As I’ve said before, there are no finish lines in politics, only checkpoints along the way. No defeat is permanent, no victory lasts forever. Republicans forgetting that reality might explain why we lose so often. How about we don’t do that this year? How about we put aside all the petty differences and recognize that while many on our side disagree about the issues and who the candidate should’ve been, the bigger, more pressing problem at the moment is Joe Biden and the agenda of the Democrats?
I realize this likely won’t be easy for some and will be a tap-in putt for others – I had my preference as to who I would’ve preferred to be the nominee, but I was always going to, and will always vote for any Republican over every Democrat, no matter what.
Unfortunately, a lot of people don’t share that sentiment. There are people who’d prefer to fire down our own trench rather than toward the other side. They prefer purity over principles.
I’m not talking about any candidate, I’m talking about every candidate’s supporters.
If you agree with any candidate 100 percent of the time, you’re probably not very interesting and you’re definitely not much of a critical thinker. If you are a “my way or the highway” person, you’re in the same boat – the SS Cut Off Your Nose to Spite Your Face.
Congratulations, you’re a supporter of Democrats. Inadvertently, probably, but a supporter nonetheless.
People in that boat will swear up and down it is they who are the standard bearers for conservatism, and everyone else is misled or dumb. They’re usually selling something, and it’s always themselves. The harder someone insists they are telling you the truth, that they’re an honest broker, the tighter you need to hold on to your wallet.
While I’d love your money too, I’d rather win. I’m all for having the knock-down, drag-out fight between various factions of the conservative movement – about taxes, health care, abortion, regulation, the border, whatever – but not until AFTER progressive leftists are vanquished. You want to argue, I’m down. But how about we wait till be beat who we both acknowledge is the real problem.
Reversing the order of that fight is like going to the doctor for a hangnail instead of the gangrene on your hand. Work the problem big to small, otherwise things will only get worse.
Nikki Haley doesn’t like Donald Trump, Donald Trump doesn’t like Nikki Haley. Ron DeSantis doesn’t like either of them, and neither of them like Ron DeSantis. So what? As the odds of you being any of them are slim, and none of them know any of us exist as individuals, we can either get lost in the stupidity of politics or beat the hell out of Democrats. It’s your choice.
You can’t help but notice on social media all the constant complaining about how this one or that one isn’t “loyal enough” or showing deference to someone else. We aren’t a monarchy, we don’t have to bow or defer to anyone. If you want that, you wildly misunderstood the founding of this country and should consider suing whatever elementary school you attended for malpractice.
At the end of the day, it’s who you vote for that matters. Why you voted for them does not, how tightly you clenched your teeth doesn’t make your vote count any differently. Cast out of love or hate, one vote is one vote.
It’s time for people to take yes for an answer and move on. If you’re wasting calories attacking people whose vote you have, all you’ll succeed in doing is inspiring them not to vote. You can jackass your candidate out of victory. Don’t do it.
On the other side, you don’t have to like a candidate to recognize they will do what you want an elected official to do. A lot of championship teammates hated each other, but they put it aside to win. The “Never Trumpers” who insisted their whole lives they supported various policies, only to oppose their implementation because the vessel achieving them was someone they didn’t like were opportunists, not principled. If they aren’t getting paid, no one is getting paid.
They’re gone. We’re what’s left. No matter where you fall on the issues or which candidate you wanted, we are all here now and as indigestion-inducing as you may find that reality, the alternative is worse.
To prevent losing you might have to bite your tongue, but the point of an election is addition, not subtraction. If you’re doing something that flies in the face of that, you’re doing it wrong. The fight is over, now the real fight begins.
Derek Hunter is the host of a free daily podcast (subscribe!) and author of the book, Outrage, INC., which exposes how liberals use fear and hatred to manipulate the masses, and host of the weekly “Week in F*cking Review” podcast where the news is spoken about the way it deserves to be. Follow him on Twitter at @DerekAHunter.