Donald Trump has caused a great deal of political turmoil over the past 16 months, but perhaps the most surprising change he has wrought in the American political landscape has been this: numerous times he has forced liberals to denounce beliefs or positions they have otherwise espoused for years.
Why is this the case? Perhaps, understandably liberals do not want to associate themselves with Trump or with anything Trump believes. Or perhaps liberals don’t really believe in anything at all (other than the consolidation of state power), so they’re happy to abandon their core convictions whenever it’s politically expedient for them to do so. Who knows?
In any event, here are six great examples of the ways how, in the face of Donald Trump, liberals have run away from the things they used to insist they believe.
Race Relations Are Now Awesome and Poverty Nonexistent
What Trump Says: Black Americans are enduring terrible circumstances: “Poverty. Rejection. Horrible education. No housing. No homes. No ownership. Crime at levels nobody has seen.”
How Liberals Responded: Trump’s remarks were “lurid and fantastical,” a kind of “racist fearmongering,” a “white supremacist fantasy in which blacks live miserable, brutish, and nearly subhuman lives in cities dominated by feckless Democrats.”
What Liberals Used to Say: There is “remarkable durability to the structure of racial inequality in this country.” Black Americans are the victims of racial inequality because America “never really tried desegregation in any sustained way. We never really tried to rectify the massive inequalities in wealth and opportunity that existed in 1964 and 1968 and [they] kind of just perpetuated themselves.” As well, “so many of the problems that we had in 1968 [with regards to black Americans] were never actually solved.”
American Elections Are Totally Never Fraudulent
What Trump Said: “The election is absolutely being rigged.”
How Liberals Responded: Trump’s election-rigging accusations are “dangerous and unsubstantiated,” Trump’s “attempt to delegitimize elections is dangerous”; there is, in fact, “no evidence there’s anything ‘rigged’ happening at polling places.”
What Liberals Used to Say: In 2013: “How Republicans plan to rig the presidential election.” Also: “How the Michigan GOP is planning to rig the next presidential election.” And again: “RNC Chair suggests how to rig the next presidential election for Republicans.” In 2012: “The new plan to rig the 2016 election for the GOP.”
(As a matter of fact, the entire Democrat history of crying “Rigged!” is far too broad for the scope of this brief article.)
Not Okay to Foment Domestic Insurrection Any More
What Trump Said: When asked if he would accept the results of the election if Clinton wins on November 8, Trump claimed: “I will keep you in suspense.”
How Liberals Responded: Trump’s tease was “a statement of disloyalty to the American system of government without precedent since 1860, when Southern Democrats vowed to leave the union if the Republican Party prevailed.”
What Liberals Used to Say: “Yes, Bush v. Gore Did Steal the Election.”
Criminals Must Get Away With It Because America
What Trump Said: “If I win, I am going to instruct my attorney general to get a special prosecutor to look into [Hillary’s e-mail] situation…We will get a special prosecutor and look into it.”
How Liberals Responded: “Let’s be clear: a candidate for president promised to put his opponent in jail if he wins. Everything else is secondary.”
What Liberals Used to Say: “[T]o protect and defend the Constitution, a president must do more than obey the Constitution himself; he must hold those who violate the Constitution accountable. So [the president] should reconsider his apparent decision to let the previous administration get away with crime. Consequences aside, that’s not a decision he has the right to make.”
How to Treat Women Who Accuse Powerful Men of Sexual Impropriety
What Trump Said: “All of these liars [who accused Trump of assault] will be sued after the election is over.”
How Liberals Responded: “Our opponent, Donald Trump…basically said if he’s president he will spend his time suing women who have made charges against him based on his behavior.”
What Liberals Used to Say: “We have to destroy her story.”
America Is Already Great, Duh
What Trump Says: ”Make America great again!”
How Liberals Responded: “America is already great!”
What Liberals Used to Say: We need to “fundamentally transform the United States of America!”
What core value or belief will Trump cause liberals to abandon next? There’s still a few weeks left yet. Soon he may have them denouncing gay marriage and top marginal tax rates of 91 percent!