WHY CRITICAL RACE THEORY NOW?

WHY CRITICAL RACE THEORY NOW?

BY PAUL MIRENGOFF IN CRITICAL RACE THEORY, RACE

Bob Moses, the civil rights leader, died a few days ago. He led voter registration drives in Mississippi during the 1960s and later founded the Algebra Project to teach math to Black students in rural areas and inner cities.

Moses didn’t believe math is racist. He believed that math literacy “is the tool to elevate the young into the first class economically.”

How did the civil rights movement devolve from Bob Moses’ vision to that of Critical Race Theory (CRT)? CRT has been kicking around in the academy since at least the early 1980s, albeit in more interesting and sophisticated forms than its present incarnation. Why has it just now taken center stage in the quest for Black advancement?

The most obvious answers are frustration and anger. Frustration at the fact that doing the things, such as mastering math, that will “elevate young Blacks into the first class economically” has proven very difficult. Anger that Blacks, to a disproportionate extent, aren’t moving into that class.

In its present form, CRT is, in essence, two things — a theory and a demand. The theory is that Whites are to blame for Blacks not succeeding to the same extent as Whites. The demand is that Blacks be rewarded as if they have succeeded to that extent.

It’s easy to understand the psychology of CRT’s theory and demand. But as a strategy for advancement, CRT seems badly misguided even on its own premise. America isn’t likely to accept the demonization of a majority (or a plurality) of its population, and it certainly won’t if the premise that Whites overwhelmingly are racist is true.

American isn’t a racist country. Americans overwhelmingly oppose discrimination based on race. Many are even willing to confer some benefits and privileges on Blacks based on race, and some benefits/privileges have been conferred on that basis. But not to the extent the CRT movement demands.

By calling on well-off Whites to stop having their kids apply to top schools so that Blacks and Latinos can fully populate the student bodies at these institutions, Dallas Justice Now has reduced CRT to absurdity. There are limits to how much absurdity even White leftists can accept. Those limits are being sorely tested thanks to CRT.

The other obvious problem with CRT as a strategy is that by blaming Whites for all that ails Black communities and by dismissing time-honored standards as racist, it gives up the quest for advancement through the means by which Americans of all races and national origins, including a great many Blacks, have succeeded.

To take just one example, it concedes defeat in Bob Moses’ quest to promote math literacy. Math is written off as “White” or racist, along with punctuality, responsible parenting, and so forth.

There is a sense, though, in which the move to CRT isn’t just a lashing out in anger and frustration. The move can be viewed as strategic, if short-sighted.

As a strategy, CRT has the advantage of changing the conversation about race in America. Blacks may feel defensive about their lack of success as a group, comparatively speaking. CRT enables them to play offense, not defense.

Every word conservatives (and a few sensible liberals) expend defending America against charges of systemic racism and White supremacy is a word not devoted to discussing the disproportionate degree to which Blacks commit violent crime, drop out of school early, or fail to maintain a strong family structure. It’s better for Black scholars and pseudo-scholars to be arguing about why American colonists rebelled against Great Britain or whether 1619 is the defining moment in American history than to be talking about Black-on-Black crime in America’s cities or the extent to which Black teenagers give birth out of wedlock.

This advantage doesn’t offset the strategic disadvantages of demonizing White America and of throwing in the towel on achieving equality through the usual methods. CRT seems like a Hail Mary — a longshot gamble that America will accept the view that it is inherently evil, that racism explains everything, and that all standards that Blacks disproportionately don’t meet must be abandoned.

The Hail Mary is a play football teams call when they are truly desperate. The answer to my question “why Critical Race Theory now?” may be desperation

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/07/why-critical-race-theory-now.php

DELTA HYSTERIA

DELTA HYSTERIA

BY JOHN HINDERAKER IN CORONAVIRUS

The current re-masking of America is driven by hysteria over the Indian variant of covid (renamed the Delta variant when it occurred to liberals that if “China virus” is racist, “Indian variant” must be racist too). It is entirely foreseeable that viruses will mutate, usually to a less lethal form, since it is bad for the virus to kill you. That is what is happening with the Indian form of covid.

A few simple charts, courtesy of the CDC, tell the story. “Cases,” many of which are false positives, are rising rather sharply:

But deaths are not:

The tally of “covid deaths” is inflated, since doctors write “covid” on death certificates in many instances where the virus had little or nothing to do with the cause of death. The better index, I think, is the total number of fatalities in the U.S., week by week. I don’t have much faith in the CDC, but I assume they can count bodies.

