Make Americans Proud Again

Make Americans Proud Again

Matt Margolis  

John Trumbull, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Patriotism used to be something that Americans celebrated. Now, kids are taught to sneer at their own country, to see only its sins and not its staggering achievements. America deserves better than that. As our nation approaches its 250th birthday, three prominent conservative voices are stepping up to change the story being told to the next generation.

Dr. Ben Carson, Kirk Cameron, and Riley Gaines are joining forces in 2026 around a single, urgent mission: making sure American children grow up knowing the truth about the country they call home. They come from wildly different backgrounds — an operating room, a Hollywood set, and a swimming pool — but they're aligned on one point. What is happening to America's kids is deliberate. And it will not fix itself.

The numbers are hard to argue with. A June 2025 Gallup poll found that only 41% of Gen Z adults say they are proud to be American — the lowest of any generation, compared with 83% of the Silent Generation. It won’t surprise you to learn that Democrats are driving that decline in patriotism. Meanwhile, the federal government's own National Report Card shows just 13% of eighth graders are proficient in U.S. history.

It doesn’t have to be this way. We can make Americans proud again.

Carson, who grew up in deep poverty in Detroit and was raised by a mother with only a third-grade education, who could not read. He credits the true story of America with saving his own life. He became one of the world's most celebrated neurosurgeons, received the Medal of Freedom, and served as a member of Donald Trump’s Cabinet during his first term. His life is the embodiment of the American Dream. Naturally, he is furious that this story is being systematically hidden from the children who need it most.

"Every movement that has sought to destroy a nation has followed the same playbook: before you can transform a country, you have to erase its memory," Carson told PJ Media. "You strip the children of their history, you teach them to despise their own country, and then you offer them your replacement. Such a movement is taking root in America today. It is not an accident. It is a strategy. Our kids are being taught that America is stolen land, that our founders were villains, and that there is nothing here worth protecting. That is not education. That is demolition. I grew up in poverty in Detroit, and the true story of this country saved my life. I wrote Built on Faith because every child in America deserves that same opportunity before it's erased for good."

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Cameron brings a Hollywood insider's eye to the fight. After spending decades inside the entertainment machine and walking away to build something different, he knows exactly how cultural narratives get manufactured, and who they're targeting. "I have traveled this country from coast to coast, and I can tell you, the American people are not what they are being told they are," Cameron told PJ Media. "They are generous, faithful, hardworking, and they love this country. The problem is nobody is telling that story to their kids. We are."

And then there’s Gaines. She first stepped into the public arena when she was forced to compete against biological male swimmer Will "Lia" Thomas, managed to tie with him, and was denied a trophy.

"A generation that does not know its own history cannot defend its own freedom," she told PJ Media. "I have seen it firsthand on college campuses across this country. Kids who have been fed nothing but shame about America since before they could think for themselves. By the time they get to college it is already too late. We have to reach them young and we have to reach them with the truth."

The vehicle for that truth is BRAVE Books, a Texas-based, faith-focused children's publisher trusted by more than 275,000 families nationwide. The three new titles — Carson's Built on Faith, Cameron's Built by the Brave, and Gaines' 1, 2, 3 We Are Free — are included in the "America Wins Bundle," a limited-edition collection marking the nation's 250th birthday.

"What we have built with Dr. Ben Carson, Kirk Cameron, and Riley Gaines for America's 250th birthday is the most ambitious and important project we have ever undertaken," said BRAVE Books founder and CEO Trent Talbot. "These are not just books. This is a movement. And these three voices represent exactly the kind of courage, faith, and conviction that built this country in the first place."

https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2026/03/28/make-americans-proud-again-n4951175?utm_source=pjmediavip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm

Another Attempt At 'No Kings' Today? Why?

Another Attempt At 'No Kings' Today? Why?

Eric Florack 

PJ Media

Leftists are trying again with the “No Kings” nonsense. They’re out there today, making fools of themselves, objecting to Donald J. Trump. I’ve already written repeatedly about this sorry business, without really examining what is driving these folks, and given today’s events, perhaps it’s time that I do.

