To hear Republicans tell it these days, Democrats are nothing but radicals, socialists, and Communists who are trying to impose their Marxist policies on all of mankind.
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It's been that way for years, certainly since the good old days of the "There you go again" president, Ronald Reagan, but the crazy rhetoric seems to be worsening in the aftermath of Donald Trump's disastrous presidency and his effort to thwart the Constitution and overturn the 2020 election.
Now it seems that the name calling playbook is being adopted by GOP politicians all the way down the line to local school boards. And Trump's influence is still apparent.
In a recent Facebook post, a conservative South Carolina school board candidate, David Warner, called out local college professor Jeremy Holland for being a "radical sociology teacher" at Horry Georgetown Technical College because of comments Holland made on the Lean to the Left podcast.
Holland criticized politicians who attempt to whip up voter support by attacking the teaching of critical race theory (CRT) in public schools, which does not occur, and which Holland does not teach.
Clearly, Warner is learning from his would-be master, Trump, exaggerating, using innuendo, name calling and guilt by association. He ends an apparently homemade campaign video on Facebook with this line: "We can make Horry County Schools great yet again" over a soundtrack of patriotic music. Wonder where he got that line.
After seeing his Facebook post about Holland, I invited Warner to appear with Holland on a followup episode of Lean to the Left. His response was to block me from his Facebook page.
Small Potatoes
But Warner is small potatoes compared to people like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the QAnon-loving Georgia Congresswoman who recently distributed a fundraising email saying President Biden's "hands are drenched with blood" and blasting him for the "Communist Green New Deal."
She said Biden’s “crippling” of “American energy production” was part of his “scheme to impose socialism on America,” and complained that “Hollywood liberals, Never Trumpers, and insider lobbyists poured $5,000,000,000 into the campaign account of my communist Democrat opponent.”
Wow! $5 billion? Hell, years ago when I was a staffer for a Congressman in Washington, an energy industry lobbyist tried to give me $500 to get my boss to vote his way on some important legislation. What a cheapskate that lobbyist was! Obviously, I told him to go away.
When President Biden and the Democrats were pushing the "Build Back Better" legislation, which would have provided funding for such frivolous niceties as pre-K programs, a child tax credit and clean energy, Republicans were solid in opposition and labeled that initiative a “socialist spending bill,” in the words of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA).
As Washington Post columnist @MaxBoot wrote, "Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) tweets: “A $1.75 trillion #BuildBackSocialist plan is just as socialist as a $3.5 trillion one.” (Note how he squeezed two s-words into one short sentence!) Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) harrumphs: “The American people didn’t vote for a massive socialist transformation.” Sometimes they even use the m-word: Marxism."
Trump
Of course, the master himself, Trump, shamelessly often used those labels in describing Democrats, even linking them to totalitarian regimes abroad -- ironic, given his adoration of Vladimir Putin.
"The courageous veterans here today bear witness to how socialism, radical mobs and violent communists ruin a nation," Trump said at an event to honor veterans of the Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba in September, 2020. "Now the Democrat Party is unleashing socialism right within our own beautiful country."
"Today we proclaim that America will never be a socialist or communist country," he continued. "I'm going to add that word, communist. I've never added that word but I think it's appropriate when you look at the kind of ideology we're also facing. When you see the rioters, looters, anarchists and then you see the press, the media play right into their hands."
All of this, while incredible, is not the least bit surprising. The Republicans have nothing to offer except to say "no", and so they resort to name calling, label using, negative branding -- anything to get their followers worked into a frenzy. And even local school board candidates, who in South Carolina are supposed to be non-partisan, are falling in line.
Here's a question: Who would rather have running your schools? School board members who support free speech, telling the truth, recognizing history both good and bad, or those who want to ban books and deny the realities that have existed, and still exist, in America?
It's an important question to decide.