This shows that there was in fact a significant excess of mortality in the U.S. during 2020 and early 2021, but total deaths have now returned to a normal level and so far, at least, there is no sign of the Indian variant having a perceptible impact:

There is no reason for a return to masking, shutdowns, remote “learning” or anything else. What we see now is mostly just the proto-fascist Left clinging to power.

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/07/delta-hysteria.php

In this undated photo, provided by NY Governor's Press Office on March 27, 2021, is the new "Excelsior Pass" app, a digital pass that people can download to show proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test. (NY Governor's Press Office via AP/File)

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A Foretaste of Fascism

Dinesh D’Souza

Commentary

How can we make sense of the Biden administration’s project to establish a shadow state in which the federal government achieves its unconstitutional objectives—mask mandates, forced vaccines, suppression of religious freedom and free speech—by recruiting private corporations to do its bidding? What is the official name for this public-private partnership in opposition to our liberties?

Before I answer this question, let’s zoom in on precisely what the administration seeks to do. It recognizes, of course, that any attempt to impose a nationwide mask mandate or to force Americans to take the vaccine would run into serious constitutional problems. Where does the Constitution give the federal government the power to require such things? Nowhere.

Moreover, there are practical obstacles. How exactly would the federal government go about enforcing such mandates? It would take a nationwide reporting system of unimaginable complexity to ensure full compliance with a mask mandate. No less than a national vaccine database would be needed to ensure that all citizens took their compulsory vaccine. In either case, it’s unclear what penalties could be imposed on those who refused.

Consequently, the Biden team has come up with an easier way. What if private corporations imposed mask mandates and required COVID-19 vaccinations? What if the government could enlist a wide array of private-sector entities that provide essential services to citizens to carry out what the government itself might find very difficult to carry out? In this way, the government would create a national passport system without having to administer it all from Washington.

Let’s say that you need proof of vaccination to fly on a plane, or to eat at a restaurant, or to go to a baseball game, or to return to work. This would put pressure on citizens to get vaccines or run the risk of being excluded from the basic activities of life. They could hold out and refuse to be vaccinated, but the consequence would be dire: They would, in effect, become second-class citizens.

Now add to this the administration’s attempt to coordinate with digital platforms not merely to enforce mask or vaccine compliance, but also to enforce viewpoint compliance about masks and vaccines. And why stop there? Since we’re on this track, there’s no reason to stop at public health; how about viewpoint compliance on a host of other issues, from gender identity to election fraud to climate change?

Pause to consider the staggering implications. Social media platforms that were created to foster communication and debate, and were given special immunity from lawsuits to foster a vibrant public square, are now the instruments of suppressing public discourse. The very tools of freedom have become tools of oppression—a clear and present danger to democracy itself.

Citizens who don’t fall into line with the enthroned orthodoxies not only face the risk of being kicked off a plane or being fired at work; they also face the risk of being excluded from the public square. In effect, they become “non-citizens” in that their participation in democratic debate has been circumvented.

To the degree they can’t even communicate with friends, relatives, and other associates, they have virtually become “non-persons,” and all with the active collaboration of the U.S. government. To quote press secretary Jen Psaki, it’s not enough that one digital platform ban purveyors of supposed misinformation; all platforms must simultaneously ban them.

There’s a name for such a partnership between the state and the private sector to force all the citizens into lockstep: fascism. In invoking this term, I’m not trying to engage in rhetorical hyperbole. First, let’s clarify that fascism is not the same thing as Nazism. Fascism preceded Nazism by a quarter of a century, and the quintessential fascist was Mussolini, not Hitler. There were powerful fascist movements in England, France, Belgium, and Italy before Hitler devised his own distinctive type of fascism—a fascism built upon anti-Semitism—that came to be known as Nazism.

To understand fascism, I’d like to focus on Giovanni Gentile, the preeminent philosopher of fascism, a prominent Italian educator who also became a close adviser to Mussolini. Gentile argues that there are two types of democracy that are “diametrically opposed.” One is liberal democracy, which envisions society as made up of individuals and the state as the protector of individual rights.