I find myself forever fascinated by the left and their attitudes toward President Trump. Not appreciative, mind you, and certainly not convinced of the justification of the reactionary venom they apply to every single action the President takes, particularly when they offer no demonstrably viable counter agenda.

For example, I’m old enough to remember when Democrats liked the idea of using reciprocal tariffs to protect and grow American businesses. They also tended to take the threats by China to our industry seriously. Somewhere along the way, they lost that edge and now disregard the trillion-dollar trade deficits, which we have no hope of sustaining. Because of Trump’s actions, the bean counters are projecting on the order of $300 billion in new revenue, and foreign businesses are investing upwards of $15 trillion in America as of March 10th of this year. Domestic businesses are upping the ante as well.

Based on their reaction, it seems the left is worried that China will lose money because of Trump. And they’re right. The trouble is that they inexplicably consider China’s loss, and for that matter, America’s gain, a bad thing.

Take, for example, the president’s America First policies. The left will praise Volodymyr Zelensky all day long for putting HIS country first, and yet will chastise Trump for taking the same position about America. He was elected by the people of America. Shouldn’t he be representing their interests?

Speaking of Zelensky, why did the left, back in the spring of 2025, complain so bitterly about Trump’s attempts at peace negotiations? You will remember perhaps the knee-jerk reactions of the Democrats to Trump’s meeting with Vladimir Putin in Alaska, despite it being a summit that the EU leaders almost universally praised. After all, the EU by that point had a war on their very back yards with nobody, not even those self-same EU leaders, making a move toward ending it, or even limiting it. Their praise was understandable. After all, at that point, there was already about a million and a half wounded, missing, or dead. But leftists in this country complained bitterly about it.

Then the left reacted negatively when, about a week after that, Zelensky, along with those same EU leaders, flew to the White House. I don’t know, but it seems to me likely that the reason for their objection to this process is that it is a path that they, under Obama, didn’t have the courage to follow.

What was the plan of the Democrats with Ukraine? What did Biden do? He provided massive amounts of arms and money so that both sides of that conflict could keep fighting and dying, with no way to get either side to back down. Not even a hint at diplomacy, which historically, the left champions as a nearly knee-jerk reaction.

When Biden was in the White House, some 14 million illegal aliens flooded into our country, with a good half million being tagged as violent criminals in their own countries. That situation has changed under Trump, to where there is statistically no illegal immigration, with a million who entered the country under Biden, have left the country voluntarily, and 100,000 more have been deported.

Meanwhile, the left fights like a cornered raccoon against the enforcement of Immigration laws that the vast majority of Americans want strictly enforced. If we take their complaints and their protests seriously, we must assume that they don’t want our immigration laws enforced. You really must wonder what their goal here is. Should we be allowing millions of unvetted and often criminal aliens so that the census can be tilted in favor of the Democrats? That’s not even addressing the issues of illegal aliens voting, which they’ve been shown repeatedly to do. JustFacts.com tells us:

In 2014, the academic journal Electoral Studies published a groundbreaking study by three scholars who estimated how frequently non-citizens were illegally voting. Based on data for the 2008 presidential and congressional elections, the study found that:

• “Roughly one quarter of non-citizens” in the U.S. “were likely registered to vote.”
• “6.4% of non-citizens actually voted.”
• 81.8% of them “reported voting for Barack Obama.”

illegal votes cast by non-citizens “likely” changed “important election outcomes” in favor of Democrats, “including Electoral College votes” and a “pivotal” U.S. Senate race that enabled Democrats to pass Obamacare.

The study’s voter registration rate was estimated with data from two key sources:

• A national survey in which 14.8% of non-citizens admitted that they were registered to vote.
• A database of registered voters that reveals what portion of the surveyed non-citizens “were in fact registered” even though “they claimed not to be registered.”

By combining these data, the author’s “best” estimate was that 25.1% of non-citizens were illegally registered to vote.

