One of the perennial fictions from the far left is that the political spectrum ranges from liberals on one side to conservatives on the other.  It is a case where leftists repeat a lie to make it the truth.  Their big mistake is that it doesn’t make any sense — a case where a mathematical discontinuity destroys the edifice.  If there are just liberals on the one extreme, then how do they account for historical figures such as Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, and the original social justice warriors?  No one can make the case that those mass-murdering tyrants were liberals literally.  They certainly didn’t advocate limited government and individual liberty, and they weren’t conservatives, so the model doesn’t work that way.

Maybe this is just a question of framing, with an alternative that makes much more sense because it’s almost too obvious in the real world.

Think of the liberal-conservative paradigm as zooming in too close on only two people in a group photo.  Zooming back out, you see the other people on each side and thus the entire group.

Gaslighting is designed to cast certain people as “good” and others as “bad” by incessant evidence-free accusations.  Conservatives are in the moderate middle of the political spectrum.  It’s a center-right world, as evidenced by recent events.  And though it may be controversial to say, liberals belong next to conservatives near that moderate middle.  We don’t agree on everything, but we all have certain fundamental beliefs in common, like human dignity, limited government, individual freedom, free markets, and the rule of law.

Like the founding fathers, many conservatives will say they are liberals in the “classic” sense.  What is curious is that “classic liberal” hardly ever shows up in most dictionaries.  Take a look at some of these examples of searches for the term.  In many cases, “classic liberal” will default to just the word “liberal.” 

Two data points also show exactly how the far left thinks of classical liberalism, as in these two video examples: “The Rise of ‘Classical Liberalism’ is a Scam” and “‘Classical Liberalism’ is Pretty F------ Conservative!”

What is even more interesting, in a colloquial sense, is that when one searches for the term on sites such as the Urban Dictionary, with all manner of invective towards conservatives and libertarians, there is this interesting entry:

classical liberalism

a political philosophy perpetuating free-market economics, minimalist government, strong private property rights, non-interventionism, government disinvolvement in social issues, separation of church and state, and open borders. the word "liberal" was originally associated with these beliefs, but liberals eventually started promoting large government, closed markets, redistribution of wealth, and high government involvement in social issues. today, liberal is associated with the latter qualities. the newer liberals are sometimes identified as neo-liberals. in modern day, a classical liberal tends to self-identify as a libertarian, and the term classical liberal is used much less than it was 100-200 years ago. some libertarian causes, like the Mises institute, still commonly use the term.

Recent events and the massive political realignment that has seemed to take place have shown that many people are shifting to the pro-freedom side of the political spectrum — toward the big tent in the moderate middle.  Granted, some of them are simply doing this out of political expediency, and these “sunshine patriots” may soon show their true colors when the inevitable winter of discontent comes upon us.  But the reality is that many have become aware of the sheer insanity of the far left, and now they know what happens when the inmates take control of the asylum.

The far left is still sinking fast, and we’re running out of popcorn.  Polling shows they are in serious trouble.  They try to console themselves that the margins weren’t that bad, but everyone has to remember that this is with their overwhelming advantage in total media domination, piles of campaign cash, and a celebrity culture all in for team commie — not to mention that they had the advantage of “extra” supporters they could rely on to “vote early and vote often.”

This is why you can’t help that schadenfreude feeling when you come across a headline like this from the New York Times: “Powerless, Democrats Debate Just How Deep in the Wilderness They Are.”

“We need deep changes and hard conversations, not nibbling around the margins,” said Representative Pat Ryan, a Democrat who represents a swing district north of New York City and who outperformed the top of the ticket by one of the wider margins in the nation. “At the core, the brand is weakened to the point that, without members running against it in tough districts, we can’t get to a majority, which is structurally untenable.”

Democrats who share this bleaker outlook see statistical signs of the party’s decline everywhere: Blue states are ceding population to red states. Voter registration figures are mostly headed in the wrong direction. More Americans are identifying with the G.O.P. than with Democrats. And Democrats lost ground last year among core constituencies including lower-income, Latino and younger voters as Mr. Trump swept every battleground state. [snip]

But Mr. Galston said that focusing on the closeness of the popular vote masked unnerving movements beneath the surface, like Gallup data showing that more Americans have identified or leaned Republican than Democratic for three straight years. That had not been the case in a single year since 1991, when the G.O.P. had won the last three presidential elections.

Even worse for the far left, a Quinnipiac University national poll released on Wednesday showed that President Donald Trump started his second term with a higher job approval rating than at the beginning of his first term.

President Donald Trump is starting his second term in the White House with a job approval rating ten points higher than at the start of his first presidential term, according to a Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pea-ack) University national poll of registered voters released today.

Just over a week after being sworn into office, 46 percent of voters approve of the job Trump is doing, while 43 percent disapprove and 11 percent did not offer an opinion. In Quinnipiac University's January 26, 2017 national poll, 36 percent approved of the job he was doing, while 44 percent disapproved and 19 percent did not offer an opinion.

Anti-liberty leftists love to pretend that “own” half the political spectrum — that they are the moderates in the middle.  But reality is showing they are dead wrong in that assumption.  They aren’t liberal, and they certainly aren’t moderate.  They occupy a far-left fringe, and that’s where they belong — “powerless,” as admitted by the New York Times.

D Parker is an engineer, inventor, wordsmith, and student of history, former director of communications for a civil rights organization, and a long-time contributor to conservative websites.  Find him on Substack.

Image: Chris Dodds via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.