Gentile rejects this form of democracy and recommends a different type that he terms “true democracy,” in which individuals are fully subordinated to the authority of society and the state. Gentile argues that the individual doesn’t precede society; society precedes the individual. Society forms the individual and represents what he calls each person’s “larger self.”

Private action, according to Gentile, must be mobilized to serve the public interest. There’s no distinction between private interests and the public interest. That’s because society represents “the very personality of the individual divested of accidental differences … where the individual feels the general interest as his own.” In the same vein, Gentile argues that corporations must serve society and the public welfare and not just seek their own private benefit.

Who, then, speaks for society as a whole? For Gentile, there’s only one answer to this question: the state. Gentile views society and the state as basically the same. “The authority of the state,” he writes, “is not subject to negotiation. … It is entirely unconditioned. … It could not depend on the people; in fact, the people depended on the state. … Morality and religion … must be subordinated to the laws of the state.”

This is fascism, a philosophy that Gentile didn’t hesitate to term “totalitarian.” For him “totalitarian” was a positive term, invoking as it did a unified state and a unified national consciousness in which all citizens and private entities fall into line and march behind a single banner and a single authority. Fascism, in this sense, represents a special variant of socialism, one in which private entities aren’t taken over by the state but nevertheless do the bidding of the state.

Isn’t this the big picture that the Biden administration is attempting to draw on the American canvas? I recognize that Biden team members would heatedly and emphatically deny the fascist elements of their policies, but this wouldn’t be because the label is incorrect. Rather, their denial would be largely based on the public relations disaster of acknowledging that they are introducing an American version of fascism. Admittedly, it’s a long way from today’s America to the kind of nightmarish regimes that fascism foisted on the world, but anyone familiar with the relevant history can see that we are moving quietly and steadily in that direction.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_morningbrief/a-foretaste-of-fascism_3917404.html?utm_source=Morningbrief&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=mb-2021-07-27&mktids=a51020e17a5a4209835beaa3e12a0f0c&est=3LdTwC5GCjbIZhzRYflLoq%2B1deZD%2BdmrorqGE9g00axKoDGGfYl7JxoDzH6S

Lindsey Graham Makes an Epic Prediction for 2022

Lindsey Graham Makes an Epic Prediction for 2022

BY MATT MARGOLIS 

AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

The 2022 midterms will be epic for the Republican Party, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) predicted on Fox News’ “Hannity” Monday night.

“I think there’s a tidal wave brewing,” Graham told host Sean Hannity. “I think this is going to be 1994 all over again. When you look at rampant inflation, out-of-control crime and a broken border and just [a] general lack of knowing what you’re doing, lack of competency … the Republican Party’s going to have a great comeback if we recruit the right people.”

In the 1994 midterms, the GOP netted 54 House seats and eight Senate seats. In 2022, the GOP only needs to net five seats to retake the House and one to retake the Senate.

While Biden and the Democratic Party are making it easier for the GOP to win back control of Congress, Graham warned that it is not a sure thing.

“We got a lot of opportunity on the map in the Senate,” Graham explained. “We’re gonna take back the House, Sean, unless we completely screw this up.”

The GOP sees several pick-up opportunities in the Senate, but one complication is that they’re also defending a number of seats left vacant by retiring Republicans.

While Graham is confident about the GOP’s chances in 2022, Democrats are “super worried” about the forthcoming midterms and see election integrity as dooming their chances to hold power. Without a doubt, the GOP taking back at least one chamber in 2022 is a safe bet. In addition to the previously mentioned factors working in the GOP’s favor, history shows that the party in power tends to lose seats in midterm elections. Democrats clearly have a lot working against them in 2022, and Joe Biden’s mishandling of everything isn’t helping them.

Related: Lindsey Graham Suggests Kamala Harris Could Be Impeached When GOP Retakes House

But Democrats aren’t likely to sit back and let fate take its course without a fight. In 2010, the Obama White House was blindsided by the Tea Party movement. Just as Joe Biden isn’t repeating Obama’s mistake of overlooking the judiciary, Biden isn’t likely to take the 2022 midterm elections for granted. In addition, Democrats nationwide are fighting election integrity laws that have been passed in over a dozen states. So, make no mistake, the Democrats may go down in 2022, but they won’t go down without a fight.

