Looters, Arsonists and Eco-Terrorists Oppose Newsom Recall

As of March 17, the Newsom Recall campaign has entered a new phase. With well over 2.0 million signatures turned in, a special election later this year is probable. So probable, in fact, that political campaigning to defend Newsom has begun. And it is the predictable garbage we’ve been conditioned to expect from Democrats.

“Far-right movements including QAnon, virus skeptics linked to Newsom…” blasts the meme, posted 3/15 on @GavinNewsom’s Twitter account.

The official opposition website, paid for by the California Democratic Party, employs the alluringly alliterative tag line “Stop the Republican Recall.” Of course. Tag it with everything you’ve trained voters to revile. Republican equals racist equals Trump equals conspiracy theorist equals domestic terrorist. See how that works?

Newsom’s allies are piling it on. Democratic Assemblyman Evan Low, with a district in the heart of Silicon Valley, posted a tweet on 3/16 that perfectly encapsulates the strategy Newsom is relying on. He writes:

If you support the recall of Gov. @GavinNewsom, you should probably know you’re joining sides with:

Trump
anti-vaxxers
Trump Jr.
Q-anon conspiracy theorists
Rudy Giuliani
white supremacists

You really want to be on that team?

Let’s explore the logic of this strategy, since it shall constitute a significant portion of the creative output we may expect to saturate all media, at staggering expense.

The first problem with relying on this alleged guilt by association is that one must wonder, is there a reciprocal version? That is, if you oppose the recall of Gov. Newsom, are you joining sides with the most violent and divisive sides of the Democratic party?

Imagine this:

If you oppose the recall of Gov. @GavinNewsom, you should probably know you’re joining sides with:

militant looters and arsonists
child traffickers and drug cartels
Hunter Biden
“Blue Anon” conspiracy theorists
communists and Marxists
eco-terrorists

You really want to be on that team?

The only reason that sounds far fetched is because the entire corporate communications apparatus in America is bent on spreading the first message and not the second. There’s no compelling case to be made that Donald Trump Jr. belongs on some odious list, but Hunter Biden does not. Quite the opposite. Nor is there any compelling case that many of the conspiracies circulating on the Right are any more fanciful than those cherished by the Left.

But guilt by association, regardless of whether or not you can flip the target, is flawed reasoning. Let’s put this another way.

There are some things that Hunter Biden, along with militant looters and arsonists, child traffickers, members of murderous drug cartels, progressive conspiracy theorists, communists, Marxists, and eco-terrorists all share in common. They all believe the sky is blue. And they all believe the sun comes up in the morning.

Therefore, if you believe the sky is blue, and the sun comes up in the morning, you’re on that team. Do you really want to be on that team?

Unfortunately, and to state the obvious, a skillfully inculcated perception will overwhelm truth and logic when you have campaign money to burn. And unlike the Republicans, which is a genuine grassroots party, Democrats rely on a perennial torrent of funds from public sector unions, amply supplemented by deep pocket donations from a plethora of multi-billionaires. The biggest lie in America, and California is no exception, is that Republicans are the party of the moneyed elite. Not so. It’s the other way around.

So once Newsom’s defenders have bloodied the recall campaign with enough slime, using a tactic that works through expensive repetition, years of voter conditioning, and a compliant media, maybe they’ll move on to actually trying to defend his performance in office. It won’t be easy. Because support for Newsom, while formidable, is far from monolithic. A lot of Democrats don’t like him.

Newsom’s problem, you see, is he is privileged. This makes him an object of hatred in a party where politicians earn political capital based on how many disadvantages intersect to form their identity. Newsom is tall, thin, rich, white, male, and heterosexual. He has no disadvantages, which is a fatal disadvantage. If Newsom was short, fat, poor, of color, female or trans, and anything but hetero, he would have a future in the Democratic party. As it is, the fact that he has made it this far is an embarrassment to them.

For this reason, Newsom is obligated to do more than just pretend that the campaign to recall him is “linked” to the usual right-wing boogeymen. After all, of the roughly 2.1 million signatures collected by the recall, around 750,000 came from independents and Democrats.

Newsom, in his sly desperation, has actually accused the recall’s lead proponent, Orrin Heatlie, to be “someone who believes we should microchip immigrants.” Heatlie, reached for comment on this, found it laughable. Newsom’s attack machine uncovered a remark, expressed hypothetically to make a larger point, took it out of context, and is riding it for all it’s worth. Sound familiar?

Democrats have acquired power and maintained power using lies and slander. They have nurtured and exploited deep seated paranoia and resentments. They are everything they accuse their political opponents of being and worse, and they are backed up by billions and billions of dollars from some of the most calculating special interests in the world.

Newsom, and his party, have failed normal, ordinary Californians. They have failed in every important facet of public policy: education, housing, homeless, law and order, energy, water, transportation, economic policy, forest management, and more. There are bipartisan solutions to all these challenges that Newsom and his party are either too cowardly or too ideologically blinded to attempt.

That’s what this recall is really about. It’s bigger than Newsom. It’s about how to govern California for the sake of the people instead of the special interests that control the Democratic party. And all the slime and smears and mudslinging in the world will not prevent that process from playing itself out over the next several months. Saddle up.

This article originally appeared on the website California Globe.

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Edward Ring

Edward Ring is a contributing editor and senior fellow with the California Policy Center, which he co-founded in 2013 and served as its first president. He is also a senior fellow with the Center for American Greatness, and a regular contributor to the California Globe. His work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, Forbes, and other media outlets.

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