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The major and big difference between the liberal/progressive national Democratic Party political views of those such as two of my college professor friends and those of people such as myself is that they are more concerned with and passionate about what many call the identity politics and cultural wars issues, while I am more concerned with and passionate about the economic, bread-and-butter and kitchen-table issues of economic and financial survival of the lower and middle classes to be able to pay their bills.

I have never had the heart to tell them that perhaps their priorities are colored by the fact that they both have combined yearly incomes with their wives of over $230,000 a year, while my wife and I fall under the official federal government category of near poverty (between 100%-125% of the official poverty line).

My well-to-do friends are more concerned with and passionate about issues such as racism, inclusion, the plight of minority groups, white nationalism and the plight of illegal immigrants. They can well afford to be.

But dont misinterpret what I am saying. I also do care a lot about the identity politics and culture wars issues. I just care more about people being able to survive economically and financially.

It is hard and painful for me to listen to many of my fellow national Democrats expressing more heartfelt and passionate concern for the wellbeing of illegal immigrants while expressing a lot less concern and passion about the wellbeing of our poor, our near-poor and our senior citizens who did all of the right things in life and now are struggling just to survive and to be able to pay their bills.

Stew EpsteinRochester, New York

Originally posted here:
Letters: Its hard to hear my fellow Democrats - The Durango Herald

One of the primary tensions fueling the Republican Party is the simultaneous loathing of and desire to be part of mainstream pop culture, which they fear has fallen permanently out of their grasp. The entertainment industry generally maintains liberal stances, at least in public, and regardless of how much power the right exercises over every other area of our lives, it will continue to do so. It is infuriating to conservatives that this one center of power remains off-limits and, as a result, a disproportionate amount of conservative resentment is directed at politically powerless but outspoken liberal celebrities and the media organizations that cover them.

This anxiety has become more acute since the election of Donald Trump, who is both more unpopular with celebrities and more personally concerned with the opinions of celebrities than any president since celebrities were invented. Trumps tendency to start public feuds with fashion writers and The View cohosts was a perfect match for a Republican base that cares way too much about what Kathy Griffin thinks, and they amplify each others worst instincts. When Trump was frozen out by his old celebrity pals in 2016, which was far too late it hurt him deeply, and his supporters felt the sting of rejection seeing formerly apolitical actors and musicians come out as fanatically anti-Trump.

Conservatives frenzied response to this increase in ill will has given us some of the most exhausting news stories in recent memory, from Griffins decapitation picture to Kanye West joining the MAGAverse to former Press Secretary Sean Spicer supposedly getting cheated out of a win on Dancing with the Stars. They are scrambling to find a way back into frivolous celebrity culture, and one strategy being rolled out is the creation of a parallel media infrastructure for entertainment news and gossip that can act as a safe space for easily offended conservatives.

POPlitics, a new venture launched last month by the right-wing youth-astroturfing firm Turning Point USA, emulates the tone and subject matter of Entertainment Tonight and Extra in daily five-minute Instagram videos. Host Alex Clark, formerly a Kentucky radio DJ, promises to deliver Pop Culture Without The Propaganda, but the result is as propaganda-free as anything else under the Turning Point USA umbrella. TPUSA brings in a lot of money ($11 million in fiscal year 2017) from anonymous billionaires who have an axe to grind, and the axe must be ground to keep the money flowing, and POPlitics uses cursory mentions of Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber to introduce a predetermined set of right-wing talking points.

The degree to which these are shoehorned into episodes (there are 26 as of this writing) varies. Episode 17 is mostly a rant about Chick-Fil-A stabbing their base in the back by withdrawing donations from anti-LGBTQ charities, which is not a pop culture topic. Episode 19 consists of a list of bad things Hunter Biden did, a story about Jussie Smollett, and then a two-minute lecture about how Ariana Grande fans should prepare to go bankrupt and die of diseases if they vote for Bernie Sanders. In Episode 11, Clark interviews Texas Rep. Dan Crenshaw about some things he probably doesnt get asked a lot...OR EVER, which means asking him if he likes dancing, which he does not, and what he is watching on Netflix, which is nothing, and then turning it over to him for a three-minute monologue on veterans issues. Despite being edited to feel like a regular celebrity gossip show, POPlitics still feels like a lecture. Also, if anyone were ever to recommend it out loud, everyone would just think they said politics while hiccuping.

The liberal bias of award shows holds another prominent place on the conservative list of grievances, roughly on par with poor people getting health care and gender-neutral bathrooms. Trump, who has tweeted angrily about the low, low ratings of the Academy Awards every year since 2013, has drawn even more attention to the scourge of liberal people receiving little statues by responding in kind to any celebrity who dares denounce him during an acceptance speech. Fox News opinion hosts cover every award show for the sole purpose of getting viewers hopping mad about the culture wars. Sometimes pundits contrast the wealth and status of the attendees with the plight of the average Joe, like when Tucker Carlson called the 2017 Emmys an expression of the contempt America's ruling class has for the rest of the country. Other times they criticize the concept of award shows for being self-congratulatory, such as Sean Hannity calling the 2018 Oscars the pinnacle of Hollywood self-praise. This opposition to wealth, ostentatiousness, and self-praise is highly selective; pro athletes and liberal actresses always get an earful, but there are exceptions for the president and Kanye West now that he stumps for the right.