The left seems to feel that this is a net positive. That’s understandable if we take as a given that they approve of illegal immigrants voting because it supports their candidates and their misbegotten policies.

Then we have Iran, where the left apparently preferred Obama’s approach, which all but handed nukes to the insane Islamic dictatorship. What could possibly go wrong? Both the left and the centrist GOP have been kicking that particular can down the road for very nearly five decades, under the guise of “diplomacy,” which in the end has actually made the problem worse. And for all the moralistic and legalistic preaching they do, they’ve apparently forgotten the people in Iran. They’d rather have those people suffer and die than admit Trump’s actions are the correct ones.

I can’t help looking at the Democrat party of today without wistfully recalling what JFK said at his inaugural address, back in 1961: “Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”

Apparently, they’ve either forgotten what Kennedy said that day or they reject it outright, either of which would make me question why they still consider him a party icon. I believe that Kennedy would not want anything to do with the Democrat party of today, which in turn explains why the polling of the last several years has been showing the Democrats of today are just about equal in popularity with raw sewage.

The anti-America left finds itself being strictly contrarian. If Trump wants peace, leftists go out of their way to support war, as in Ukraine. Yet they come down against the reckoning being waged in Iran.

Trump wants prosperity; they fight to maintain poverty. If individual freedom is the issue, they fight for virtual slavery. Witness the doings in Cuba over the last few weeks, and their whining about our arrest of Maduro as two prime examples of such. Instead of being pleased that the law is being enforced, they side with the criminal.

So deeply into this contrary position are they that they’ve invested literally billions in tax dollars in over 90 versions of lawfare, in bogus investigations, they’ve tried to jail him, and they've tried impeaching him twice. Heck, they’ve even tried killing the man. And he just gets stronger.

And most recently, they fight tooth and nail to keep a bill from passing that repeated polling shows that well over 80% of American voters from both parties support: The SAVE Act.

Why do they continue? Simple: They’re not worried that his policies will fail; they’re concerned about being shamed by comparison to what the establishments of both parties have offered us, his policies will be wildly successful.

So they have been. And America’s success under Trump, particularly the long, long list of failures the left has given us, is something they simply cannot stand.

Remember, gang, as you watch the riots erupting today: Businesses and municipalities have never had to board their windows because of conservatives.

https://pjmedia.com/eric-florack/2026/03/28/another-attempt-at-no-kings-today-why-n4951165?utm_source=pjmediavip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm

Where Is the Arc of Justice Headed?

Where Is the Arc of Justice Headed?

Michael Barone 

AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster

Former President Barack Obama liked to quote the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s line that "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." Of course, what was an expression of optimism for the moral reformer King was more like a victory spike of the football for a competitor in a zero-sum electoral contest like Obama.

More importantly, the belief that things are moving toward justice comes more naturally to believers in American exceptionalism, of which Obama isn't one. He famously said that he believed in America's exceptionalism only as much as "Brits" believe in British exceptionalism or Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.

But British and Greek exceptionalism look to distant pasts and encompass the idea of decline, which, if not the opposite of justice, is certainly not positive. Britons may look with pride on the British Empire, but not without a twinge of regret that it has all but disappeared. Greeks may look back on the astonishing creativity of Athens 2,500 years ago, but not without recognizing that it was held down under the Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman empires for almost all the centuries since.

In contrast, the United States has a history that can be easily, if perhaps oversimply, interpreted as a story of continual winning. Economic growth — the exception rather than the rule before 1800 in European lands — has been cumulative over time. Cultural progress abounds: the abolition of slavery, equality for women, and civil rights for Black people, all have advanced, though with some setbacks over the years.

In such an environment, it may seem natural to believe that, as a general rule, anyway, things get better. Yet the long run of history teaches different lessons. Historians of ancient cultures and their archaeological colleagues can describe marked declines of civilization enough for one of them to title a book "1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed."

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Edward Gibbon, listening to the monks chanting vespers on the steps of Santa Maria in Aracoeli, was inspired to write the history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, the first volume of which came out in February 1776 and is still in print today.