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/matt-margolis/2021/07/27/lindsey-graham-predicts-epic-1994-like-gop-blowout-in-2022-n1464956?utm_source=pjmedia&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm&newsletterad=&bcid=333548a2571394d78f5984884e55069e&recip=28668535

A woman holds a sign saying "climate change = mass murder" while people participate in a a protest with a group called Extinction Rebellion in New York City on April 17, 2019. (Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)

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The Media Can Produce Derangement

Dennis Prager

Commentary

This past weekend, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd added another column to the myriad irrational and hysterical pieces about the “existential threat” climate change allegedly poses to human life.

As I do after almost every piece I read on the internet, I read comments submitted by readers.

One provided me with an epiphany.

It was a comment submitted by New York Times reader “Sophia” of Bangor, Maine:

“I have one child, a daughter, who told me age 8 that she would never have a child because of global warming. She’s now 34 and has never changed her mind. So I will not experience a grandchild. For her wisdom, I am grateful. I would be heartsick if I did have a grandchild who would have to experience the onslaught of changing climate.”

It is hard to imagine greater proof than that comment of the power of mass media and of the left. That a normal woman would celebrate her daughter’s choice not to be a mother and not to make her a grandmother can only be described as deranged. No normal-thinking human being would think that way. Jews had children during the Holocaust and made sure to have children if they survived the Holocaust.

Does this deranged woman know how few people are dying due to weather-related incidents in the era of global warming?

Danish statistician and economist Bjorn Lomborg noted this past week:

“Over the past hundred years, annual climate-related deaths have declined by more than 96 percent. In the 1920s, the death count from climate-related disasters was 485,000 on average every year. In the last full decade, 2010–2019, the average was 18,362 dead per year, or 96.2 percent lower.

“In the first year of the new decade, 2020, the number of dead was even lower at 14,893—97 percent lower than the 1920s average …

“The preliminary estimate of 2021 climate-related deaths (is) 5,569 or 98.9 percent lower than the 1920s …

“The newest Lancet study of heat and cold deaths show(s) that cold ‘vastly’ outweigh heat, and that climate actually has dramatically lowered (the number of) total death(s)…”

Of course, none of that matters to Sophia—because she relies on The New York Times (and probably NPR and CNN) for her understanding of the world.

For more proof of how deranged many New York Times readers—and Washington Post readers, CNN viewers, and NPR listeners—are because they rely on these sources for what they believe about the world, here are some replies to Sophia’s comment from other New York Times readers:

B. Rothman, New York City: “I completely agree. I have 6 grandchildren and weep inside for the calamitous life that is ahead for them.”

Ida Martinac, Berkeley, California: “I weep with you, Sophia. Whenever I look my 11 year old daughter in the eyes I feel so many emotions: guilt for bringing her into this dying world.”

Liberal, Texas: “I feel your pain. I have 2 sons. Neither one will have children and their partners agree. I’ll never have grandchildren. But I also realize that their decisions have in some way been molded by me. I am proud of their decision.”

Liz, Portland: “Frankly, as someone who has been concerned about climate change, and observing what is happening over the last ten years with real dread, I do not understand why anyone in the last ten years would voluntarily have a child.”

CC, Sonoma, California: “My only daughter shares your daughter’s feelings. I will have no grandchildren. As I watch my peers enjoying their final years surrounded by grandchildren, I can’t help feeling a little jealous. At the same time … our daughters are stepping up to the challenge. I’m proud of them.”

Marisa Leaf, Brooklyn, New York: “I, too, am coming to terms and accepting that my 36 year old son will not have a child as well—for stated reasons. It is painful for me when I watch other young men and women his age going about town with their children. But I understand, and concur, on an intellectual level, that of course they’re right. Bringing more children into the world these days is an existential worry. And irresponsible. So, as I grieve for our planet, I also grieve for the grandchildren that I will never have.”

What do all these deranged reactions have in common? How could so many people living in the healthiest, wealthiest society in human history welcome not having grandchildren?

The answer is they have been brainwashed by the media (and college). They have read and heard nothing—absolutely nothing—by scientists and scholars (such as Steve Koonin of NYU, Richard Lindzen of MIT, or William Happer of Princeton, to name just three) who have studied climate change and found the hysteria morally as well as scientifically indefensible. It is not possible to live a life insulated from left-wing ideas. But it is extraordinarily easy to lead a life insulated from all non-left-wing ideas.

