Civility

In a week, the new Democrat House of Representatives will be in place, and at the same time a collection of shadowy left-wing non-profits will begin work to bring down the Trump presidency or cripple it so badly that the 2020 presidential election will be a guaranteed Dem win (sort of like the 2016). As Dem House investigations work to demonstrate that Donald Trump is a cross between Alger Hiss, John Gotti, and Adolf Hitler, we're going to hear one word repeated incessantly as Trump and his allies try to defend themselves—"civility."

The Dems' trained hamsters in the media will criticize Trump as he counterpunches via twitter ("he lacks civility"), they'll pile on his defenders ("why don't we see 'civility' in political discourse"), and they'll lament the growing trend of political attacks but always—always—suggest that the GOP is the villain.

Conservative bomb-thrower Kurt Schlichter comments:

Civility is a component of a system of reasoned debate, not its end product. Civility is necessary in a system where people reason in good faith in order to come to the best solution to the policy challenges facing them. Civility lubricates that process, and allows people of good faith to disagree without engendering unnecessary and destructive discord.

People of good faith. See, that’s key.

The problem is that progressives are not people of good faith.

They are not trying to reason. They are not trying to compromise. They do not accept the basic concept that all American citizens have inalienable rights and that the law must apply equally to everyone. They hate us.

Schlicter's words are extreme, no doubt, but there's an element of truth in them. It appears (based on the events of the past two years) that many progressives truly do believe that they have a monopoly on morality and values, and that people who disagree with their version of morality and values are somehow deplorable. They throw words like "racist" or "misogynist" around like confetti, in an obvious attempt to shut down any dissent from their worldview. Their tools include the ad hominem attack, which they use like a cudgel to intimidate, and "outrage" which allows them to re-interpret innocent comments or events in their most damaging interpretation. The Kavanaugh hearings demonstrated the depths to which some progressives will go to get what they want.

And when their opponents push back—hard—Democrats and their trained hamsters cluck their tongues and begin talking about "civility." A better topic might be "hypocrisy."