Historians continue to dispute just how much and even whether the Roman Empire declined. But it seems indisputable that its military forces dwindled, its long-distance trade petered out, and its technological advances were forgotten. It took centuries for Europeans to figure out how to build a dome like that of the Pantheon in Rome, but there it is today.

In American politics over the last century, it has been the Democrats whose rhetoric proclaims them as the party of progress. Some of this has a Marxist base, the New Deal idea that a complex industrialized society should have an increasingly large government to protect and guide individuals.

To many since at least the 1980s, that argument seems antique. Big government has not managed to build a single mile of track for California's high-speed rail line in 19 years, while the private sector has developed artificial intelligence at astonishing rates. Note also that in this century Americans, including recent immigrants, have been moving out of big-government states like New York, Illinois and California, and into small-government states like Florida, Tennessee and Texas.

Republicans under Ronald Reagan and the two Bushes made the argument and provided some proof that market-friendly policies can produce more than big government. But President Donald Trump's "Make America Great Again" mantra suggests moving back to some unspecified moment in the past.

Perhaps to the low-immigration, high-family-formation, high-churchgoing 1950s in which Trump and his baby boom predecessors, former Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, grew up. In any case, Trump's inevitable retirement leaves Republicans uncertain and probably divided on what progress and decline mean.

For articulate Democrats, the focus has moved from economics — on which they make vague promises of more redistribution to the less affluent — and toward cultural issues. But on that, their confidence that the arc of justice moves their way has encountered some turbulence. They have seen American opinion do so on some issues, notably same-sex marriage, but not on abortion or immigration.

Or, as the liberal economist Noah Smith argues, in their isolated communities — trendy central city neighborhoods, affluent suburbs and university towns — and sycophantic media, they have failed to notice that most Americans don't believe, or aren't moving closer to believing, that "racial preferences in hiring, leniency toward petty crime and illegal immigration, and trans women on women's sports teams are basic rights."

My sense is that the arc of history moves around, and sometimes in a malign direction. Notably, among the sharply increasing antisemitism of the university Left (now installed in New York's Gracie Mansion) and in the emergence of a less numerous but equally disturbing antisemitism on the fringes of the podcast Right from Southwest outposts to the woods of Maine. There are some directions in which the arc of history should never head again.

https://townhall.com/columnists/michaelbarone/2026/03/27/where-is-the-arc-of-justice-headed-n2673505?utm_source=thdailyvip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&utm_content=ncl-FZMbYkTYpW&utm_term=&_nlid=FZMbYkTYpW&_nhids=ncdGxHGkCPEzls

Election Day and Election Reforms (Not Week, Month, or Season)

Election Day and Election Reforms (Not Week, Month, or Season)

Arthur Schaper 

AP Photo/Louie Traub, File

The United States Supreme Court is finally ruling on an issue (Watson v RNC) that should have been decided long ago: the dissonant practice of accepting ballots after the Election Day deadline.

This case could indeed shift the 2026 midterms in Republicans’ favor, since Democrats often win by broad and unjustified election expansion, which opens the door to cheating, stuffing, and undoing the vote.

More election cases are coming before the United States Supreme Court, and the conservative majority looks more inclined to bring the much-needed order and common sense back to our elections.

Why would the RNC sue Mississippi, of all places? It’s a ruby red state, after all, where even Elvis Presley’s Democratic cousin could not get elected Governor.

This decision was a masterstroke. Democratic states have mostly expanded this corrupt effort, allowing ballots to be counted long after the Election Day deadline. If a Republican organization went after a Democratic state, the proponents of these “grace period” laws could have argued that the RNC is targeting election reforms they don’t like in states where they can’t win. Instead of arguing the merits of the case, the RNC would have wasted time and resources explaining to federal courts that their interest is in the fairness of the vote as opposed to the pursuit of partisan assistance or advantage.

