When liberals invade

I hear this complaint often. “Our state is being taken over by liberals.” Not just in Nevada, but other states as well. Liberals often flee the socialist dystopias they created and without a second thought set about creating in their new state exactly what they fled from.

California is a good example. In 2018, 700,000 people left California. Most were fed up with high taxes, intrusive government, and an ever-increasing failure of government to solve problems such as homelessness. To be fair, many of those who left share common principles with those whose states they move to. Many, but not all. Idaho and Texas are no longer red, they are turning purple. Nevada, thanks to a strong Las Vegas union presence, has always been purple at best and is now a dark shade of blue.

So why does the right and center right allow this to happen? Surely the numbers still favor their values. That is true in most cases. What is also true is a high level of what might be called apathy but is really more a case of “just leave me alone.” Most just want to live their lives in peace. They want to do their job, come home, and raise their family without interference from others.

So how is that working out? Are you being left alone? Or is the newly-ensconced neighbor with the Prius hybrid somehow changing the breadth of government in your life?

Conservatives and centrists generally offer two options when faced with encroaching leftism. One is to complain. The other is to move. Thus the invasion of Californians into other states. The big question is when will there not be a place to run to? Liberals are often morally wrong, usually intellectually either clueless or dishonest, and spread failure while espousing it as success. They are vocal. They bully anyone who strays from their beliefs, even other leftists. And they are abetted by politicians, Hollywood, and media.

There is a third choice. Stand up and be vocal about your values. But first we need to learn how to fight a foe that has control of almost every sphere of influence. I read an interesting article that addresses this issue and resonated with me. I will try to recap it. The left isn’t winning based on their superior arguments or because they are smarter. The left wins because they play on emotion.

The author used the example of abortion. Pro-lifers lost the second leftists used the term “a woman’s right to choose.” That hits at an emotional level. Who could be against autonomy over your body? After all, isn’t that what America is really about, independence and individual rights?

In their view sucking out an unborn baby from the womb has nothing to do with body autonomy. And it has been a good sales job. Usually the only thing that changes people from pro-choice to pro-life is the gut punch of actually seeing an abortion performed.

So how do we apply this gut punch to other issues? First, quit arguing with liberals based on principle and intellect. It hasn’t and won’t work. We need to make the argument emotional from the conservative perspective. Liberal failures must be emotionally tied to liberalism. Californians didn’t vote to fill streets with drug needles and poop. They were promised that liberal government could solve a problem. Which government made worse. When dealing with a Californian who fled but wants to create what they left, tie the problem of Democrats helping the homeless to the result of needles and poop in the streets.

Tie the programs and policies of liberal failure directly back to the elected officials who made the failed promises. Don’t blame the voters, blame the politicians. Instead of asking how Californian bureaucracy became so out of control or instead of asking how such a beautiful city as San Francisco became overrun with homelessness, say something like “I hear there are needles everywhere in San Francisco, how did that happen?” Often they don’t know. Then the door is open to offering alternative solutions.

Go to county commission and city council meetings. Go to the state legislature. Public turnout nixed a non-medical marijuana dispensary in Fallon. Even if you aren’t successful, a seed of thought may have been planted. Fighting back is hard, frustrating, time consuming, and forces you out of your comfort zone. But it is easier than moving to somewhere the left will eventually show up anyway.