Has anyone else noticed that Democrats routinely accuse Republicans of being guilty of what they have been doing themselves? The term projection was first introduced into psychology by Sigmund Freud. The word is used to describe that most peculiar form of hypocrisy where one person accuses another of thoughts or behavior of which they themselves are actually guilty. It seems to be the only word that adequately describes Democrat speech and behavior.

For example, Democrats love to frequently accuse Republicans of being racists and white supremacists. But it was Democrat and former Ku Klux Klan Grand Kleagle Robert Byrd who personally filibustered the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for more than fourteen hours. While it is true that a slim majority of Democrats supported that landmark piece of legislation, the percentage was only about 60/40 or so. The fact is the bill only passed because of overwhelming Republican support (80/20). The Democratic Party was the original home of the KKK.

It was the Democrat President Woodrow Wilson who made the racist film Birth of a Nation the first movie ever screened in the White House. It is a well-known fact the Republican Party was literally formed by abolitionists who were vehemently opposed to slavery. Many of the statues recently torn down by violent protestors, especially those of Confederate generals, represent Democrats who supported slavery. Yet even contemporary Democrats like Ralph “Blackface” Northam have their own issues with racism. Never forget that it allegedly was LBJ himself who said that he’d have “blacks” (though he used the “N” word) voting for Democrats for the next 200 years after leading the effort to get the 1964 Civil Rights Act passed. Bull Conner was a Democrat. Selma was an atrocity committed by Democrats. Let me remind you that LBJ was notorious for using similar language on a regular basis, even though Snopes has rated the LBJ claim as “unproven,” which means it’s almost certainly true. Even the self-proclaimed “fact checkers” have become experts at spinning bad behavior when done by Democrat politicians.

It’s a glaring, infuriating double standard where Larry Craig is forced to resign from the Senate after being arrested for lewd conduct in a men’s restroom and yet amazingly, nobody said a word after Congressman Barney Frank hired a male prostitute as a personal aide and had to fire him after it was discovered the “aide” was running a male prostitution ring right out of the congressman’s personal residence. If the Democrats aren’t allowed to have double standards, they’d have no standards at all.

Recently Democrats have begun screaming about voter suppression and screeching that every (illegal or fraudulent) vote must be counted…  However, we should all remember that in the “hanging chad” vote count during the 2000 election it was none other than Al Gore who actively worked to suppress the vote of military personnel from Florida serving overseas, probably because he knew the military didn’t support his politics. Democrats want people to be able to vote without a photo ID, even though you can’t walk into a government building without showing a security guard your photo ID. Democrats have started using COVID-19 as an excuse to promote a campaign to implement wide scale mail-in voting, ignoring all the problems involving missing ballots, easy voter fraud, and delayed vote results.

Democrats accuse Republicans of being the political party that represents the “evil” rich but in reality, but there are plenty of Democrats among of the richest members of Congress. Obscenely wealthy Democrat contributors include George Soros, Warren Buffett, Eric Schmidt, most of Hollywood, most of Silicon Valley, public-sector labor unions, and the lamestream media. By comparison, who do the Republicans have, besides the surviving Koch brother? The last time I checked, the Koch brothers hadn’t even cracked the top 50 list of political donors, and that was when David was still alive. Know who was #1 on that list? Act Blue. Do you know where all the money currently being donated to the “Black Lives Matter” movement is going? Act Blue.

Don’t let their hypocritical lies fool you. Clearly, the Democratic Party is the political party that primarily serves a fragmented conglomeration of special interests (for example abortion, gun control, gay marriage) that donate large amounts of money to their party, while the Republican Party seems to come closer to serving the American people. Yet for some reason (probably due to the constant barrage of lies, omissions, and distortions of truth coming via the lamestream media) many Americans seem convinced the opposite is true. Trust no one, and especially don’t trust anyone named Jim Acosta, Anderson Cooper, Brian Stelter, or Rachel Maddow.

Democrats claim they support free speech, but then they label opposition speech as “hate speech” in order to suppress it. Liberals tell white conservatives they cannot express an opinion on race and tell men they cannot hold an opinion opposed to abortion. Democrats like to characterize Republicans as poorly educated religious nuts bitterly clinging to God and their guns. Yet radical liberal activists, who support Democrats and are supported by them, have been the first to resort to violence in the recent Black Lives Matter “protests” that have often escalated into riots.

Democrats warned that Donald Trump would not accept the election results if he lost in 2016, and then promptly refused to accept losing to him for the next four years. Now they have begun bleating that Trump won’t accept losing in 2020. But does anyone believe the Democrats will accept losing in November? Remember Al Gore. They are claiming the election will be stolen by voter suppression and other Republican tactics to keep eligible voters from voting, while Republicans are worried about the number of dead people who might vote Democrat in November.

And of course, Democrats accused Republicans of colluding with the Russians to steal the 2016 election, but it was actually Hillary Clinton’s campaign that hired Fusion GPS to work with a former intelligence agent once employed by a foreign government, who allegedly worked with Russian sources to create laughably false stories about Russian prostitutes and golden showers on a mattress upon which Obama once slept. Who on earth could even conceive of such an outlandish claim, and accuse the President of the United States of being a pervert?

Why, the same sort of person for whom that sort of vile behavior comes naturally, of course.

John Leonard is a freelance writer of nonfiction and detective novels. Most recently he’s been the lead editor of the Rootstock series of epic fantasy novels. Connect with him on Facebook (where he’s an actual friend of Corn Pop) or contact him through his website at southernprose.com