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Richard Vigilante's avatar

When I decided to vote for Trump the first time I wrote that "in a contest between our thug and their thug I see no obligation to vote for theirs or to refrain from ours."

I don't know if the Republic can recover. But I have feared that for some time we are in a post-constitutional era in which reverence for process will be for losers. A measure of this will the extent to which violence becomes a tactic in election campaigns. If violence is perceived to be an essential tactic, both sides will practice it and the Republic will be gone.

Finally, for mere historic interest, I think the Democrats giving up on free speech goes all the way back to campaign finance laws. It started the Dems on a road to thinking about "fair speech" as in 'it's not fair if some people with money get more speech than others.' At first the Dems did not notice the conflict and continued to believe they believed in free speech. But the conflict between free and fair is real and the supporters of fair inevitably turn to government, cf socialism.

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Dear Diary's avatar

Love your writing

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