So, then, the epiphany I had was this: A majority of people will believe anything the mass media tell them. This is especially true of those who received a college education. Colleges teach students not to question, not think for themselves, and not to think rationally.

That is why many people believe the world is coming to an end; it is good not to have children or grandchildren; men give birth; Russia colluded with the Trump campaign; Israel is an apartheid state; all-black dormitories on college campuses are progressive; there should be fewer police; it is fair to women to allow biological men to compete in women’s sports; and myriad other absurdities.

There is no other explanation for these deluded readers of The New York Times.

However, I do agree with them on one point. I, too, support their children’s decisions not to have children. The world doesn’t need more fools.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_morningbrief/the-media-can-produce-derangement_3920985.html?utm_source=Morningbrief&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=mb-2021-07-28&mktids=7d4ac62ce9b1807ce83d7ffb11995b7a&est=qTkBM6vKMjUXLzT0eMlOh0TDzPnht1wCDqYhpj818xSYg%2FI7HreUgNualglN

AMERICANS ARE GETTING PESSIMISTIC…

AMERICANS ARE GETTING PESSIMISTIC…

BY JOHN HINDERAKER IN 2022 ELECTION, BIDEN ADMINISTRATION

…which shows that they are paying attention. A just-released ABC News/Ipsos poll finds that most Americans are now gloomy about our prospects for the coming year:

As President Joe Biden completed 100 days in office, the country was optimistic about the coming year, but now, just after hitting the six-month mark, Americans’ optimism about the direction of the country has plummeted nearly 20 points, a new ABC News/Ipsos poll finds.

A majority — 55% — of the public say they are pessimistic about the direction of the country, a marked change from the roughly one-third (36%) that said the same in an ABC News/Ipsos poll published May 2. In the early May survey, Americans were more optimistic than pessimistic by a 28-percentage point margin. Optimism is now under water by 10 points. Looking ahead to the next 12 months, fewer than half — 45% — now report feeling optimistic about the way things are going, a significant drop from about two-thirds (64%) in the May poll.

ABC News attributes the drop in optimism largely to the Indian covid variant, which has caused renewed concern about coronaviruses. Perhaps that is a factor, but I think the rapidly rising cost of living, with the prospect of more inflation to come, is a bigger one. The reality is that our country’s main problems are getting worse, not better. There are several good reasons to be pessimistic about the near future.

Obviously, much could change between now and November 2022. A war could break out; Joe Biden could die or his disability could be acknowledged via the 25th Amendment. But as things stand now, the three biggest issues in next year’s election will be: 1) the cost of living; 2) crime; and 3) critical race theory. All three of those issues represent areas where the U.S. has gone rapidly downhill over the last year, and where the Democrats’ policies are patently making things worse.

In general, pessimism in any country is a bad thing. But when that pessimism is objectively justified and can lead to a change in policy direction, it can only be welcome.

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/07/americans-are-getting-pessimistic.php

WHO’S PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN?

WHO’S PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN?

BY JOHN HINDERAKER IN CONSERVATISM, POLL

I don’t know whether these poll data are reproducible, but they are interesting. Most people, first of all, are proud of being Americans. That is a good thing. Conservatives are most proud, but 87% of moderates are proud to be Americans, too.

Hispanics are slightly more proud to be Americans than whites, but Asians, for some reason, are less proud in this survey. Maybe it is a fluke, or maybe quite a few Asians are angry at being discriminated against by institutions like Harvard and Yale, and many less renowned organizations and public bodies.

Basically, the only people who are not very proud to be Americans are “progressive activists.” That, plus Generation Z–no doubt a reflection of our unbelievably bad education system. Those groups are vastly over-represented on Twitter, where journalists and Democratic Party activists go to assess the mood of the American people. Which explains a lot.

Here are the numbers:

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Exposing the 'Soft Totalitarianism' Behind the Virginia Values Act

Exposing the 'Soft Totalitarianism' Behind the Virginia Values Act

BY MARK TAPSCOTT 

AP Photo/Shafkat Anowar

A Virginia court judge issued a recent decision against a challenge to that state’s Virginia Values Act (VVA) brought by two Christian churches, three Christian schools, and a pregnancy center.

