Republican voters have lamented for years over the lack of pushback from their elected leaders. Democrats and the media hurl baseless and libelous accusations at Republicans, only to be met with a weak defense at best, or silence at worst.

Republicans want to push granny off a cliff, make senior citizens eat dog food, starve children and put them in cages. Republicans are racist, sexist, bigoted, homophobic, Islamophobic, mean-spirited, and ignorant.

Watch any cable news show and get a healthy dose of this garbage. If you don’t like the news, watch late night “comedy,” entertainment award shows, or virtually any television series to hear much the same. It’s one-way propaganda with no pushback.

As one of the all-time great propagandists Joseph Goebbels summed it up, “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

In the last few years, however, the tide is turning. Pushback is being demonstrated by our pugilist-in-chief, President Donald Trump. And others are following his lead.

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Compare this to the last Republican president, George W Bush, who never pushed back against his political opponents while president, who had only kind words to say about Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, but who finally found his voice when Trump was elected.

George W Bush preferred the “high road,” saying in 2013, “There’s no need to defend myself. I did what I did and ultimately history will judge.” His high road gave us eight years of an Obama low road.

Not pushing back allowed the media and Democrats to drive Bush’s approval numbers into the toilet by the end of his second term to the point that a political lightweight like Obama could become president.

The Bush family could only push back against candidate Trump, offering no support or even a vote for their party’s candidate, “The elder Bush voted for Hillary Clinton, while his son voted for neither Trump nor his Democratic challenger.”

Watch any Trump rally to see pushback in action. Trump constantly calls out the fake news media at the back of the venue. His political opponents are branded with nicknames, from Pocahontas and Crazy Bernie, to Nervous Nancy and Little Mike Bloomberg. Then there is Pencil Neck Adam Schiff and Pete Boot-Edge-Edge.

It’s not only funny, but also effective. Just ask Low Energy Jeb, Lyin’ Ted, Little Marco, or Crooked Hillary.

The Mullahs of Iran also learned about pushback recently. They taunted Trump by bombing Saudi oil fields, shooting down an American drone and capturing a US Navy ship. Feeling their oats, last month they attacked our embassy in Baghdad and killed an American contractor/

Rather than jetting off to a Vegas fundraiser and sending out his poodles to blame a YouTube video, as Obama did, this president sent a Covfefe missile to deliver a couple of terrorist bigwigs to Allah and the promised 72 virgins.

Iran, not knowing what hit them, quickly backed down, lobbing a few ineffectual missiles into Iraq, and then accidently shooting down a commercial airliner. Trump then tweeted out in support of anti-government Iranian protesters in Farsi, another punch back to the Ayatollahs.

Punch a bully and give him a bloody nose, and the bully behaves. Ignore the bully and expect the bullying to continue. Perhaps Trump learned that growing up in Queens and spending decades in the rough and tumble world of real estate development.

Others are pushing back too, perhaps taking inspiration from President Trump. Here are two recent examples.

Filmmaker Joel Gilbert, director of The Trayvon Hoax is suing Coral Gables Art Cinema and the city of Coral Gables. As the Miami Herald reported, “The suit says the cinema, at the urging of the Coral Gables mayor, had no right to cancel a rental of the theater for a private screening of Gilbert’s documentary on the George Zimmerman trial after the shooting death of Trayvon Martin.”

Not only did Gilbert expose the bogus Trayvon Martin story, he is pushing back against those continuing to perpetuate the hoax. There is nothing like a $670,000 lawsuit as a punch in the nose to those bullies pushing censorship and suppression of the truth.

Another recent example is Covington Catholic High School student Nick Sandman agreeing to settle a multi-million dollar defamation lawsuit against CNN.  Big media accused the MAGA hat wearing teenager of racism, as he stood smiling in front of Native American activist Nathan Phillips beating a drum and chanting in Sandman’s face.

Media organizations neglected to show additional video footage showing the Black Hebrew Israelites shouting racial epithets at the students, instigating the entire confrontation. This was similar to how the media handed the Trayvon Martin incident, calling Zimmerman a “white Hispanic” and doctoring his 911 call.

It’s not only pushback against CNN but also other media outlets including future lawsuits against ABC, CBS, The Guardian, The Huffington Post, NPR, Slate, The Hill and Gannett. Lawsuits have already been filed against the Washington Post and NBC.

Those who have peddled fake news without consequence for years are now learning what pushback looks like. Will they fold and settle, like CNN, to avoid embarrassing discovery and a peek at their anti-conservative agenda, or fight for their First Amendment right to slander and smear their political opponents?

Either way they lose. This is a subset of the Trump doctrine. Attacking him or his supporters often leads to a lose-lose predicament, suggesting that Trump picks his battles strategically.

The Ayatollahs learned this lesson. They can fight America and be annihilated or back down and face the wrath of their hardline “Death to America” crowd. Or the protests of the Iranian people.

Congressional Democrats are learning the same lesson over impeachment. They can push their nonsensical impeachment, rapidly losing support even among Democrats, or back off and face a tsunami of blowback from the Ayatollahs of the House, also known as “The Squad”, and their supporters. Lose-lose.

It’s not complicated. President Trump has figured this all out. So have Nick Sandman and Joel Gilbert. The shame is that more Republicans still prefer the “high road” of “reaching across the aisle,” only to be bitten by a poisonous snake every time they put their hand out.

This is what pushback looks like and it’s been a long-awaited treat for frustrated Republicans voters. Elected Republicans should take note.

Brian C Joondeph, MD, is a Denver based physician, freelance writer and occasional radio talk show host whose pieces have appeared in American Thinker, Daily Caller, and other publications. Follow him on Facebook,  LinkedIn, Twitter, and QuodVerum.