I have maintained for years that the symbol of the Republican Party should not be the elephant, but rather a crying baby banging a rattle.
I bring this up again because there is seemingly not a week that goes by when some Republican or conservative isn’t whining: “The left controls Google; the left controls YouTube; the left controls the media; the left controls academia; the left controls corporate America; the left controls entertainment; the left controls …”
Cry me a river. Guess what? It’s your fault.
Over the course of the last several decades, the left has gained majority control over what I call the “five major megaphones of our nation”: the media, academia, entertainment, science and medicine.
And you know what? Good for them.
None of that happened in a vacuum. With eyes wide open, Republicans, conservatives and people of traditional faith either ignored the takeover or were not bright enough or committed enough to their cause to compete for the leadership and influencer roles in those critically important arenas.
Was there eventually some discrimination in the hiring and firing of some Republicans, conservatives and people of traditional faith as the left gained control of those megaphones? I and others would say “yes,” but ultimately … so what?
Liberals have a point of view. Activists have a point of view. If they happen to insert themselves into a company or industry, human nature dictates that not only will that point of view come with them, but that they will mostly surround themselves with like-minded individuals.
Instead of pointing fingers and throwing tantrums in their sandbox, Republican and conservative leaders might want to ask themselves: “Why did we ignore those ‘megaphones’ these last few decades? Why didn’t we recognize the massive power those arenas have to influence and bring change? Why did we stand on the sidelines and do nothing?”
While Republicans, conservatives and people of faith prepped for the culture wars — or least pretended to via massive fundraising campaigns — certain liberal and Democratic-leaning entrepreneurs looked toward the future of business and technology, identified critical gaps and opportunities, and went about creating transformative companies.
Whoops.
No one at the time was stopping conservative and Republican-leaning entrepreneurs from doing the same except … themselves. They may have talked a good game when it came to “capitalism” and the “free market system,” but it was often left-leaning businesspeople who continually beat them to the punch.
Republicans, conservatives and people of faith are not without the means to succeed in these arenas. They simply lack the will.
There is no dearth of money floating around the country today in Republican, conservative and faith-based circles. And yet, so many from those demographics seem much more willing to make millions in profits via those “nasty far left Big Tech sites” than to try to create their own. The same is true for the creation of entertainment sites, media companies and academic institutions.
Conservatives seem all too happy to take the crumbs swept off the table.
The left can — and should — rightfully declare: “You hate us and ours so much? Build your own and get off our backs.”
Will they? Elon Musk and Twitter aside, almost never.
There is very little mystery in all of this. Republicans and conservatives may be loath to admit it, but Democrats, liberals and the far-left not only tell you right up front who they are, what they believe, what they want and how they plan to achieve it, but generally support each other through the always-contentious process.
Whine, slam your baby rattle and kick sand all you want, but the liberals you condemn for censoring and shadow-banning you did in fact create often brilliant companies via thousands of hours of sweat equity while pulling together the financial backing not only to make them a reality but to make them multi-billion-dollar successes.
Didn’t Republicans used to call that achieving the American dream?
The time has long since come for Republican leaders and their plutocrat financial backers to climb out of the sandbox, wipe away their pitiful tears, throw away their baby rattles, take responsibility for their decades of non-action and actually build something of their own for a change.
If not, they really need to put a cork in it.
Douglas MacKinnon, a political and communications consultant, was a writer in the White House for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, and former special assistant for policy and communications at the Pentagon during the last three years of the Bush administration.