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For the record, the RNC deserves more credit than they are receiving for fighting off election fraud machinations and seeking to restore election integrity in our voting practices. They jumped ahead of the problems, potential, and actually, long before Election Day in 2024, warding off a repeat of the failures and questions that dominated the 2020 election results.  

How do we want the court to rule in Watson? What should this first set of election reforms look like?

Justice Samuel Alito could not have summed it up better:

“We have lots of phrases that involve two words, the last of which, the second of which is ‘day,’ Labor Day, Memorial Day, George Washington's birthday, Independence Day, birthday and Election Day, and they're all particular days. So if we start with that, if I have nothing more to look at than the phrase ‘Election Day,’ I think this is the day in which everything is going to take place, or almost everything.”

It’s Election Day—not a week, month, or season. Everyone understands that simple phrase in connection with many other holidays and commemorative events. Sure, some of us turn our birthday into a week of avoiding work and spoiling ourselves with fun and frolic. Some families extend their Christmas festivities for the entire week, all the way into New Year’s Day.

But with election day, power and the course of governments hang in the balance. Voters deserve a sense of finality, whether their preferred candidate or cause wins or loses. We have to finish the work in order for the voice of the people to be heard.

Yes, it’s time to end the folly of mass vote-counting long after Election Day. Mississippi most likely allowed the five-day grace period as a holdover from the old days when the Democratic machine dominated the Magnolia State.

Today, the worst offender when it comes to late tallying is my home state of California. Everyone receives a ballot in the mail, whether they want to vote or not. They can drop off their ballot in any number of voting centers across the state. Yes, across the state—a massive contrast to 25 years ago, when you had to vote in the county where you lived, and obtaining a provisional ballot was very difficult. I still remember trying to vote in Election 2000, and the voting both at the UC Irvine campus (in Orange County) told me that I had to find a voting station in Los Angeles County. Those were the days!

Currently, Californians wait over a month before the ballots are tallied for statewide and local elections. It’s outrageous! Election integrity activists monitored the vote count in Orange County, where a number of Congressional seats slipped into Democratic hands as the Election Day(s) turned into weeks. We watched a Northern Los Angeles County seat slip into Democratic control, as well.

These elections need to get wrapped up, and in a timely fashion.

But we should not settle for timely election results alone.

The vote is all about registering the view of a citizen. If it were possible and practical, every voter would have the opportunity to cast their vote in person, declaring their views and values in the election. The ballot exists as a means of transfer and should not be viewed as the end in itself of our election process.

How do we restore confidence in our elections? How do we ensure that those who have the right to vote, who want to vote, get to vote?

1. Absentee voting must be restricted. Only those physically incapacitated or those removed from the country or jurisdiction should use absentee ballots. Furthermore, if the individual cannot vote in person, they should go to the County Clerk or Registrar of Voters' office, request the ballot in person, and show their ID to prove their identity. For those who cannot visit the registrar, they can provide a proxy to pick up the ballot, including a notarized statement of identity and support.
2. Early voting should be eliminated. Citizenship should include the virtue of patience. Besides, many weak candidates depend on early voting by making quick pleas and social media campaigns to hype themselves up. Many elections are getting decided by this permanent absentee process, and all too often those same candidates flame out under pressure or during debates. By then, the votes have been cast, and the electorate cannot retract or change their vote.
3. If we take away early voting, how do we deal with the long lines and the obstacles to a rapid voting process? I have no problem with turning Election Day into a holiday. Let’s make it easier for working people to retain basic compensation, but at least have an opportunity at any time during the day to cast a ballot.
4. Of course, the SAVE Act reforms should become standard operating procedure for all elections around the country. Citizens must provide documentation that adheres to uniform standards in order to register to vote, i.e., prove their citizenship. They should register in person (not by computer) in order to vote. States should have a basic system in place to remove inactive voters (whether due to death or relocation. Above all, a strict voter ID requirement should be the norm for all elections. Some states have ID, but it does not have to have the citizen’s photo. What is this?! Other states allow citizens to claim that they are who they say they are, then sign an affidavit. We shouldn’t tolerate such flimsy assurances. Also, elected officials who do not comply with the election integrity reforms should face fines or go to jail, and American citizens should have the power to sue government entities that don’t comply with these laws.

