Christchurch

I'm guessing that 99.99 percent of all Americans have never been to Christchurch, NZ. I have—twice. Prior to the disastrous earthquake that destroyed a substantial portion of the city, Christchurch was a throwback to the mid-20th century. Friendly, welcoming people, architecture that was as modest as it was alluring, beautiful parks and natural scenery in a mountainous region, and a quiet and calm feel that is hard to find in the USA. The earthquake in 2011 shattered some of that, and the heinous murder of innocent Muslims this past week surely destroyed the quiet and clam that New Zealanders love.

The right-wing, white supremacist scum that did this deserve every condemnation that has been leveled at them. Period. No equivocation or comparisons. And certainly, there should be no attempt to politicize this tragic and despicable act by connecting it to Donald Trump or conservatives in the United States.

Wait. What?

Within hours of the breaking news coming out of NZ, unhinged commentary out of CNN, MSNBC and other hard-left sources tried mightily to connect Trump to the massacre. Muslims in the US accosted Chelsea Clinton (!!) and blamed her condemnation of Ilhan Omar's anti-Semitic rants as a trigger for the NZ attack. That. Is. Idiocy.

John Hinderacker comments:

Liberals wasted no time trying to make political hay out of the slaughter. The deplorable Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tied the murders to President Trump. It is noteworthy that liberals attribute almost superhuman powers to Donald Trump, attributing responsibility to him for pretty much anything that goes on in the world. The only phenomena for which the Left does not assign responsibility to the president are the intended, beneficent results of his own policies.

The Left cannot win policy arguments on their merits. They do not want a rational debate on, say, the merits of socialism and its ability to better the lives of those who have adopted it. They do not want to examine the effects of uncontrolled social spending and taxation on the economic lives of all citizens. They do not want to examine critically the effects of government dependency on poor and minority populations. They do not want to calmly debate the notion that it's perfectly okay to shut down free speech if it "offends" the sensibilities of those who disagree with that speech.

Instead, they have a compelling need to demonize their opponents and even better, to connect them to heinous acts across the globe. Hence, the NZ atrocity becomes a referendum on Donald Trump's alleged support of white supremacy (a canard that is as ridiculous as it is dishonest).

The world is a harsh and often dangerous place in which hatreds bubble to the surface far more frequently than decent people might like. We saw hatred happen in NZ this past week.