{"id":2244008,"date":"2024-05-14T06:51:02","date_gmt":"2024-05-14T10:51:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/until-republicans-use-power-to-reward-their-friends-and-punish-their-enemies-theyll-always-lose\/"},"modified":"2024-05-14T06:57:00","modified_gmt":"2024-05-14T10:57:00","slug":"until-republicans-use-power-to-reward-their-friends-and-punish-their-enemies-theyll-always-lose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/until-republicans-use-power-to-reward-their-friends-and-punish-their-enemies-theyll-always-lose\/","title":{"rendered":"Republicans will continue to lose until they leverage power to reward allies and penalize foes"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">30<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Funtil-republicans-use-power-to-reward-their-friends-and-punish-their-enemies-theyll-always-lose%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2244008&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The article \u200ddiscusses \u200bthe concept \u200cof identifying political allies and adversaries, emphasizing\u200d the friend\/enemy distinction in shaping contemporary \u2063politics. \u200cIt\u200c highlights the divisive rhetoric by Democrats, portraying \u200dRepublicans as enemies, \u2062and the\u200d left&#8217;s strategy of rewarding ideological friends. The narrative underscores the critical role of discerning friends\u200c and enemies in today&#8217;s \u2063political \u2062landscape.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<p><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><\/p>\n<div class=\"article-content\">\n<p>During an episode of \u201cReal Time with Bill Maher,\u201d James Carville, a Democrat and political strategist, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/amrenewcitizen\/status\/1731697186386141537\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">expressed<\/a> his opinion that Speaker Mike Johnson and other \u201cChristian nationalists\u201d are a bigger threat to America than al-Qaeda. In a more recent rant <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CollinRugg\/status\/1784951750262395237?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1784951750262395237%7Ctwgr%5E2167c5f491c9b841e2413b83fdae148816eb8b95%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&#038;ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fmishtalk.com%2Fpolitics%2Fjames-carville-has-meltdown-over-young-voters-sitting-out-the-election%2F\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">posted<\/a> on X, Carville urged young people to recognize the potential dire consequences of not voting for Biden in this year\u2019s November election, at least as he sees it:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\">\n<p>If Trump, and Roberts, and Alito, and Gorsuch, and Thomas, and Leonard Leo, and the Heritage Foundation \u2014 if they get a hold [of power], there will be no government left, there will be no rights left, you will live under theocracy, you\u2019ll end up [with] Christian Nationalism. My advice to tell these young people is to get off your motherf**king a** and go vote because you should vote like your entire future, and the entire future of this United States depends on it because, quite frankly, it does, and that\u2019s not an exaggeration.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Carville is not alone in employing this divisive and vitriolic rhetoric. President Biden and many other Democrat politicians have repeatedly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/briefing-room\/speeches-remarks\/2022\/09\/01\/remarks-by-president-bidenon-the-continued-battle-for-the-soul-of-the-nation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">stated<\/a> that the Republican Party of today, led and influenced by Donald Trump, is \u201ca threat to this country\u201d and has continuously <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/2024-election\/biden-trump-describe-maga-extremist-rcna117796\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">called<\/a> \u201cMAGA extremists\u201d a \u201cthreat to the brick and mortar of our democratic institutions.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-2-long d-flex justify-content-center\" style=\"margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center; \" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-53647408\">\n<div id=\"div-gpt-ad-1379703300879-0\" class=\"mb-30\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-43d6bdc4af0b7f6260b64c3d777c721c fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-2\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-43d6bdc4af0b7f6260b64c3d777c721c\"><\/div>\n<p>This demonization of Republicans as an existential threat that must be completely vanquished from American politics altogether is now commonplace rhetoric for even supposedly centrist Democrats such as Carville and Biden. And yet far too many Republican leaders and conservative pundits cling to the notion that the response to this extremism is to defeat liberals in the \u201cmarketplace of ideas,\u201d while chastising their own allies about their perceived lack of civility in the face of eliminationist rhetoric. This is not the way to win an election, much less save America from leftist tyranny.