One of the most frequent criticisms that I have heard from the right about Charlie Kirk is that he was too moderate, he was Milquetoast, all he wanted to do is talk, etc. I have a news bulletin for people who say that-
The struggle between the US and the Commies of the left isn’t going to be won by guns.
The left’s strength is young voters. For decades, the left has gotten young people on board with the message that the older folks are out of touch. The reason that young people are poor, the left tells them, is that those old farts over there are cheating the system and keeping you down.
It just isn’t about violence. It’s going to be won by convincing the people of this nation that the left is nuts. That their ideas are unworkable. You don’t change people’s minds by shooting at others. You can’t shoot enough people to change the minds of an entire nation. On paper, Kamala Harris won more than 75 million votes. Even if half of those votes were fake, there are 37 million people in the left’s camp. It isn’t practical to shoot and kill 10% of the nation.
Those of you who think that a Civil War is just going to be you running around engaging in some fantasy where you shoot people in your spare time and simply go back to work on Monday while leaving Saturday evenings free to take the wife to dinner and play with the kids is a fantasy.
What Mr. Kirk did was connect with college students in a way that none of the people who read this blog can: He spawned a movement that got young adults involved in the conservative movement, because he was one of them. He started Turning Point USA when he was 18 years old. He was, in large part, the reason why Trump won the last election. Let me illustrate:
Read that chart- There was a 16 point shift to the right in young men, and a 5 point shift in young women. What Mr Kirk was doing was beating the left where it hurt them the most- their most powerful demographic: young, college educated whites.
He did it without violence, but with reason, debate, and discussion. His mantra was “Let’s talk, let’s compare ideas,” and he was damned effective. He won over hundreds of thousands of people through merely showing them that the right weren’t fascists that wanted to kill brown people. Instead, showed these young adults that those on the right were not ignorant moron racists- he won them over with reason and debate.
The left murdered him for it.
If you think that you will be more effective than Mr. Kirk was, tell me how you and your rifle are going to change 100,000 people’s opinion. Tell me what the nation will look like if you “win.” Do you think that the US will be better after this civil war than before it? Do you think that those who are left of the 70 million or more Democrats are going to just love you and your ideas because you shot a lot of people? Or do you really think that you are going to walk off into the sunset without knowing loss at the end of what will assuredly be a long a bloody affair?
We need the Charlie Kirks of the world. They are the ones who are the path to winning over in the land of ideas. The biggest problem isn’t that he isn’t violent- it’s that the left is.
Once dialog breaks down, violence is guaranteed. With the killing of Charlie Kirk, the left has signaled that they can’t be reasoned with. That’s the reason why this blog may have to go if a bunch of people on my watch list are killed- it signals that talking and dialog are a thing of the past.
That’s a scary, dangerous thing.
I am sure that there are readers who are reading this and thinking that I am being a pussy. There are a couple I can think of right now. To those people, if you REALLY believe that, why aren’t you out there stacking bodies instead of trying to demand that others do it for you? Are you a Fed that is trying to goad people into being the FBI’s next patsy? Or are you a fool that thinks you are going to go all John Rambo and kill everyone who displeases you?
EDITED TO ADD
If we have entered a phase where people who talk are being silenced through assassination, the time for talk is over. The blog has to go, and it will be time for other tactics. If people aren’t having discussions, they are fighting. That was the message that Charlie Kirk was spreading.
The left, as I have pointed out more than a few times on this blog, sees speech with which they disagree as being violent and has also said that whatever it is that they disagree with is “hate speech” that deserves no Constitutional protection. At first, it was petitions, then canceling, then it was “follow people and outshout them with megaphones,” then it was riots, now it is just blatant assassination. The left has been escalating the violence for over a decade.
Once we get to the point where those who speak are murdered, then there is no longer any point to speaking.
