The electoral failure of the Left

The Left still hasn't figured out what happened to them. They lost, and lost badly. Nationwide, more than 1000 offices shifted Republican since 2010.

First, they lost by being unable to articulate reasoned responses to criticism. Unable to formulate an argument, their first, and often only, technique is hysterical invective.

But name-calling, screaming, and protesting doesn't work anymore. There's only so many times people can be called racists or haters before they say, "Why should I care what you think?" People aren't withering away anymore when you call them vile names. They are tired of hiding from you hateful leftists, and are now proudly coming out as Americans.

Second, the Left lost lost because they were unable to explain how doing more of what they are doing will change the results of what they had already done. They're left defending the status quo, a nine decade legacy of failure, economic, moral, and political devastation, unequaled in world history.

They're doing their level-best to maintain the failed systems and programs of yesteryear, yet they call themselves progressives.

Third, they offered a particularly distasteful candidate for president. All they can offer are dried up old socialists who can barely walk under their own power.

Fourth, their stranglehold on information is failing. Whether it's media, government, the internet, or education, people are no longer suffering under a leftist-controlled agenda of information.

Thus, the Left has no response, no alternatives, and no bench.

How has this all come about? Well, first we need to understand that most people mind their own business. They work, play with their kids, mow their lawns, volunteer at church, and generally follow the law. They just aren't interested in power or changing the world.

But leftists are. It's what they live for. Government is power, and leftists love, love, love to tell people what to do, what to think, and how to act. So they invest heavily in the acquisition and retention of power. For the past few decades they've been infiltrating every power structure in the US. Not just government, but also corporations, schools, churches, and charities. Anywhere they can mold an organization to serve the leftist agenda, there they went.

And the work-a-day American paid scant attention.

In fact, it would have been difficult to discern what was going on, anyway. That's the nature of infiltration, to remain hidden for a period of time. So the Left made its advances, and no one knew for a long time.

If there was a single thing one could identify as turning back the tide in the leftist propaganda/power machine, it would have to be Rush Limbaugh. He came to national prominence articulating a conservative message with humor, intelligence, and lucidity. His combination of bombast, thoughtful commentary, and outrageous stunts have done much to change the information landscape over the last 30 years.

Now conservatives had a champion who persuasively articulated their ideas without apology on a national stage. Conservatives now had the teaching, tools, and rhetoric to engage the Left. The leftist monopoly on information was broken.

It was the sound of the sleeping bear awaking from its slumber. Conservatism had new life, and conservative thought exploded into a vast array of publications, media outlets, and a newfound activism that birthed the 1995 Republican congressional takeover, the TEA party-induced 2010 Republican house majority, and the 2014 senate majority.

Which brings us to Trump. Trump is full-bore, unapologetic, and sure of himself. He knows exactly what he wants. He's large and in charge, and everyone knows it. Trump's election was so outrageous to the Left, so unanticipated, so disheartening.

Leftists are so used to getting their way, so used to having their adversaries shrink back, so used to shouting down people, that they have no answer for someone like Trump who is impervious. They actually could not deal with it. All of their usual techniques failed, yet they keep using them.

Trump is a quintessential outsider. He's never held political office, never depended on the entrenched political power structure (the "Deep state"), so he owes no one any favors. This scares the Left, and frankly, the squishy Republicans.

He doesn't filter his message through a hostile media, he goes direct. He doesn't have any special interests to kow-tow to. The string-pullers have nothing to hold onto.

He's an Alpha Male, and the Left hates Alpha Males. Irritatingly confident, brash, untempered, and direct, Trump is quintessential non-politician. And people love it.

But the Left has no answer, no strategy, no agenda. They're left sputtering and apoplectic. They're hysterical. Their temper tantrums aren't getting results. They've run out of names to call Trump.

And it makes me smile.