After spending the last 8 years decrying the loss of “Democracy”, Democrats are doing a magnificent job of proving they have no idea what the word means. The left is gleefully chortling about the ongoing brouhaha on the right over H1-B visas, heralding it as a failure of the MAGA movement. But vociferous, sometimes antagonistic debate is a necessary precondition of a functioning representative government.
Democrats may be baffled that the right can go at each other as hard as we go at them, and see it as weakness, but that’s only because their side of the aisle has so thoroughly stifled anything close to real debate among themselves that the very concept now seems alien. They allowed cancel culture and purity tests to replace popular contestation of their ideas, and still don’t realize their loss in November was a direct result. They drove the likes of Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema from their ranks, and did the same to Elon Musk and a large cadre of leading technologists. Instead of recognizing they made a mistake, the left is doubling down and actively seeking to push yet another Senator, John Fetterman, from their ranks.
The argument on the right over H1-B visas will be settled on the right soon enough, and what comes from that debate will likely lead to significant benefits for U.S. citizens. We need the best and brightest from around the world to help power our future, but we don’t need hordes of low and middle-skilled workers dragging down wages and limiting opportunities for citizens. Both sides of the debate can be right, and wrong, at the same time. A public brawl is the best way to come to solutions that provide the most benefit to the greatest number of Americans. It may be messy, but it’s exactly the type of debate the Founding Fathers didn’t just tolerate, but actively demanded in our Constitution.
Starting in 2016 with former President Obama’s re-election run, Democrats replaced dissent with accusations of racism, hatred, and harmful bias and used those accusations to shut down opposition to a radical shift in their policies. The outcome of that change in both governance and social cohesion has been devastating. Opposition on the left can no longer be tolerated as honest opinion, but must be punished as heresy – an attitude that has served to turn everyday political differences into culture wars. Meanwhile, programs and policies formulated by the left in this environment have made government less efficient and more invasive.
Republicans should take that lesson to heart. Debate is democracy, and we don’t always have to agree to get along.
Note: the opinions expressed herein are those of Sam Stone only and not his co-host Chuck Warren or Breaking Battlegrounds’ staff.
