Cognitive Dissonance?

When you want your party to retain control of government but can’t stop yourself from antagonizing potential voters? Am I using the term properly?

Not long ago I asked, Are We In Pre-Revolutionary Times? My rationale for asking that question ran like this:

This is a topic that’s been ‘out there’ for some time—probably since Trump’s inauguration, when Antifa hit the streets of DC. The classic sign of an emerging revolutionary environment is, after all, the resort of a major political party to violence to advance its goals.

The Dem party has clearly been taken over by an extreme faction that views most of the populace of America as enemies and does not shrink from violent rhetoric—including condoning actual violence. Obviously the attempted assassination of Steve Scalise (and others), the widespread Antifa and BLM violence (condoned and encouraged by Dems), the false claim that Trump was a Russian agent, the purge of normal Americans from the military, are all typical revolutionary preliminaries.

We have now moved to a new stage, with threats of violence being directed at the judiciary, the constitutional third branch of government. However, in the background—largely unmentioned by the media—is a wave of firebombings directed at pro-life offices and churches. My working assumption is that all the talk of “white supremacist” movements is largely a cover for hatred and violence against Christians.

Once again we see that the Dem party refuses to condemn this new form of violence, directed against a majority of the populace, if you consider polling results.

Yesterday, in the wake of the abortion ruling from the SCOTUS, John Daniel Davidson at The Federalist rather elegantly seconded that concept—among other observations:

The end of Roe v. Wade is perhaps the greatest political and cultural event in a generation. It will change American politics forever, and — what’s more important — it will save the lives of countless unborn children. The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs is a great victory for the U.S. Constitution, for the American people, and for justice and truth and the common good.

It is also a turning point. We should now expect Democrats and the left to call more explicitly for violence, initially against places like crisis pregnancy centers and Catholic churches, as we have already seen, and eventually against ordinary people who disagree with them. We should expect not just calls for physical attacks against the justices in the Dobbs majority, but, as we have also already seen, attempts to carry out such attacks.

This violence will likely be accompanied by rhetoric that more explicitly posits abortion not just as a positive good — “shout your abortion” — but a necessary one for women to enjoy their full rights as citizens under the Constitution. The argument, already gaining steam in public discourse, is that without a constitutional right to kill the unborn, women are relegated to a kind of second-class status, stripped of their full humanity. This rhetoric will be used in part as a justification for violence, but it also reflects the actual views of Democrats and the left on abortion.

We saw the beginning of that last night with disruptive demonstrations. But there’s something else that has been apparent in virtually all of the protests leading up to the Dobbs decision—a large proportion of these demonstrators are patently mentally disturbed. This is a very positive development, because the marginal, fringe, nature of the Dem base is on full display. Normal people who want to live normal lives are increasingly undeceived by the Left’s rhetoric. Unlike these disturbed demonstrators, normal men and women understand that pre-born babies are not hostile attackers seeking to harm their mothers.

Rajan Laad at American Thinker offers what is probably sound advice, summing up the current state of things thusly:

To sum it up, the pro-choice people are a minority whose voices are amplified while the pro-life people are a majority whose voices are suppressed.

…

The Democrats have refreshed public memory regarding their violence, intolerance, and extremism. Their true colors are once again on display on a much wider canvas.

The people will be reminded that these aren’t the Democrats of the '90s who said that abortions should be “safe, legal, and rare."

This isn’t even the Democrat party of 2008 when Hillary Clinton said the same thing during a presidential debate.

The Democrat party now hysterically celebrates abortions and reacts violently to anyone who doesn't subscribe to this perspective.

…

Most, people, including moderate Democrats, will be horrified to see the conduct of their fellow Democrats.

In other words—let the Dems keep digging. Digging their electoral grave. They have no issues that move voters. Even Dem politicians are admitting that “nobody” cares about their J6 “insurrection” narrative—and by “nobody” they mean their own voters, as well.

The Washington Examiner quantifies some of this for us. With “nobody” interested in J6, but instead focused on the manifold failures of the Zhou regime:

The Dems are flailing. They have somehow convinced themselves, in the face of all the evidence, that talking about abortion from now until November will be their salvation. How they ever came to that conclusion is anyone’s guess, and that’s what I meant by cognitive dissonance. The data that the Washington Examiner cites is not some closely held secret, inaccessible to Dem pollsters—and yet they plunge ahead:

Just 5% call abortion top concern

Remarkably, and as a measure of just how out of touch with normal people the Dems are, reliving the last election—what Dems thought would be their sure fire winning issue—is even less popular:

While the Supreme Court’s decision overruling the 1973 Roe v. Wade right to abortion has dominated today’s network and cable coverage, the latest McLaughlin & Associates poll said just 5% of voters call it a top concern.

Just below abortion, at 1%, is reviewing the 2020 election, over which the media are also obsessing.

By comparison, 54% cited the economy.

As my wife says, nobody thinks about abortion every day, but everybody thinks about inflation every day.

Something else to bear in mind, and that is the lesson that Trump taught but which so few Republicans seem able to internalize (although DeSantis seems to get it). That lesson is, Don’t be apologetic about your principles—showcase them, put them front and center, because most people retain normal instincts and conservative principles are nothing if not normal. That’s what Trump did and that’s how Trump won—he reached out to normal people who wanted to live normal lives. And that’s exactly what the Dems are trying to deny Americans. It’s also the approach that explains why Trump remains a major force in US politics. Bluto Barr can whine about “one damn thing after another,” but can Bluto name one GOP politician with any sort of public following who isn’t in some way connected to Trump? Of course he can’t, and certainly not the Jeb! to whom Bluto gifted something like $40K.

Such considerations lead McLaughlin to conclude:

And while the media were suggesting that the question of abortion will help drive a bigger Democratic turnout in fall elections, the McLaughlins said it also stands to help Republicans.

In an April survey, they found that 93% agree with this statement: “Every human being represents a life that is precious and has value.”

John McLaughlin said, “If the Republicans stand on principle and defend human life, Americans are on their side.”

Loaded question? Who’s going to say otherwise? Well, in fact some did disagree—and you can bet they’re on the Left. It remains from these data that appealing to people’s better instincts is still a winner in American politics. Trump understood that and his policy platform reflected that appeal to the better instincts of Americans, no matter what some still say about his “mean tweets.” Consider this graph:

GOP candidates need to internalize that graph and find ways to make it part of their campaigns. Pro-life is a winner and can be incorporated broadly into most issues. It may be one issue among many, and Americans may be predominantly focused on the economy, but life is still a winner. Only Dems prefer death.

And I couldn’t resist including this graphic that I saw at Powerline: