Too Stupid for Words: NBC News Op-ed Claims Voting for Trump Not Only Racist But Unconstitutional
Has the dumbest article of 2020 already been written?
It’s still very early in 2020, but when it comes to stupid political columns, we may already have a winner. A recent op-ed published by NBC News suggests that voting for Trump is not only racist and unethical, it violates the Constitution.
The author, Noah Berlatsky, seems to be serious about this if you can believe it:
Trump voters motivated by racism may be violating the Constitution. Can they be stopped?
If the Trump era has taught us anything, it’s that large numbers of white people in the United States are motivated at least in part by racism in the voting booth. Donald Trump ran an openly racist campaign for president, calling Mexicans rapists and criminals, regularly retweeting white supremacists and at least initially balking at repudiating former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. Trump made it clear in his campaign that “Make America Great Again” meant that America was greater when white people’s power was more sweeping and more secure. White voters approved of that message by a whopping 58 percent to 37 percent.
Some politicians deny the evidence, no doubt because they don’t want to alienate white voters, including prejudiced ones. Other commentators try to parse whether Trump’s racism will be a winning strategy in 2020. Terry Smith, a visiting professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law, offers a different response in his new book, “Whitelash: Unmasking White Grievance at the Ballot Box.” Rather than excuse racist voters or try to figure out how to live with their choices, he argues that racist voting is not just immoral, but illegal. The government, Smith says, has the ability, and the responsibility, to address it.
This sounds radical. But Smith argues that it’s in line with the Constitution and with years of court rulings. For example, Smith points out that racist appeals in union elections are illegal and that an election in which one side uses racist appeals can be invalidated by the National Labor Relations Board.
Byron York of the Washington Examiner provides this enlightening tidbit about the writer:
To be fair, the author of the NBC racist-voters-violated-Constitution-by-voting-for-Trump piece is a ‘comics expert’ and ‘cultural critic’ whose works include ‘Wonder Woman: Bondage and Feminism in the Marston/Peter Comics, 1941-1948.’ https://t.co/SMr4CkQOGS
— Byron York (@ByronYork) January 17, 2020
Twitchy has rounded up some responses to the piece:
The Constitution places limits on government. Private citizens can’t do anything unconstitutional ever. https://t.co/2Ddf6z2ZGw
— Eric Spencer (@JustEric) January 18, 2020
This is a professor of law who apparently doesn’t understand the First Amendment or the Sixth Amendment or that free speech rights in labor issues are restricted. https://t.co/395DDpyaWA pic.twitter.com/DwtO7pYehO
— Mo Mo (@molratty) January 18, 2020
Because the 6th Amendment protects defendants from racism and the NRLB can protect union elections (where free speech can be restricted), Berlatsky extrapolates that being “racist by voting” is unconstitutional and voters can be fined or otherwise punished, despite 1A. pic.twitter.com/DPMhmUkdLF
— Mo Mo (@molratty) January 18, 2020
This entire article is filled with falsehoods.. it really burns me that a national news org would publish something like this. Idc who you prefer to vote for, you should not be fed half truths or all out lies by a respected news source…
Get mad people! https://t.co/VWLhBsDMF3
— Kelly Rae (@kellyrae2723) January 18, 2020
While it’s tempting to just point and laugh, Ace of Spades provides some sobering analysis:
And for those who say “Oh, this is just an opinion piece” —
1, it’s an opinion piece pushed by a billion-dollar corporation. They’ve moved the Overton Window to the point where this now fair grist for consideration.
2, The opinion they’re pushing is an official government apartheid, but with a target class selected by the antifa left.
3, the extremism of their demands is accelerating. Only recently they started agitating to repeal the First Amendment’s right to free speech; that is now in peril, and restricted where it still exists. Now they’re upping the ante to say that the right to vote must also be limited — and preserved only for the right people, who vote the “right way.”
4, the last opinion they pushed — which the “reasonable” fake conservatives told me wasn’t anything to worry about — was the idea that a man could wake up one day and declare himself a woman, and that I would be under legal compulsion to agree with his delusion.
And now that’s a fact of daily life.
These are not just hot takes. These are previews of coming attractions.
The fact that NBC News would publish this piece speaks volumes. The left isn’t trying to hide their most authoritarian ideas anymore, and the media is seemingly happy to play along.
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Comments
It’s not stupid. Stop calling it stupid.
It’s malicious.
It’s not designed to convince anybody. It’s designed to start bringing leftists around to the idea that they can strip rights away from conservatives as long as they declare them racist. As long as you have the Right Reasons, you can ignore little things like the Constitution.
Stop calling them stupid and listen to what they’re telling you. They’re telling you that you are not ALLOWED to vote for anybody they don’t approve of.
If the Left ever takes power again they will never, EVER give it up willingly.
Act accordingly.
The Supremes have agreed to hear a case on whether or not electors must vote to reflect the popular vote.
The popular vote in their state is what you mean to say.
As Kurt Schlichter advises, “Buy guns and ammo”.
Truly. This is why the people of VA must resist their government, with force if necessary, on Monday. We have reached the point where they are ready to take our guns, they’re already talking about what they plan to do once they have them. It is not a joke. It can’t be excused as “modern times” during which things like this don’t happen “here.” Every violent act of government against its own people has always occurred “in modern times” and “here,” there is no other place and time for anything to occur but the here and now.
“Stop calling it stupid. It’s malicious….”
Absolutely right. Like the violent criminal losers surrounding bernie sanders (radical leftists surrounding radical leftists are always violent criminal losers – ever notice that? radical leftist need Brownshirt thugs), this kind of propaganda is their care and feeding. It also helps enlist new losers.
‘It’s not stupid. “…
Not if you ask a rat like mittens romney.
So what you’re saying is, this proposal is designed to bring leftists around to believing what they already believe, have been saying they believe, and have been acting like they believe, for most of my life.
Thanks for the heads-up. I still think it’s stupid because it’s been stupid all along.
Dusty, I think it’s an attempt to say “all clear” OK to express this in public now.
“It’s okay to express in public” what they have been saying they believe for most of my life.
How did I now about it, if they weren’t expressing it in public 40 years ago?
Because the every day average American pays little attention to this stuff and has no idea what the progs really have in store for them.
You’re not average.
Problem is our side is not going to win by dismissing this sort of thing out of hand with ridicule. The fact remains that in 2018 60 million votes were cast for Dem House candidates vs. only 50 million for the GOP, so it is clear that quite a few people take these proposals seriously.
What is needed is not legalistic appeals to the Constitution, but recognition that these people are willing to commit violence against ordinary citizens to impose their will. Cf. all kinds of Antifa activity, vandalism at GOP campaign offices, harassment of Trump Admin officials in restaurants, James Hodgkinson, etc. We need to respond by asserting (as preposterous as it might be) that there is no right to vote for anyone other than Trump, and back it up with as much force as required.
Google some of the crap Noah Berlatsky has written …. this guy is so woke, he NEVER sleeps.
This is another leftist step toward the elimination of the citizen vote. As was said earlier, it is rational behavior in support of our journey to totalitarian Utopia. It is not stupidity. It is dangerous and NBC knows what they are doing. It must be countered aggressively.
The deep state thought they could rig the election. Then, the damn voters elected Trump. They can’t risk that happening again. Thus the sham impeachment and anti-voter crap like this editorial. This is warfare. Know the enemy. They intend to take control.
PMSDNC Larry O’Donnell also claims they don’t book liars. That because Larry does that job himself. While he pontificated this statement all that came to my mind was him backing off his Russia co-signer tale on live TV.
O’Donnell is a leaping, screaming, raving, flaming ass. And that’s being charitable. The clip of his “STOP THE HAMMERING” rant is one for the ages.
O’Donnell is also at ldeast eight innings short of a complete game.
O’Donnell is either mentally ill, or he is the ultimate hack.
Either way, we have to protect ourselves from these maniacs.
To listen to the left you’ll come away believing that the Constitution itself is unconstitutional.
And that of course follows since the aim of the left is unrestrained government. The purpose of the Constitution was to restrain, to limit, the created government, not the people.
Remember, the only known alternative to limited government is unlimited government. The 20th century alone has plenty of examples of what happens, examples that abound throughout history,
Death by Government: Genocide and Mass Murder Since 1900, by Rummell,
https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE1.HTM
Read the words of lefty professor James MacGregor Burns of just how important a limiting document is,
“Let us face reality. The framers (of the Constitution) have simply been too shrewd for us. They have outwitted us. They designed separate institutions that cannot be unified by mechanical linkages frail bridges(or) tinkering. If we are to turn the founders upside down we must directly confront the Constitutional structure they erected.”
Well….even SCOTUS hasn’t abided by the Constitution by making up things….it’s those invisible words between the lines that were used in some decisions.
Are we about to fight a civil war to give these yoyo’s back the rights they are trying to take away now? The very freedoms they despise they will dearly wish they had if they push it too far. Or….if they win…The same outcome befalls us. So much for the goal of a “perfect union”. Unless it’s a perfect (soviet) union.
“To listen to the left you’ll come away believing that the Constitution itself is unconstitutional.”
After all, that is what Reynolds v Sims was all about–a trial run against the Constitution.
Diversitist, immoral, and uncivil. Also, denialistic?
Color judgments, irreligious (e.g. aPro-Choice or “ethical”/relativistic), and progressive liberal (i.e. monotonically divergent). Also, “good” Americans? Ok.
Last night I had some movie on in which one of the characters said something to the effect that working for (Big woke news organization) means being willing to pay the price for telling the truth.
I almost turned the movie off there (and should have) because the self-regard was so nauseating. Here we have another Big Woke News Organization peddling outright lies (“Trump ran an openly racist campaign”) in order to justify racist tyranny.
And they wonder why we don’t trust them.
another example of misleading news – Yesterday on Westwood One news (the radio affiliate of CNN ) reported that the 4 faithless electors defected (electoral college electors)which helped Trump win the election.
Zero mention that Trump had won 306 electoral votes and non of the defectors voted for trump.
