On Tuesday Republicans scored a hat trick. They won the presidency and retained control of both legislative branches of Congress.
In many respects, that’s a huge win. We should be ecstatic, right?
Not really.
Today, Virginia has a Democratic governor who is more than willing to use his auto-pen to circumvent longstanding precedent; a Democratic lieutenant governor who is more than willing to come up with crafty catch-phrases for recommended medical procedures to demonize Republicans; and a Democratic attorney general who is more than willing to completely ignore Virginia law and fail to uphold his institutional responsibility.
Today, Virginia also has two Democratic United States senators. One, who was most recently a vice presidential candidate and the other who probably is kicking himself for not challenging for the top job.
Today, Virginia Democrats have picked up one Congressional seat.
And, today, with 99.88% of precincts reporting [1], Hillary Clinton has won Virginia by five points.
That hardly seems like a time for victory laps.
To top it all off – even with what is arguably a massive victory for Democrats in the commonwealth – protesters took the streets of Richmond, vandalizing historic monuments and the Republican Party of Virginia headquarters on Grace Street.
Talk about insult to injury.
But, also today, the president met with President-elect Trump and, by all accounts, it was an incredibly gracious meeting that demonstrated everything that’s right in this country as we prepare for a peaceful transfer of power.
Additionally, the Democratic Party of Virginia outright condemned the actions directed toward RPV and even set up a crowd-funding page to raise money to repair the damage. Chairwoman Susan Swecker released this statement:
“The Democratic Party of Virginia strongly condemns any violence or vandalism against the Republican Party of Virginia. This is not the Virginia way, nor is it compatible with our values as Democrats. While we strongly respect and support the right to protest peacefully, these actions are indefensible.”
However, Chairman John Whitbeck, had this to say in response:
“The violent protests that led to the vandalizing our headquarters are unacceptable but not unexpected. The Clinton campaign, the Democrat Party and their supporters in the media spent the entire presidential campaign calling Trump supporters such terms as racist, sexist, mentally ill and a “basket of deplorables.” Our candidate’s signs were stolen, vandalized and even at times defecated upon and we heard nothing from Democrats to demand this behavior stop. The hateful rhetoric we have seen these past few months is the cause of this violence.”
“If Terry McAuliffe, Ralph Northam and the Virginia Democrats are truly sorry for what has happened, then they will apologize to the millions of Americans who supported Donald Trump in Virginia for the toxic and hateful name-calling their campaign is responsible for, and call for an immediate end to this violence.”
“Regarding the Democrat GoFundMe campaign, the RPV has had a very good year fundraising and has more than enough money to fix our windows. Instead, we urge the DPVA to donate those funds to a local crisis pregnancy center.”
Before I write what you probably all know is coming – I have to commend Chairman Whitbeck for articulating what’s on the mind of many conservatives. We’re tired of being called Nazis, white supremacists, zealots, and any a myriad of other epithets that cannot be named here. In that regard, the chairman is completely correct.
However, I think we need to look with a clear head at the state of the Republican party here in Virginia (see above; it’s not good) and, more importantly to this issue, we need to demonstrate goodwill and why it would have been better to simply have accepted the money in the spirit it was offered, and leave the snark for later.
If the Democratic Party is going to be generous – and their voters…voters we conservatives need…are watching – why not meet grace with grace? As an aside, Grace from Grace Street would be a great fundraising slogan for an RPV campaign for that crisis pregnancy center, no?
There comes a point in every organization where it has to examine its culture and this incident is a perfect example of where the Republican Party of Virginia is: still embattled, bitter and losing.
It’s time to turn that around. Maybe the rest of the conservatives in this country are celebrating, but sorry to be Debbie Downer – Virginia has realigned and the GOP must adapt.