Political parties and candidates have a long tradition of using biting insults against one another. In some ways, today's rhetoric looks tame compared to the past, but in other ways, it is very different and much uglier.
The presidential campaign of 1828, when Andrew Jackson sought to unseat President John Quincy Adams, was as bitter and nasty as it got at the time, with the honor of the candidates’ wives brought onto the political playing field—especially poor Rachael Jackson.
The Smithsonian Institute said, “Rachel Jackson, the “profligate woman” in question - not only was Rachel a divorcée, but rumor had it that she and Andrew had lived together before she was legally separated from her husband. In papers across the nation, she was called a bigamist, adulteress, and a whore, and critics questioned whether her character was suitable for the White House."
The big difference today is that rather than insulting one candidate, or their wife as the case may be, the Democrat Party has developed a strategy of personally demonizing wide swaths of Americans for their political and policy beliefs – tens of millions of Americans. The intent is to degrade and divide not to debate policy. You aren’t simply wrong on policy – you are a bad person.
Barack Obama called Republicans “bitter clingers” – his insult for Americans who are religious people for “clinging “ to their bibles and those who exercised their Second Amendment right by “clinging” to their pistols.
Hillary Clinton added to this in her now infamous presidential debate with Donald Trump where she referred to his supporters as “a basket of deplorables”. She wasn’t just attacking Trump the candidate, she was attacking every Trump supporter – all 63 million voters and their families.
Clinton wasn’t disagreeing with your policy position and making a rebuttal argument, she and the Democrat Party she represented were calling you personally a “deplorable”.
Clinton went on in that campaign to call her opposition “racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic, and Islamophobic”. It didn’t go well for her then or since. No one likes a scold let alone someone who falsely thinks you, your family, and your friends are terrible, hateful people.
Since the Hillary Clinton days, the Biden-Harris-Walz team, the Democrat Party, and all of their surrogates have upped their “deplorable” game and are now routinely calling Trump supporters “Nazis and Fascists”. Trump got over 74 million votes in the last election. Are we really to believe that over 74 million people and their families are Nazis and Fascists?
There were a little over 161 million registered voters in 2022. Wouldn’t the average American notice if 46% of the voters walking around on Main St., shopping in the grocery stores, and going to PTA meetings were Nazis and Fascists?
And, now President Biden calls supporters of former President Trump “Garbage” in his reaction to a joke told by a comic at a Trump rally.
Biden says, “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters”.
Biden says the “demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it's un-American” and it would be if the joke, however flat it fell, was intended to be an insult. Much like comedian George Lopez’ joke about Mexicans being criminals at a Harris rally, they are jokes - poor taste and maybe not funny jokes – but jokes nonetheless.
It is especially rich that in a campaign cycle where Biden, Harris, Walz, and practically every one of their surrogates calls Trump supporters Nazis and Fascists, Biden would refer to a joke as un-American. He and the Democrat Party might need a mirror if this is their standard of un-American.
Why are things different now? For my whole life until I’d say the 2016 election, we always had agreement on the basic tenants of America and our Constitution. We could disagree at the Thanksgiving table on methods and still break bread with one another and leave with respect for our friends and family. We were united as Americans.
It is different now because we aren't disagreeing on methods to get the same goal - a strong and Constitutionally-led America. The controlling Left wing of the Democrat Party does not agree with this goal any longer. They are committed to breaking down the Constitution, changing the Supreme Court, and taking away the fundamental rights of all Americans.
If it takes labeling half the country as 'Garbage' and "Nazis' to reach their goals then so be it. It would appear the far-left Democrats think the ends justify the means and if regular Americans who have different policy perspectives need to be used as fodder they are willing to do it.