Election reforms start with simple rules and clear deadlines: One day for Election Day, a chain of custody, and rigorous safeguards should be the norm.

https://townhall.com/columnists/arthurschaper/2026/03/27/election-day-and-election-reforms-not-week-month-season-n2673520?utm_source=thdailyvip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&utm_content=ncl-rwcQbt6b9N&utm_term=&_nlid=rwcQbt6b9N&_nhids=ncdGxHGkCPEzls

What a Difference a Day Makes

What a Difference a Day Makes

by Alan Joseph Bauer 

AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein

Especially if that day happened to be January 20, 2025.

I know plenty of people who do not like Donald Trump. They usually throw out words like “narcissist” or “fascist”. When I ask about specific policies like closing the border or collecting tariffs in the tens of billions monthly, they are rarely opposed. They object to a mental image of Donald Trump either created during the president’s more swinging years or from the media that call Donald Trump every name that more correctly applies to the politicians on their team.

In all likelihood, if you read Townhall articles, you are neutral to very positive on the current president. Anyone who loathes Donald Trump and reads the offerings on this site probably also brushes his teeth with sandpaper. Donald Trump has done an enormous amount both at home and abroad in the relatively short period of time that he has been back at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. The experiences of his first term (can you say “Rex Tillerson”) and his years persecuted out of office prepared the president and his people to act quickly and aggressively. Millions of illegal aliens have left the US, Nicolas Maduro is sitting in a NY jail cell and the US is finally taking apart the Iranian regime after nearly fifty years of global terror. Let’s take a look at the upgrade that took place on that cold January day of last year.

• President

Where does one start? Joe Biden was never there. When he was running in 2020, I kept saying that his wife should be in jail for elder abuse. It was both pathetic and sad to see Joe Biden unable to walk or communicate with complete sentences and intelligible words. The 46th president was a figurehead for the Obama retreads. They injected huge amounts of money into the economy and high inflation made life too expensive for many. Their lack of being feared apparently played a role in both Putin and Sinwar making their moves against Ukraine and Israel, respectively. Biden was ineffective as he was mentally compromised. He would be hard-pressed to name a meaningful accomplishment in his four years in office. The auto-pen was used to give everyone a Stay Out of Jail card on their way out.

Donald Trump is the antithesis of Joe Biden. He is a human dynamo who seems to be working all the time and is in no need of sleep. If Marco Rubio says that he has to hide on Air Force One so that the president doesn’t know he is taking a nap, then that tells you a lot. He answers reporters’ calls and has had many more press conferences than Joe Biden ever could. His cabinet meetings are often open to the press, and he most importantly understands the common man—a rare feat for other billionaires. His policies are geared to make life for average American families affordable, safe, and enjoyable. Crime rates are the lowest ever recorded, and his recent move to get ICE into the TSA-reduced airports has led to faster movement of fliers as well as positive reviews from anyone without blue hair. The president’s economic and foreign policies will seal his place as one of the most consequential presidents in US history.

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• Vice-President

This comparison is almost unfair. While Joe Biden is suffering from the effects of old age, Kamala Harris is clueless and ineffective in her own efforts. She has no signature accomplishment from her four years as vice president that she can hold up and use for an apparent 2028 presidential run. Her word salads give a bad name to RFK Jr.’s efforts to have people eat more leafy vegetables. She could not answer simple questions, and her cackling laughter covered for her complete ignorance on most subjects. She famously used child actors to have a “natural” discussion with students about space. She once ran a meeting in which she introduced herself by her name, pronouns, and what she was wearing. There was nothing serious about Kamala Harris, and her only accomplishment in life has been to ride the DEI wave to the second most important position in the US government. Just as Prince once said of U2’s Bono that if he had had the latter’s voice, he would have been a janitor, Kamala not making her way through California politics as she did would have made her an outstanding candidate for the French fry station at an Oakland McDonald’s.

