The Left’s Linguistic War
Originally published at Fox News by Newt Gingrich
One of the key lessons of the 2018 elections is that the Left is waging – and winning – a linguistic war.
The Left claims and occupies more and more linguistic ground with each new fight.
Defense of the Founding Fathers becomes defense of white, racist, slaveowners.
Defense of American identity becomes an act of white male domination.
Racism is so commonly used by left-wing news media and politicians to describe conservative positions that one poll shows that 61 percent of Democrats believe Republicans are racist/bigoted/sexist (a study of CNN’s and MSNBC’s use of the word racist to describe conservative and Republican positions would be breathtaking).
Wanting to obey the law in counting votes becomes an effort to suppress votes and disenfranchise poor people, minorities, and immigrants.
The presumption of Democrats winning is so great that Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown said, “[I]f Stacey Abrams doesn’t win in Georgia, they stole it, it’s clear.”
Every day, we are watching Democrats break and stretch the law for the sole purpose of winning, while they attack Republicans for wanting an honest count of legal voters.
Democrats and their liberal media allies know that if they repeat something often enough it begins to be accepted as truth.
However, the Left’s interest in winning the language war is only the first step toward legitimizing real threats and mob behavior.
Once they win the language fight, they can claim moral superiority. Once they have gained moral dominance, they can do anything to their opponents because they will be presumed right, and their opponents will be presumed wrong.
This is how Tucker Carlson’s wife found herself home alone, facing a mob that was pounding at her door so hard they cracked it.
The most recent example of the left-wing fascist threats and their impact comes from Seattle, where an independent candidate has been intimidated into withdrawing from a city council race by left-wing thugs.
As the former candidate, Christopher Rufo, wrote to his supporters:
“I had hoped that this would be a campaign of ideas, but I quickly discovered that there are some activists in this city who have no interest in ideas. Since the campaign launch, they have harassed and threatened my family nonstop. I was prepared to take the heat, but unfortunately, they have focused their hatred on my wife and children. They’ve made vile racist attacks against my wife, attempted to get her fired from her job, and threatened sexual violence. They even posted hateful messages to my 8-year-old son’s school message board. I know that as the race progresses, they will ratchet up their hate-machine and these attacks will intensify significantly…
“I know in my heart that our cause is just and our ideas would make Seattle a better place. But my primary responsibility is to make sure my family is healthy, happy, and safe. That’s not possible in our current political climate, which has been overtaken by polarization and the ever-present threat of violence.
“I’ve learned that our problem here in Seattle is much deeper than the city council’s policies—we have created a culture of intolerance that is deeply destructive to the common good.”
We are entering a dark period where freedom of speech becomes intimidation by the Left, where freedom of association becomes mobs threatening violence, where the very meanings of words are twisted to browbeat conservatives into silence.
The efforts to steal the governorships of Georgia and Florida and the Senate seat in Florida are only the tip of the iceberg of illegality and hostility that the Left now practices routinely.
Conservatives must develop new strategies, approaches, and skills to defeat the linguistic war of condemnation, hatred, and intimidation being waged every day by the Left.
This is a new era with new requirements. The skills and strategies of the past will simply fail.
Developing the conservative solution to the Left’s linguistic war is a major step toward winning in 2020 – and preserving our society.
