A SECOND CIVIL WAR HAS BEGUN

History was made, in a bad way, this week (02/07) when Vice President Mike Pence cast the deciding vote to confirm Betsy DeVos to be Secretary of Education.

A generation ago, the unprecedented opposition to a nominee of unblemished character for a minor Cabinet post strictly for ideological or partisan reasons would have scandalized even most Democrats.

From the founding of our republic until now, both parties agreed a president should be able to choose for his Cabinet whomever he wants, unless a nominee was clearly unqualified, or there were serious character issues.

The campaign against Ms. DeVos was the most dramatic effort by Democrats and a “mainstream” news media that has shed all pretense of objectivity and fairness to try to strangle the Trump administration in its crib.  Nearly all Mr. Trump’s nominees have been opposed for no other reason than that they are Mr. Trump’s nominees.

For the first time since the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, the “Loyal Opposition” isn’t loyal.  A Second Civil War has begun.

Though it was incredibly bloody (more American soldiers died during it than in World Wars I and II, Korea and Vietnam combined) the American Civil War was, for a civil war, remarkably civil.

That’s mostly because it wasn’t a typical civil war, where allegiance is determined more by ideology, religion and social class than by geography. The Confederate name for the conflict, the War Between the States, was more accurate.

Billy Yank and Johnny Reb had more values in common than in conflict.  The chief bone of contention – whether some men had a right to own others – was so big it could be settled only by fighting. But once the issue of slavery was settled on the battlefields, the shared values of Americans North and South made reconciliation – and a more perfect union – possible.

You and I share few values with the leftist elite waging war upon us.

“Leftists don’t merely disagree with you,” notes Kurt Schlichter.  “They don’t merely feel you are misguided. They don’t think you are merely wrong. They hate you. They want you enslaved and obedient, if not dead.

“When they call Donald Trump ‘illegitimate,’ what they are really saying is that our desire to govern ourselves is illegitimate.  Their beef isn’t with him – it’s with us, the normal people.”

Hard core “Progressives” have no more respect for facts or logic than they do for us.   “Their only principle is what helps the left win today,” Schlichter observes.  It is impossible to reason with, or to compromise with, such people.

We can win this civil war…but only if we recognize we’re in one. “Don’t allow yourself to be deluded by false nostalgia for a past period of cultural peace that existed only because, at the time, the Left was winning,” advises Schlichter.

So far, the Second Civil War has been virtually bloodless.  Let’s pray it remains so. But it may not.

“If violence is what it takes for the Left to prevail, then violence we will have,” Schlichter says. “Berkeley was a message about the price of dissent where leftists hold sway.  And they seek to hold sway everywhere.”

I regret and recant not a single criticism I made of Donald Trump during the campaign.  He’s said and done many things I think deplorable, taken positions on issues I think foolish and harmful.  But for all decent people, NeverTrump ended Nov. 8.  He won fair and square, Donald Trump is a fully legitimate President of the United States, and that’s the end of it.

Further, as Erick Erickson, another former NeverTrumper said, any conservative who isn’t grateful to The Donald for Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch is an ingrate. The last two weeks have been the best for America in a decade or more.

Trump traits that might warrant criticism under normal circumstances may be advantages in this cultural civil war.  G.W. Bush never fought back against all the slanders. Trump has little difficulty identifying enemies, or firing back. He is especially good at handling the Lying Swine, the main enemy.

Nor do I regret or recant a single criticism I made of Republicans in Congress, who were too timorous in confronting Obama’s palace coup of their control of Capitol Hill, and often put petty grievances and personal ambition ahead of the common good.

But victory in the Second Civil War depends on President Trump and the GOP Congress working together, and on both receiving wholehearted (though not obsequious or unqualified) support from us.

We should not abandon our principles.  But we must put them into context.  Our allies, including Trump, are sure to disappoint us from time to time.  So let’s be clear:  in times like these, a person who would withhold because of differences on minor points of principle is a horse’s ass.

I’ll criticize the President and Congress when I think they’re making mistakes.  But I’ll do so gently, in the hopes of enlightening them, improving their behavior.  But I’ll never forget they’re our allies, our leaders, never join our enemies in attacking them.

“Understand that the Left will exploit your principles and morals to make you disarm yourself – figuratively and literally,” Schlichter said this week. “Don’t play their game; don’t fall for their manufactured outrages.”

“The keys to victory are to know yourself, and to know your enemy,” Sun Tzu said 2,500 years ago.

Most Democrat voters in 2016 were remarkably ill informed.  Many were lazy, greedy, more than a little smug and arrogant.  But few were evil.  Many Democrats – especially in minority communities — would join the side of decency if they were better informed, and approached properly.  Some must if we are to prevail.

Our enemies are the Fascist Left Elite, numerically small, but well entrenched in the news media, colleges and universities, government bureaucracies, public employee unions, foundations, Hollywood, and major corporations.

The first step in beating them is to call them what they are: arrogant, corrupt, racist fascist ignoramuses without honor or virtue.  Deny them the respect and deference they think they are due.  This is especially important in dealing with the Lying Swine.

Most of our enemies suck off the public tit.  We must sharply restrict access to it.  Here’s how:

*All that’s necessary for Trump to be perceived as a success (by ordinary Americans) is to repeal Obama era regulations chiefly responsible for stunting economic growth.  As Jack Wheeler and Kim Strassel noted last week, thanks to the 1996 Congressional Review Act, most of this can be done without passing new laws.

Entitlement programs have been immortal because they quickly develop huge constituencies.  The great thing about regulatory reform is that among ordinary people, there is very little constituency for the regulations we need to repeal, or for the bureaucrats who wrote them.

Another great thing about regulatory reform is the more of it we do, the less likely it is businesses will contribute to Democrats, because fewer regulations means less opportunity to buy favors, less need to pay protection.

*We must cut off funding for so-called “sanctuary cities,” which give succor to illegal alien felons.  This would be popular, and we may be able to do it without additional legislation.

Congress should also pass a law to give the victims of violent crimes committed by felons in sanctuary cities, or their surviving relatives, the right to file wrongful death and other damage suits against those cities.  Trial lawyers are always looking for new deep pockets to sue. Let’s give them Chicago, Boston, Denver, New Orleans, and the entire state of California.

*If federal funding can be cut off for schools which violate the rights of transgenders, then we can cut off federal funding for colleges and universities which engage in race and gender discrimination, as most now do against white males, or deprive students of their constitutional rights, as typically happens in those schools that have established kangaroo courts for alleged sex offenses.

Congress should also pass a law to make it easier for students who’ve been mal-educated to sue colleges and universities.  Again, giving trial lawyers more work to do for us.

*Republicans now control more state legislative bodies than ever before.  As many as possible should pass laws like Wisconsin’s which sharply limit the dues money public employee unions can spend on politics.

*Federal employee unions were permitted not by legislation, but by Executive Order 10988 issued by President John Kennedy in 1962.  Like any other Presidential EO, it can be altered or abolished the same way.  Trump can issue an EO to forbid federal employee unions from endorsing candidates or contributing to politicians.  FDR explains here why that’s necessary.

If we do these things, the mid-term elections could be the functional equivalent in the Second Civil War of Sherman’s capture of Atlanta and March to the Sea.

Leftists thought they could never lose.  Their response to Trump’s surprising victory has been as brain dead as it’s been wicked and immoral.  If they get thumped in the midterms, they may finally reach the 5^th stage of grief.

Jack Kelly is a former Marine and Green Beret, and was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force during the Reagan Administration.  Until his retirement last month, he was the national security writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.