JD Vance is the antithesis of Kamala the Clueless. A former Marine and Yale Law graduate, he is included in most major Oval Office meetings. He has recently been put in charge of fighting fraud, which apparently is annually in the hundreds of billions of dollars or higher. I wish he would break from Tucker Carlson, as it’s hard for me to see a solid MAGA candidate hanging around with a shameless Jew hater, but in terms of intellect and ability, JD Vance is miles ahead of his predecessor.

• Secretary of State

The only thing that Tony Blinken might have going for him is that he plays guitar. He was ineffectual and lacking in gravitas in dealing with America’s friends and enemies. He was the driving force for the 51 Lying Intelligence Officials, as he initiated the letter to get Slow Joe past Donald Trump and the radioactive Hunter laptop. He was a non-factor in world affairs and he still bought into the UN as a force for good. I hope he plays guitar better than he does diplomacy.

Marco Rubio might be the most successful cabinet member in the Trump White House. He is on top of the issues and is a driver for policy and action, like revoking 800 student visas for the Intifada Revolution crowd. His Cuban background and fluency in Spanish are major pluses with the US reapplying the Monroe Doctrine in the Western Hemisphere. A recent poll by Donald Trump of Republican donors had Rubio as the man they want to see run in 2028.

• Secretary of War

In all fairness, Lloyd Austin was Secretary of Defense, while Pete Hegseth is the present Secretary of War. Austin was a former defense contractor executive. When he wore a mask and plastic cover during COVID-19, he looked like Darth Vader’s nephew, Billy. Under his watch, the US did not win any wars or battles. DEI and Drag Queen Story Hour on major bases became more important than actual military readiness. Ships slammed into each other and longtime bases were renamed so as not to offend the sensibilities of people long dead. The department did everything except make and win wars. Christians were hounded, Covid vaccine refusers were thrown out, and recruitment goals were not met.

Enter Pete Hegseth. Though he barely got through the Senate, he has been a dynamo in his position. Recruitment numbers are through the roof, and professionalism and lethality are back. Admiral Brad Cooper always reminds those currently fighting Iran to remain lethal—and he gets that from the top. Hegseth has moved forward by reaching back to America’s martial successes and history. No more DEI or gay/trans considerations. He works out with the troops and shows them the respect that they deserve from all American citizens. His office has shown professionalism in the Maduro raid and the current Epic Fury operation. Maduro and the mullahs thought that Biden and Austin were still around and then they got a dose of Trump and Hegseth. Kinetic action is his way of running the Pentagon.

One could write about additional members of the Trump team like Bobby Kennedy, Jr., Scott Bessent and Chris Wright. Donald Trump chooses strong lieutenants and then sets them free to run their shows. Most succeed and we benefit. And then there is Tom Homan….

https://townhall.com/columnists/alanjosephbauer/2026/03/27/what-a-difference-a-day-makes-n2673495?utm_source=thdailyvip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&utm_content=ncl-Ndgcv82gSR&utm_term=&_nlid=Ndgcv82gSR&_nhids=ncdGxHGkCPEzls

What’s Fueling the Democrats’ Trump Derangement and Nihilism?

What’s Fueling the Democrats’ Trump Derangement and Nihilism?

Aaron Hanscom 

AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, File

“We are going to fight back and we’re going to punch this bully in the mouth.”

This example of unhinged hostility toward President Donald Trump came not from some random online troll in a comment section, but from the governor of California — the online troll who is the frontrunner for the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination.

Victor Davis Hanson cites this example of Trump Derangement Syndrome in a recent video for The Daily Signal on the subject of Democrat nihilism. "He’s completely flipped out,” Hanson says of Newsom.

Consider any red-state governor who ran for president in the last decade — Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Ron DeSantis. Can you imagine any of them saying this about Barack Obama or Joe Biden, or vulgarly telling Europeans they “had kneepads as if they were performing some… foul sex act” on a current president, to use another example Hanson gives of Newsom’s TDS?