<\/p>\n<p>The unwillingness of many leaders on the right to confront Democrats directly is hard to\u00a0stomach; however,\u00a0this rhetoric should come as no surprise,\u00a0given the ideological origins of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/shapiro-wokeifying-americas-military\/\" title=\"SHAPIRO: Wokeifying America\u2019s Military\">left-wing politics<\/a>. Leftist hero Mao Zedong succinctly characterized politics as \u201cwar without bloodshed,\u201d though his cultural revolution was still eager to use violence to achieve its political ends. Accordingly, the \u201cwokeness\u201d we see unfolding in all aspects of American life bears striking resemblances to Mao\u2019s cultural revolution, including the use of political violence as evidenced throughout the 2020 George Floyd protests and, more recently, within the \u201cFree Palestine\u201d movement.<\/p>\n<p>As such, one would think the Republican Party would take Democrats at their word and finally wake up and realize \u201cwhat time it is,\u201d but regrettably, that is not the case. Conservative gatekeepers act as if anyone on the right who exercises political power to put the left in their place is dangerous, and all the while the left is amassing power for the sole purpose of harassing, intimidating, and even jailing those on the right. Instead, they make outdated and ineffective overtures to the \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2024\/04\/26\/conservatisms-three-legged-stool-has-no-legs-left\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">three-legged<\/a> stool\u201d of conservatism as a way to appeal to moderates and fight the leftist onslaught. To say this belief is na\u00efve would be an understatement. To say this is the rhetoric of controlled opposition would be more accurate.<\/p>\n<p>Like it or not, our politics now fundamentally revolves around discerning \u201cfriend\u201d from \u201cenemy\u201d \u2014 and rewarding the former and directly engaging the latter. German political philosopher Carl Schmitt introduced the friend\/enemy distinction in his 1932 book <em>The Concept of the Political<\/em>. According to his theory, political entities define themselves by identifying friends (allies) and enemies (adversaries), a differentiation that profoundly influences political decisions and actions. This distinction constitutes the core of political and power dynamics, central to our contemporary politics.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-2a60d96e4db6b5ff2cf13e3787ed28b6 fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-6\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-2a60d96e4db6b5ff2cf13e3787ed28b6\"><\/div>\n<p>It\u2019s important to note that this does not pertain to mere rivalries or political disagreements. We are not talking about political battles over marginal tax rates or economic tariffs, as was the case in our politics of old. The friend\/enemy distinction explicitly deals with what would be an extensional threat to one side or another.<\/p>\n<p>During both the Cold War and the initial phases of the war on terror, the focus on an external adversary somewhat alleviated the intensity of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/sheikh-of-oil-producing-powerhouse-dead-at-86\/\" title=\"Oil-Producing Powerhouse's Sheikh Dies at 86\">internal political disputes<\/a> in America while fostering solidarity and patriotism at home, especially when juxtaposed with the existential concerns of nuclear conflict or significant terrorist threats. However, the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union and the disillusionment with the war on terror, combined with the election of Barack Obama and later Donald Trump, awakened something within American politics that has been absent for decades:<\/p>\n<p>The enemy within.<\/p>\n<p>Whether it was when Obama designated working-class Americans in the Midwest as people who \u201ccling to guns or religion\u201d and have \u201cantipathy to people who aren\u2019t like them\u201d or Hillary Clinton designating Trump voters as a \u201cbasket of deplorables\u201d or, as mentioned earlier, President Biden likening \u201cMAGA Republicans\u201d as extremist threats to the nation, the escalation by Democrats designating their political opponents as the \u201cenemy\u201d has been deliberate.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-10ffb6bc45c19e59665beecfab33d56e fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-10\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-10ffb6bc45c19e59665beecfab33d56e\"><\/div>\n<p>That said, while it\u2019s vital to designate who the \u201cenemy\u201d is within this binary, it is equally important to identify who is a friend. Once again, the left excels at this.