If liberals were animals, it would be a marked improvement.  For one thing, animals don't lie.

Ever since President Trump characterized MS-13 gang members as "animals," Democrats have been playing dumb (when they haven't actually been dumb) for political gain.  What started with some fake news outlets purposely misrepresenting Trump's remarks and others sloppily parroting the deception has degenerated into the comical: leftists trying to save face and gain votes by cynically claiming they're offended that anyone would do violence to the principle of the dignity of all human persons.  Why, Nancy Pelosi, a pooh-bah of prenatal infanticide posing as a latter-day St. Thomas Aquinas, actually lectured us about how every person has a "divine spark."

Screen grab via HBO.

Question: Does anyone really think Trump's remarks were a theological statement about the nature of man or, even, the worst among his number?  Are we analyzing political comments or a seminary lecture?

Not to be outdone, CNN commentator Ana Navarro wasn't deterred in her condemnation of the president by the fact that two years ago, she herself had characterized Trump as an animal; she furthermore said he "should drop out of the human race."  But hey, children do tend to live in the here and now.

Speaking of which, a corollary of Democrats' situational values is, obviously, situational interpretation: all of a sudden, they've conveniently developed an inability to recognize, or to accept, figurative speech.  Any conservative who doesn't talk like Mr. Spock is to now be reviled.

We've seen this before.  After the 2011 shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords (D-Ariz.), Sarah Palin was condemned for using crosshairs imagery in a political ad.  Yet nothing was said about how Barack Obama stated that he talked to certain people so he'd know "whose a-- to kick"; he also advised in 2008, "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun."

This is all figurative speech, of course.  Yet Democrats, the first to condemn and mock fundamentalism, have done William Jennings Bryan one better: they insist on literalism when interpreting spoken words.  

Ironic (and pathetic) here is that Democrats' violent and vulgar tongues have led to actual crimes against traditionalists, such as the 2012 attack on the Family Research Council's offices and the 2017 congressional baseball shooting.

The truth is that umbrage over the animals remark is posturing and delusion.  Leftists will do anything to attain power, and this is another way to play the identity politics card.  "Trump means all Hispanics!" is the narrative.  (Now we just have to wait for the solidarity-driven chant, "I am MS-13!")  Some liberals, though, have no doubt really convinced themselves that such talk is wrong; never forget that leftists live in the moment and in a world of rationalization.

In the former but not the latter, they are a bit like animals.  But what beasts would they be?  Would Ana Navarro be a weasel?  Would Pelosi be a kookaburra (also known as a laughing jackass)?  Chris Cuomo a peacock?  Hillary a Tasmanian devil and Bill a rooster?

The final irony here is that liberals tend to embrace godless evolution and generally believe that people are nothing but animals.  Yet as the brilliant G.K. Chesterton put it, "Man is an exception."  He "is always something worse or something better than an animal[.]"  So true.  And I think we know which free will-abusing people are keeping MS-13 gangsters company in the worse category.

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