Following the decision, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring issued a statement declaring victory:

“Our landmark civil rights protections will remain in place, and Virginia will remain a place that is open and welcoming to all, no matter what you look like, where you come from, how you worship, or who you love. I was proud to support passage of the Virginia Values Act and am so proud of our work to successfully defend the law twice against legal attack. As CNBC recently confirmed when it named Virginia its ‘Best State for Business,’ inclusion and diversity make our Commonwealth stronger.”

Herring’s mention of having twice successfully defended the VVA referred to his previous win in federal court in a March 2021 challenge to the controversial act. After that earlier victory, Herring said this:

“Every Virginian deserves to live without fear of being discriminated against because of whom they love, what they look like, where they come from, or how they worship. Discrimination will never be tolerated in the Commonwealth and I will continue to do all I can to defend the Virginia Values Act and protect Virginia’s LGBTQ community.”

In the state’s brief to the federal court, Herring had claimed that the the VVA’s purpose  originated from the fact  that “Virginia’s elected leaders sought to protect the Commonwealth’s more than 300,000 LGBT residents from the type of discrimination that has long infected public life.”

Recommended: Virginia Forces Christian Ministries to Adopt ‘Government Ideology’ or Pay $100K

Note well the fundamental claim justifying the VVA — the allegedly continuing “discrimination that has long infected public life.” Note, too, that in the federal court case brief, Herring admitted that in the nine months the VVA had at that point been on the books, not a single discrimination claim had been filed in state courts.

Now, let’s go to the challengers’ side of this case, who were represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, the Arizona-based public interest law firm that specializes in religious freedom litigation and has to date compiled 13 Supreme Court victories in its efforts.

In the state court, the challengers pointed out that:

That “rather than protect values, the [VVA] forces people of faith to adopt a particular government ideology under threat of punishment. [The VVA] purports to forbid businesses and organizations from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, but in practice it tramples on the free exercise and free speech rights of religious ministries like Plaintiffs.

“The [VVA] went into effect July 1, 2020, and now threatens the biblical foundations that plaintiffs were established upon because the act lacks any effective religious exemptions for these ministries. A day before signing [the VVA], the Governor [Ralph Northam] signed HB 1429, which requires the ministries and other employers that provide health insurance to cover medical treatment that promotes a certain ideology about gender and sexuality.

“Specifically, it mandates that if the ministries wish to offer health insurance to their employees, they must cover sex reassignment and ‘gender affirming’ medical procedures — actions that violate their religious convictions.”

In other words, it doesn’t matter whether the people of the churches, schools and pregnancy center are thus associated in part due to their commonly held religious beliefs — beliefs the practice of which is guaranteed by the First Amendment — the state has a law on its books that says no such right exists in the state of Virginia.

But wait a minute, the VVA hasn’t been invoked in even one claim of discrimination, even though, according to Herring, such discrimination has “long infected public life.” One wonders if the VVA was passed to protect individuals from a form of discrimination that isn’t actually a problem of such long-standing severity as Herring claimed.

Let’s compare that to what lies in wait for the churches, schools, and pregnancy center if they try to practice the religious freedom guaranteed to them by the First Amendment:

The VVA “puts the Ministries in an impossible position: They must either abandon the religious convictions they were founded upon, or be ready to face investigations, an onerous administrative process, fines up to $100,000 for each violation, unlimited compensatory and punitive damages and attorney-fee awards, and court orders forcing them to engage in actions that would violate their consciences …

“Even merely posting their religious beliefs on their own websites could subject the ministries to prosecution and exorbitant fines. These penalties could easily exceed a million dollars, ruin the ministries financially, and make continuing their Christian missions impossible.”

The issue on which the judges in both the state and federal courts decided against the challengers to the VVA concerned their “standing” to bring suit. In effect, the judges said the challengers had suffered no harm and therefore had no basis on which to challenge the VVA.

Related: A Post-Christian America Is Bad News for Everyone

Put another way, in order to assure their right to exercise their First Amendment rights, the challengers must first endure the bureaucratic and legal nightmare of defending themselves against the VVA, a process likely to have catastrophic financial consequences for their activities regardless of the legal outcome.

In other words, the mere threat of prosecution under the VVA is a real obstacle to the full enjoyment of the rights and protection afforded by the First Amendment. That is called “soft totalitarianism” and it is at the heart of much of the Left’s agenda for America.

https://pjmedia.com/culture/marktapscott/2021/07/22/exposing-the-soft-totalitarianism-behind-the-virginia-values-act-n1463948