Successful policies are one of the reasons red-state governors don’t have to resort to this type of rhetoric. Hanson explains the failures of blue-state governors that have led to a mass exodus of residents from blue to red states:

Their paradigm of high taxes, fraudulent entitlements, lax on crime, overregulation leads to … unsafe streets, poor schools, people who feel they can’t stay in the middle class because they’re taxed too high, they can’t afford a home. I’m talking about places that particularly like Massachusetts, New York, Illinois, and California, and people are leaving, and the Democrats are doing what? They’re appealing to a shrinking constituency in local and state politics that has no national resonancy. It doesn’t resonate with the national population. So if you can’t win an election because your agenda either doesn’t exist, but more likely, if it did exist would offend people as a 70/30 issue — they being on the 30% — you go hysterical, you go nihilistic. You do what the Democrats are doing today.

VDH mentions Illinois, whose governor, JB Pritzker, is also — amazingly — considered a frontrunner for the presidential nomination and, as our own Stephen Kruiser has pointed out, like Newsom is “trying to position himself as one of the tough guys in the Democrats' sad 'Resist' tantrum.” Pritzker's rhetoric, like the following words he said at a 2025 press conference, has been as belligerent as Newsom's: "These Republicans cannot know a moment of peace. They have to understand that we will fight their cruelty with every megaphone and microphone that we have! We must castigate them on the soapbox, and then punish them at the ballot box."

     Related: Fat, Drunk, and Governor of Illinois Is No Way to Go Through Life, Son

It’s not just the middle class that is fleeing blue states like California and Illinois; it’s also the wealthy class. PJ Media has reported on the billionaires who are leaving California to join the exodus to red states because of a 2026 ballot initiative that would impose a 5% tax on the state's billionaires.

Ironically, pandering to billionaires is one of the things that led to so many of the Dems' problems. Globalization enriched people along the blue coasts because it rewarded those with the necessary skills in such industries as media, finance, insurance, and law with access to a "7 billion–person market." Hanson explains the dire consequences:

And they made an amount of money that was staggering. And that gave the Democratic Party the billionaire class. Go into the Fortune 400, look at two things: the size of the fortune and the political leanings of the billionaires. They were mostly left-wing, and that enriched the coffers of the Democratic Party through foundations and PACs, and gave them these boutique issues from green energy to transsexuality that they pushed down our throats — all fueled by money, all without popular support.

Open borders have had just as deleterious an effect on the Democratic Party as globalization. There are now 53 million foreign residents in the U.S., 16% of the population. Many are from poor, autocratic societies and require large amounts of federal and state subsidies, Hanson notes. Appealing to them results in more bad ideas being pushed down our throats, like anti-Israel rhetoric. Hanson says: “We see it with questions of Israel, The new DEI constituency does not like Israel. It’s radically changed the Democratic Party. We see it with visiting students. We see it with green card holders.”

That’s why politicians like Newsom will lie and say genocide is being committed by Israel in Gaza but will say nothing when the Iranian regime slaughters tens of thousands of its citizens in the streets.

     Related: The Fraud Newsom Doesn’t Want You to Know About

As with many mental illnesses, sometimes we can't even be sure of what leads to TDS — Hanson wonders if it's Trump's "Queen’s accent, his appearance, his utter disdain for the media, the academic world, the deep state, the corporate boardroom." Whatever causes it, there's no denying how insane it makes its sufferers look, whether it’s Cory Booker screaming at airports even as travelers are happy that ICE agents are filling in for unpaid TSA agents, senators appearing at "No Kings" rallies alongside clueless protestors, or female members of Congress kickboxing in the name of "resistance" in a TikTok video. 

It makes a Republican long for the sanity of the ... Bill Clinton years. At least Clinton could say, "I believe that together we can make American great again.”

Hanson concludes: "The Democratic Party such at is in the last ten years, at least from the advent of Barack Obama, bears no resemblance to what we saw as lately as the 1990s with the 1992 and 1996 Democratic platforms. They seem like Republican platforms.”