OPINION:
The Democratic Party of the 21st century needs a new symbol that reflects its commitment to self-destruction. Instead of the donkey, how about the dodo?
When the donkey became a Democratic symbol early in the 19th century, the animal was considered stupid. Scientists now tell us that donkeys are quite intelligent and have remarkable memories.
On the other hand, the dodo is (as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said of her president) “just perfect.”
The large, flightless bird became extinct in the 17th century. Renowned for their stupidity, dodos could not adapt to changes in their environment. When sailors armed with clubs came ashore looking for food, dodos actually ran to greet them.
Like the dodo, Democrats have been selected for extinction. The party marches headlong toward a cliff, believing those sailors with clubs are there to escort them to a golden age of progressivism.
The president will need an oxygen tank if he gets any further underwater. His approval rating is now below 40%, slightly higher than his vice president, who won’t win any popularity contests. A higher percentage of Hispanics disapprove of his performance than whites (65% to 56%).
Republicans are comfortably ahead in 6 of 10 generic congressional ballots. In a December Rasmussen poll, they led by 9 points. It’s quite possible that 2022 will be one of those sea-change elections like 1994 when the GOP picked up 54 seats in the House and 8 in the Senate.
If President Biden doesn’t run for reelection, what then?
The Democrats don’t have farm team. Once proclaimed “the gold standard” by the president, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s sexual scandals forced him to resign. California Gov. Gavin Newsom was only saved from a recall by an infusion of cash from Hollywood and Silicon Valley. Democratic governors in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Michigan have alienated voters with COVID-19 restrictions that seemed to be designed by the Marquis de Sade and Vlad the Impaler.
Mr. Biden’s first year in office has been marked by massive illegal immigration (1.7 million border encounters in 2021), a crime wave to make Prohibition-era Chicago seem tame by comparison and inflation at a nearly 40-year high.
Of the 16 cities with record-breaking homicides last year, all have Democratic mayors. District attorneys who helped detonate the crime explosion (like George Gascon in Los Angeles, Kim Foxx in Chicago and Larry Krasner in Philadelphia) are Democrats too.
Democrats keep piling on the pain. It’s as if they’re saying to the public: “Inflation isn’t high enough for you? Let’s have another orgy of social spending.”
“We won’t lift a finger to stop illegal immigration. We’ll let material for unbuilt sections of Trump’s border wall lie on the ground and rust, rather than use it to close gaps.” It took alleged border czar Vice President Kamala Harris months to even get close to the border, and then only because she’d heard that former President Donald Trump was going.
The Democrats’ surrender seal of approval is stamped on a string of foreign policy disasters, starting with Afghanistan, where we acted as the Taliban’s quartermaster.
The president says he’ll defend Ukraine by threatening Mr. Putin (he’s the guy with a big grin on his face) with sanctions. We let China get away with unleashing a virus that’s killed more than 820,000 Americans. Why should China’s President Xi Jinping think there will be serious consequences if he tries to take Taiwan? Now our State Department is in Switzerland playing let’s-make-a-deal with the mullahs.
But don’t blame it all on Mr. Biden. Starting with George McGovern in 1972, the party has drifted steadily leftward. The process is almost complete with a president who’s a marionette for radicals.
Like the dodo, Democrats can’t handle changes in their environment. People no longer get their news primarily from liberal papers and network television. Now there’s The Washington Times, Fox News and the information multiverse of the internet.
Even Hillary Clinton says her party needs to figure out how to win outside its strongholds. That’ll be a neat trick when Democrats refuse to listen. It’s as if their fingers are stuffed in their ears while they chant at voters: “I can’t hear you!”
The American people look at the unmitigated disaster of rising crime, inflation, chaos at the border, cancel culture, defunding the police, anti-Americanism and gender madness, and see nothing but blue.
Stupid it may have been, but at least the dodo didn’t choose its own extinction.
• Don Feder is a former Boston Herald writer and syndicated columnist.
