A marvelous feature of the Culture War is that it is the thinkers not government leaders who are waging and winning it. At least not the national leaders — yet. A few regional ones like Ron DeSantis of Florida and Glenn Youngkin of Virginia have more than pulled their weight, turning their states from the brink of progressive lunacy to oases of normalcy. Especially DeSantis, as the leftist DC gravitational pull in Virginia appears to be inescapable. But nationally, even the man who helped end the most inhuman blight since slavery — constitutional abortion via Roe v. Wade — has made himself a Culture War embarrassment.
The Donald Trump of 2016 and 2020 would have given a rapid unequivocal “No” when asked if a man can become a woman. The current presidential frontrunner Trump totally blew his response when radio star Megyn Kelly posed the question. After a painfully long pause, he answered, “Uhmm,” followed by an indecisive, “In my opinion, you have a man, you have a woman,” then the painful, pointless, “I-I-I think part of it is birth,” and finally, “No.”
READ MORE from Lou Aguilar: Mars Needs Women
Infinitely worse, Trump called Florida’s six-week pro-baby bill, signed by DeSantis, a “terrible mistake” on Meet the Press. Attacking hard-won cultural victories from the left is a bad look for a Republican candidate, and DeSantis made the point to Glenn Beck (starts 41:45). “Protecting unborn babies that have detectable heartbeats is not terrible. It’s noble. It’s just. And it should be something that anyone who says that they’re pro-life would embrace.”
Trump in 2024 has become the living embodiment of O’Sullivan’s First Law (John O’Sullivan was a former Margaret Thatcher advisor and current National Review columnist), a “law” consistently predictive. “All organizations that are not actually right-wing will over time become left-wing.” The sad irony is that Trump’s equivocation only bolsters the very forces that destroyed his presidency to deny him a second term (and probably will again) even while he seeks to placate them. And for a politician who once read a room like few others, his timing could not be worse. For it is the cultural warriors he now slams, like DeSantis, who are making America better if not yet great again.
The Florida governor took relentless heat from all sides for lancing the Woke Disney behemoth in his state, with Trump the most contemptuous. “DeSanctus is being absolutely destroyed by Disney,” Trump said on Truth Social. “Disney’s next move will be the announcement that no more money will be invested in Florida because of the Governor. In fact they could even announce a slow withdrawal or sale of certain properties, or the whole thing. Watch!” And watch we did, to discover that Trump was completely wrong about Disney, and “DeSanctus” entirely right. (READ MORE: The Left’s War on Young People)
Last week, Disney CEO Bob Iger signaled a retreat in the Culture War, telling investors that the company will “quiet the noise” in the conflict. Iger then announced that Disney will double its investment in theme parks and cruise ships over the next decade. So much for Trump’s “slow withdrawal,” Iger had previously indicated his company’s capitulation to the DeSantis view. “Our primary mission is to entertain,” he said in April. “It should not be agenda-driven.”
I’d say the elites’ beclowning has already begun. And it is with them that Trump has sadly decided to play ball.
While Trump gropes for a poor reply to the transgender question in 2023, realists like DeSantis, Matt Walsh (What Is a Woman?), and Jordan Peterson are radically derailing the insanity train this year. Walsh’s clarity led to the governor of his home state, Tennessee, Bill Lee, signing a bill prohibiting child-mutilation surgery to attain the unattainable — cross-sexual transference. That didn’t stop mainstream huckster media from trying to politically correct the truth, as did CNN (“Tennessee Governor signs ban on gender-affirming care for minors”), The Tennessean (“Gov. Bill Lee signs ban on gender-affirming care for minors, drag restrictions into law”), and Daily Beast (“Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee Signs Anti-LGBTQ Child Welfare Bill Into Law”). And yet the tide has turned against the trans deluders.
In far-gone California last week, the beyond woke Governor Gavin Newsom faced a dilemma. On his desk lay a most inopportune bill, passed by the cartoonishly leftist State Assembly, requiring judges to favor the parent who “affirms” her or his child’s “gender identity” in custody cases. Newsom would have normally welcomed such a bill and virtue-signaled on it. But he was smart enough to know that signing it would doom his presidential chances in the still sane majority of America. So, he chose practicality over ideology and vetoed the thing.
In Canada, a court had sided with the College of Psychologists of Ontario that universally popular psychologist Jordan Peterson undergo reeducation for his conservative “anti-trans” scholarship. Peterson then vowed to make his re-education public, which will most certainly beclown his re-educators and the entire College of Psychologists of Ontario. And thanks to wiser Canadian heads like Peterson, the Trudeau fantasyland is now shakier ground. (READ MORE: Jordan Peterson Speaks of God)
Last week, hundreds of thousands of parents protested LGBTQ-plus indoctrination in their children’s schools in cities all over the country. A website promoting the protest advocated “for the elimination of the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) curriculum, pronouns, gender ideology and mixed bathrooms in schools.” A panicky Prime Minister Trudeau lambasted the parents, X-ing, “Transphobia, homophobia, and biphobia have no place in this country. We strongly condemn this hate and its manifestations, and we stand in support of 2SLGBTQI+.”
Biphobia? 2SLGBTQI+? I’d say the elites’ beclowning has already begun. And it is with them that Trump has sadly decided to play ball. Consequently, I’ll vote for Trump if he wins the nomination. Any Republican would be better than a pro-infanticide, trans-fantasist Democrat. But my heart won’t be in it, as it is for a real cultural warrior like DeSantis.
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