DeVos, education and the 2nd Civil War

So the Democrats got a taste of what they set in motion 3 years ago. Betsy DeVos was confirmed today as the Secretary of Education. Vice president Mike Pence cast the confirming, the tie-breaking, vote. Of course, today you'll hear the gnashing of teeth by democrats as they pretend what happened is simply unprecedented. The fact of the matter is, they have just reaped what they have sown.

We'll see how she does. Of course she has to face a hostile bureaucracy in the department of which she is now in charge. One has to assume, just as in the State Department, career bureaucrats and teacher's union sympathizers will team up to try to slow up and screw up any implementation of a new agenda. Naturally, they're all about "choice". But only if it is about their choice.

For the future, this appointment and what it promises is critical:

"... the importance of this fight for the future of American education cannot be overestimated. Having a White House that is willing to back the most prominent advocate of reform, along with a Republican Senate, creates a unique opportunity. DeVos’s presence at the Department of Education could begin moving the school-choice movement from the margins of the public square to its center. And that is precisely why the forces that are most opposed to shaking up the public monopoly on education funding are so eager to defeat her."

I was recently entertained buy a Bernie Sanders tweet. In it he said:

Betsy DeVos must not become Secretary of Education. We must strengthen public education in America, not destroy it.

I got a chuckle out of that. One wonders if Bernie has bothered to look at the state of education today. Senator Sanders, it has already been destroyed. You've thrown every bit of money one could ask at it and there has been no improvement for decades thanks to "progressives" like you. Time to try something new.

We have touched on Berkeley the last few days and the riot that took place there. Despite the left's best attempts at diverting attention away from the fact that the rioters were representatives of their ideology, the mask has been ripped away and the violence inherent in the ideology exposed to all. John Kass:

For all their talk of tolerance and social justice and diversity, the political left is at bottom, all about force. The force used to silence dissent. The force used to carve out "safe spaces" at universities to protect students from challenging ideas. The force used against those who hold differing views. And ultimately, it is about using the force of government, under the color of law and with government's awesome power to tax and destroy, to compel outcomes, modify behavior, shape culture and change minds.

Banning speech, using violence against the other side and refusing to engage them are not the hallmark of a tolerant ideology. It's time to quit pretending that progressives champion either tolerance or diversity. Diversity is about more and skin color. And tolerance welcomes engagement, it doesn't try to silence it with violence.

Will it get worse? Well here's a warning from a libertarian in Spain. He tells the story of a woman beaten badly by Spanish "progressives" because she had the temerity to wear a small Spanish flag on her bracelet:

You dear libertarians from America and all over the world must be asking yourself “just because she loves her country?” The answer is yes! 

The Spanish left is one of the most violent and reactionary political groups in all Europe. They believe that anything that has to do with patriotism, freedom of expression, or individual rights is fascist. 

Whenever the left has governed this country (Spain) you could see how they divided society to amazing extremes. They bankrupted the country, and if you look at history as a teacher you can learn how they were responsible for pushing the country towards its last civil war (1936 to 1939). They created such fear in the population that now almost no one dares to display a Spanish flag openly, besides in the Olympics and international soccer matches. 

You can’t even identify yourself as religious for fear of backlash and public humiliation.

We talked on the podcast, briefly, about the 2nd Civil War, a war that may be just now beginning to heat up. I mentioned that in the first Civil War there had been irreconcilable differences which drove it.

There are those on both the left and right who call for American unity. But these calls are either naive or disingenuous. Unity was possible between the right and liberals, but not between the right and the left. Dennis Prager has also talked about it ... and the irreconcilable differences we now face.

Liberalism -- which was anti-left, pro-American and deeply committed to the Judeo-Christian foundations of America; and which regarded the melting pot as the American ideal, fought for free speech for its opponents, regarded Western civilization as the greatest moral and artistic human achievement and viewed the celebration of racial identity as racism -- is now affirmed almost exclusively on the right and among a handful of people who don't call themselves conservative. 

The left, however, is opposed to every one of those core principles of liberalism.

Like the left in every other country, the left in America essentially sees America as a racist, xenophobic, colonialist, imperialist, warmongering, money-worshiping, moronically religious nation. 

Just as in Western Europe, the left in America seeks to erase America's Judeo-Christian foundations. The melting pot is regarded as nothing more than an anti-black, anti-Muslim, anti-Hispanic meme. The left suppresses free speech wherever possible for those who oppose it, labeling all non-left speech "hate speech." To cite only one example, if you think Shakespeare is the greatest playwright or Bach is the greatest composer, you are a proponent of dead white European males and therefore racist.

Without any important value held in common, how can there be unity between left and non-left? Obviously, there cannot.

What values do the left and right in this country hold in common anymore? Is there a way to reconcile the divergent paths each side seems to be on? If you take the events of the past few weeks, the answer seems to be "no".

~McQ