As you all know, Charlie Kirk was killed today, leaving behind a wife, two young children, and a movement. I had the pleasure of meeting Charlie nine years ago, at the start of his amazing rise as a voice of young conservatism, and I came away deeply impressed, a perception that never left me. But to understand both Charlie and his death, you need to understand the madness of the left. (And no, we don’t yet know who shot him, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t someone with MAGA hats in his closet.)

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Almost exactly nine years ago, a young man named Charlie Kirk stepped onto the stage at the 2016 Republican National Convention and blew everyone away. At the time, he was only 22, but, with Bill Montgomery, he’d already been leading Turning Point USA for four years. Outside of college campuses, though, where he was trying to make headway against overwhelming leftism, few had heard of Charlie. After his speech, though, every conservative knew who he was.

Back then, I was the speakers’ chair for a small conservative organization in Marin County. I emailed Charlie and asked if he’d come to speak to our group, and he instantly agreed to do so. On October 12, 2016, he came to Mill Valley, had lunch with us, and then gave an hour-long speech. I wrote about it in a post that same day:

I had the privilege of hearing Charlie Kirk speak today. Oh. My. God. Charlie is a human dynamo:  incredible intelligence and moral decency wrapped up in pure energy and passion, presented through the medium of a riveting presence.

His speech (which I summarize in my post) was intelligent, informed, and, as it turned out, prophetic. In other words, I was absolutely right in my estimation of Charlie. It was apparent then that he’d be someone important in the world of conservative ideas, especially in transmitting them, not to the old fogies in my group, but to young people trapped in the leftist ideological hell of campus Maoism.

In the ensuing years, Charlie made a name for himself, not for demanding that people be executed, imprisoned, tortured, but for going to campus after campus and engaging with student leftists. He was always polite and respectful, but he did something those young students had never seen before: He demanded that they intelligently defend their ideas. They couldn’t, of course. He made leftists lose face.

And then, today, someone—we don’t yet know who that someone was, but we all have guesses that don’t involve fellow conservatives—destroyed that vital, meaningful young life.

But while conservatives are outraged and horrified, none are surprised. This is what happens when you have several decades of Democrats, most loudly in the media, but also in political speeches and classrooms, demonizing those whom they dislike as Hitlers. It’s the meme:

Democrats may be historically illiterate, but there’s one thing they know: Hitler is bad, so good people kill Hitler. Just as the Islamists have been doing, the leftists have created dozens, hundreds, even thousands of lone wolves, all of whom are carefully cultivated time bombs who give the people in the pulpits plausible deniability. “We didn’t tell them to kill. They decided to do it on their own.”

Throw in several thousand mentally ill, heavily medicated, and physically mutilated people who have been assured that they can change their fundamental biological being through will-power and cultural bullying, and you’ve got a boiling cauldron of murderous rage.

And so Charlie Kirk had to die.

I put on my big girl pants and wandered over to Bluesky to see what the seething leftist masses had to say. I was not disappointed, only disgusted. When I typed in “Charlie Kirk,” roughly 25% of the posts I saw properly expressed dismay that a person was murdered for having political views with which they disagreed. Another 25% or so said that the problem was guns, so Kirk, who believed in the Second Amendment, had it coming.

And 50% were bat-fecal-matter crazy, celebrating Kirk’s death, and believing that it was all a plot to allow Trump to gain total fascist (i.e., Hitlerian) control over America. Here are just a few I grabbed before I was sickened by the whole thing:

Even worse, it wasn’t only in the fetid swamp of Bluesky. It went right into the heart of the federal government:

.@SpeakerJohnson: "The Chair would ask that all members present in the Chamber and those in the gallery please rise for a moment of prayer for Charlie Kirk and his family."

After the moment, various lawmakers can be heard shouting about prayers and gun control. pic.twitter.com/xDRkOMm0t4

— CSPAN (@cspan) September 10, 2025

Speaker Mike Johnson holds a moment of prayer for Charlie Kirk and his family. When Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado rises to ask for an additional moment, she is shouted down by Dems. Johnson offers additional group prayer following the House session. pic.twitter.com/9Nda9hh8we

— Libby Emmons (@libbyemmons) September 10, 2025

And of course, MSNBC did its thing:

PURE EVIL: At a moment when the entire country is unified in prayer for Charlie Kirk, MSNBC is speculating that the assassin may have been “a supporter of Charlie shooting their gun off in celebration.”

MSNBC needs to have their broadcast license revoked immediately. pic.twitter.com/F6pSry5eBm

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) September 10, 2025

MSNBC calls Charlie Kirk "divisive" and "polarizing" AFTER he was shot.

You can't hate them enough.

pic.twitter.com/Y6JEdEJj13

— john jackson (@pvtjokerus) September 10, 2025

Going back to the French Revolution, leftists have been marinated in violence. It’s their language. And beginning in 2016, with Trump’s first term, they began picking up volume. Now, they’re at bullet-blasting decibels, and this cannot be sustained. Conservative outrage is even greater than it was with the two assassination attempts on Trump.

Ever since Lincoln, we’ve recognized that politicians, unfortunately, will be targets. However, something has shifted when someone like Charlie Kirk is killed. He’s just another guy, only better at what he does. He’s one of us, and he was killed for being one of us.

This will not end well.