But just another of intentional lying news from CNN (along with the others MSNBC, CBS, AP, ABC, etc)
If you check Noah Berlatsky’s linkedin.com profile, you’ll discover he is an Oberlin grad.
Lefty colleges knows the truth of this statement,
https://pics.me.me/e-alone-who-owns-the-youth-gains-the-future-adol-41691925.png
Was he ever caught shoplifting at Gibson’s?
Yes, it is malicious and it has the purpose of imposing totalitarian control over us.
But the valid way to fight ideas is with better ideas. We should not suppress their speech as that would make us just like them. We have to call this idea stupid because it is downright stupid, but we need to say WHY it is stupid. We also need to say it loud, louder and loudest, and mostly, we need to go out and vote this November. We need to convince family, friends and acquaintances to vote because this election will be very consequential.
I know what is coming if Democrats win. They are not hiding it anymore, and it’s bad. I know because I’ve been there.
Sorry, but ideas don’t make it anymore. Resistance by any means necessary.
So how can you tell when voters are acting out of prejudice? Again, Smith says, employment discrimination law provides a useful analogy. In discrimination cases, courts look for pretexts. If someone gives a reason for a hiring decision that is obviously false or makes little sense in context, the court has good reason to believe that prejudice or bias may have influenced the hiring decision.
To whom will we have to “give a reason” for our vote? Or will they — as the article goes on to suggest — be empowered to infer our malevolent intent merely from the results of the election?
(That was just a rhetorical question, of course.)
The concept he advocates, using a pretext, is an invalid marxist bit of baloney to start with, and never should have been admitted into our legal institutions anyway.
So, not convincing.
We still have a secret ballot for the time being, so I don’t know how they would know who voted how. But rest assured, they’re going after the secret ballot too.
We still have a secret ballot for the time being, so I don’t know how they would know who voted how.
The article indicates that there’d be no need to know who voted in what way: a “racist” outcome of the election would prove the “racist” motivations of the voters, thereby nullifying the election. A prospect even more terrifying than the elimination of the secret ballot.
Starting to wonder if calling diversity the new state religion isn’t actually just engaging in a bit of hyperbole.
So this “journalist” and “law professor” are saying to abolish the secret ballot.
He’s just a fascist.
Hard to believe this is happening in our country, but given our election of Trump – and the Great Awakening from it – the swamp/left/islamic axis in this country is desperate, and they will act like it.
We need to be ready to respond in any way.
Their biggest mistake is not to realize that if you can’t vote at the ballot box, your only choice is to vote from the rooftops.
As the government or anyone else, for that matter, is not allowed to ask people how they voted, just wondering how this is going to work? I guess if the Republican wins, under this theory, it’s an automatically supported racist win, and the government needs to invalidate it?
Before a White person is allowed to vote, they must prove they live in California, New York, or D.C., or that they have at least three good friends who are Black, or five good friends who are Hispanic.
But, I thought “I have friends who are black” was racist?
Two things….
If the Trump era has taught us anything, it’s that large numbers of white people in the United States are motivated at least in part by racism in the voting booth.
No, that’s a preconception with which you came to the table. You see racism because you assume racism. (And, because you’re following the dictates of your religion: progressivism.)
If the Trump era has taught us anything, it’s that large numbers of
white people in the United States are motivated at least in part by racism in the voting boothpeople who claim to be ‘journalists’ are really just propagandists, shilling for the wannabe dictators of the Dem party.FIFY
As with those who would limit free speech (because “hate speech” is supposedly not protected), the itty-bitty problem is: who gets to decide?
What this fool is advocating is that best of all possible governments: a benevolent dictatorship. In order to do so, he must be very sure he and his political friends would be the ones who get to decide who is to be dictator (and who is to be dictated to). As well as very sure that if they were to establish such a thing it wouldn’t turn on them (as Stalin turned on the Old Bolsheviks who’d created the system that enabled his dictatorship).
Somehow the word “fool” seems inadequate …
The Overton window slide has already worked.
Look at the comment lines in this section and the article’s content. Not one person is even bothering to rebuke the author for the ridiculous yet repeated declaration that the Trump government is racist. Everyone is too busy pointing out that the idea of calling someone’s vote unconstitutional is utterly ridiculous that the author succeeded in its original mission of making the racism a foregone conclusion such that we no longer need to critically examine this “obvious truth”.
So, in summary, yes we should get mad. Further, were we to actually live in a just world, an obvious and vile act of propaganda such as this should be wholly condemned and the sources of this despicable plague should suffer comeuppance…nothing too severe, just public scorn and some sort of career consequences as consistent with culpability.
I was white but now I identify as black. So now my vote for President Trump indicates greater support in the black community, right?
The author inadvertently makes the case for ditching all this mind-reading nonsense in favor of strict Legalism.
This pronouncement from National Broadcastin Communists.
I vote for whom I wish. The Constitution does not limit me, it places limits on government. Obviously this non-entity writing this article was in one of 00bama’s classes where he taught as a “Constitutional scholar” while claiming that the Constitution needed to grant people rights. Total ignorance.