. Which elected Democrat would have performed basic constituent services in my case? Feel free to raise a hand.

If silence is the answer, why should I ever vote for a Democrat again?

Good question! Taibbi is a journalist who cares about freedom of speech. So, QED. The Democrats are on the other side.

Another life-long Democrat who has been rethinking her loyalties is Bari Weiss, as I noted here:

As a Democrat who has been left homeless, who is now definitely in the center but probably leaning increasingly right….

We are in the midst of a political realignment. Some of it has to do with which party (and which philosophy) best represents the working class, but there are other elements too. The current conflict in Gaza, with pro-genocide demonstrations from the Left on college campuses and in public places, like the one that shut down Grand Central Station today, is another factor that is disrupting traditional loyalties. And there are more.

I actually think that we are at the beginning of a considerably greater re-alignment than most people now realize, and that by far the larger movement will be from left to right.