The Increasingly Violent Resistance

By Gary L. Bauer

We have reported in the past about the growing violence on university campuses and attacks against conservatives in major cities. Physical assaults and violent attacks by the left are becoming more frequent. These are not isolated incidents by rogue leftists. It is part of a deliberate strategy to terrorize and silence conservatives.

That political debates can at times get heated and occasionally out of control is not surprising. Passions on hot button issues often run hot. But the left has a growing problem with violence and few responsible elected officials are calling them out about it.

The Occupy Wall Street movement, for example, formed to protest excesses in the financial industry, developed a lengthy rap sheet. Liberal pollster Doug Schoen surveyed the Occupy demonstrators and found that 31% supported violence to achieve their agenda.

Hillary Clinton's defeat did not result in any significant introspection by the left. It appears to have only further radicalized many in the "resistance." During Donald Trump's inauguration, they took to the streets of Washington, D.C., blocked public entrances, set trash on fire and attacked private property. I was accosted by two left-wing demonstrators while attempting to get to an inaugural event.

Remember the recent pipeline protests in North Dakota? Law enforcement officials collected 41 pages of social media posts against the police officers who had to confront the demonstrators. The names, addresses and pictures of law enforcement officers were posted online with threats like this one: "Every one of these cops has family . . . Make their family pay."

In one video, a progressive threatened to gang rape officers' family members and threatened to "kill your daughters, your mothers, your fathers, your grandparents, even you!"

As I wrote last week, the progressive left is increasingly engaging in fascist tactics, and The Daily Caller has outlined a number of shocking incidents. For example:

Last week, police in Tennessee charged an Obamacare supporter with felony reckless endangerment after she followed Rep. David Kustoff (R-TN) from a town hall event and attacked his vehicle.

Rep. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) was also physically accosted by an Obamacare supporter.

Again, my friends, these are not just spontaneous outbursts. The "Resistance" is embracing violence. Let me share with you what one Huffington Post writer suggested recently:

"It's time to move beyond polite protests within specified boundaries. It's time to escalate the expression of our outrage and our anger in a massive way. Starting today and from here on, no elected official -- certainly those in the GOP defending and supporting Trump on a variety of issues, for example -- should be able to sit down for a nice, quiet lunch or dinner in a Washington, D.C. eatery or even in their own homes. They should be hounded by protestors everywhere, especially in public -- in restaurants, in shopping centers, in their districts, and yes, on the public property outside their homes and apartments, in Washington and back in their home states."

Of course, at least two members of the Trump Administration have been harassed in public places. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer was accosted at an Apple store. Omarosa Manigault was accosted while shopping at a northern Virginia mall.

There was a time not that long ago during the Obama years when "civility in our public discourse" was all the rage among the media. Tea Party supporters were told to calm down and be quiet. Suddenly, those concerned media voices are silent. Virtually no one in the mainstream media or the liberal political establishment is calling out the Huffington Post for threatening Trump supporters in their homes or denouncing the left's embrace of violence.

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