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps one of the most egregious historical examples of how the left \u201crewards friends\u201d without a care for their moral failings is with Bill Ayers, the leader of the Weather Underground, an FBI-designated far-left Marxist domestic terrorist group. Not only did he participate in a rash of political bombings that injured and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/pentagon-releases-first-footage-of-botched-kabul-airstrike\/\" title=\"Pentagon Releases First Footage of Botched Kabul Airstrike\">killed innocent people<\/a>, but after his charges were dropped due to misconduct by the FBI, the University of Illinois had no issues hiring him as a professor.<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, no doubt due to his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/illinois-governor-backs-including-black-queer-theory-other-controversial-lessons-in-african-american-studies\/\" title=\"Illinois Governor Backs Including \u2018Black Queer\u2019 Theory, Other Controversial Lessons In African American Studies\">radical leftist beliefs<\/a>, Ayers even found a way to cross paths with then-presidential candidate Barack Obama. Ideological friends tend to find themselves frequenting the same political circles. Most recently, Bill Ayers has been seen at a campus protest offering the violent \u201cFree Palestine\u201d movement his public support.<\/p>\n<p>And if you think the friend\/enemy distinction is relegated only to political theory, you should know that a lot of supposedly mainstream liberal organizations are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tabletmag.com\/sections\/news\/articles\/people-setting-america-on-fire-soros-tides-wespac\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">directly offering their financial support to the campus protests, as well as other left-wing purveyors of street violence<\/a>, such as Antifa and the environmentalists that have been blocking roads around the country. This is a highly coordinated effort utilizing specific tactics to undermine law and order to achieve radical political ends.<\/p>\n<p>In electoral terms, in a moment of brutal honesty Obama specifically <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/obama-explains-his-remark-about-punishing-enemies\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">alluded<\/a> to the friend\/enemy distinction during an interview with Univision when discussing Latino voters.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf Latinos sit out the election instead of saying, \u2018We\u2019re gonna punish our enemies, and we\u2019re gonna reward our friends who stand with us on issues that are important to us\u2019 \u2014 if they don\u2019t see that kind of upsurge in voting in this election \u2014 then I think it\u2019s going to be harder. And that\u2019s why I think it\u2019s so important that people focus on voting on Nov. 2,\u201d he said.  <\/p>\n<p>Obama\u2019s statement clearly embodies the friend\/enemy dynamic in political alliances and reflects how identity politics, despite many internal contradictions, is a highly effective way of signaling who is a friend and who is an enemy.<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re in a war and only your opponent is going on the offensive, you\u2019re guaranteed to lose. To thrive and win in politics as it exists today, conservatives must wholeheartedly embrace the reality of obtaining and wielding political power within this friend\/enemy binary. Like it or not, in politics, as in warfare, the distinction between friend and foe is an indispensable guiding principle, intricately shaping the contours of our modern political landscape. <\/p>\n<p>For those on the political right, recognizing and embracing the friend\/enemy distinction isn\u2019t a mere choice; it\u2019s a strategic imperative.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-2337c3b2b8602941e286e1941ceceaef fdrlst__b89e9-after-post-content\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-2337c3b2b8602941e286e1941ceceaef\"><\/div>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\">    \t\t\t\t\t   \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During a &#8220;Real Time with Bill Maher&#8221; episode, Democrat strategist James Carville likened Speaker Mike Johnson and &#8220;Christian nationalists&#8221; to a greater threat than al-Qaeda. In a recent outburst on X, Carville urged youth to grasp the severe ramifications of inaction<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3120,"featured_media":2244009,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/5640465073_8389bfd7b7_k.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2244008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/5640465073_8389bfd7b7_k.jpeg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2244008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2244008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2244008\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2244009"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2244008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2244008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2244008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}