This is the context in which the Fox News crew has established The Patriot Awards, so-dubbed the Oscars of what really matters, broadcast live from St. Petersburg, Florida for the first time last month on the FOX Nation streaming service. What really matters, in this case, is the flag, the anthem, troops, and cops. The idea of a conservative awards show has been bouncing around the MAGAsphere for a while in a rant about the 2017 Emmy Awards, Sean Hannity asked By the way, when are we going to have an awards show for carpenters and doctors that save lives and nurses and people that do plumbing and heating and make our lives better every day, and truck drivers that bring us all the food and materials we need? Do they ever get an award show, ever?

This is the kind of idea that works best on a bumper sticker. The Patriot Awards were hosted in their first year by Fox News weekend co-anchor Pete Hegseth, who sported an unnerving grin and a suit lined with the American flag. Fox anchors were the star talent here, and they did not shy away from promoting their own shows while introducing award recipients. The audience didnt seem to mind; a puff piece on the Fox News website quoted an attendee as saying I just want to see the Fox hosts in person because I see them every day and they're my family. Hegseths opening monologue was fairly on-the-nose about the purpose of the event. Hollywood has their award shows, right? Self-important types giving awards to other self-important types. The audience booed. Big trophies given to actors who play heroes on TV. Tonight we honor the real heroes. We must pause to consider that that Hegseth has spent the last year successfully lobbying the president to pardon soldiers credibly accused of war crimes to whom he has also referred to as heroes. He really, really loves people who commit war crimes.

Before the awards began, the audience was forced to stand for the National Anthem, a gesture that has taken on extra political significance for conservatives since Colin Kaepernick first took a knee in 2016. The anthem was performed by Kaya Jones, an occasional Fox News guest whose claim to fame is that she was briefly a backup singer in the Pussycat Dolls but left before they recorded their 2005 debut album. Jones resurfaced in 2016 as a popular promoter of Trump on Twitter and Instagram and became a fixture on Hannity soon after. She has benefited immensely from low standards necessitated by the deficit of conservative celebrities under 65, and particularly of young female musicians. It will probably not surprise you that her anthem rendition was off-key. Performances of such a caliber are forgivable at, say, minor league baseball games, or if you are Fergie, but less so at highly produced events where the song is specifically shoehorned in to make a point.

Physically, the Patriot Award is a flimsy-looking metal flag on a stand. What it means is harder to gauge. The categories (Patriot Award for Service to Veterans, Most Valuable Patriot, Patriot Award for First Responders, Patriot Award for the Unsung Hero, The Most Patriotic Sportsman and the Ultimate Patriot Award) are vague, and the criteria are rather broad. Award recipient Sgt. Rob Jones, a double-amputee veteran who runs marathons for charity, received a Patriot Award; this is the sort of respectable endeavor one would expect to be rewarded here, though it should be noted that Jones is currently running for Congress as a Republican.

Other recipients have not sacrificed quite so much, like a 14-year-old who went around his neighborhood pestering homeowners to fly the American flag, or a minor league hockey coach who told players to stand for the anthem or get the fuck out in a viral video. An award was presented to Mission BBQ, a Maryland-based Goldman Sachs-backed military-themed fast-casual restaurant chain founded on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 by two non-veterans that forces customers to stand for the anthem every day at noon. The focus on performative flag-and-anthem worship in an event purportedly more serious and meaningful than the Oscars and the Emmys confirms what Hegseth implies with his opening monologue that the Patriot Awards were never meant to be the high-minded and depoliticized affair they are in the ad copy. It is, after all, a Fox News broadcast.

The difference between liberal pop culture broadcasts and their explicitly conservative equivalents isnt in the amount of political content or the level of smugness or how wealthy the hosts are or how often they pander to the audience with applause lines its who the applause lines are meant for. When creating parallel versions of Entertainment Tonight and the Academy Awards, conservatives opt not only to keep in all the worst excesses of these formats, but to intensify them. The clear implication is that right-wing antipathy toward mainstream culture stems mostly from the feeling that they, and not the big Other, should be the ones relentlessly pandered to.

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The right's attempt at pop culture is hilariously wrong - The Outline

Spotlights like this one provide original commentary and analysis on pressing criminal justice issues of the day. You can read them each day in our newsletter,The Daily Appeal.

Last month, longtime public defender Chesa Boudin was elected San Franciscos next district attorney. His victory was not merely an upset over an interim incumbent with establishment support and an unlikely win for a public defender whose parents served time for felonies; it also came despite the fact that the San Francisco Police Officers Association, the citys police union, outspent Boudin in an effort to defeat him. The union pulled in cash from police unions in Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle, and New York. The San Francisco Deputy Sheriffs Association aided the effort, too,sharinga John Birch Society video calling Boudin a communist radical and a son of terrorists.

In New York State, wherelandmark criminal justicereforms are set to go into effect on Jan. 1, a familiar chorus of concern has piped up,according to the New York Times editorial board. Police Commissioner James ONeillwrotein an op-ed in May that the law would have a significant negative impact on public safety. His successor, incoming Police Commissioner Dermot Shea,expressed similar views in November. Police unions and prosecutors across the state have issued ominous warnings. The Oneida City Police Benevolent Associationwrotein a Facebook post, Think this is wrong & insane? Then tell your politicians that this needs to be repealed ASAP! Over the summer, the New York Prosecutors Training Institutereleased audioof a Nassau County assistant district attorney training prosecutors on various ways to work with the police to subvert the new law.

For decades, law enforcement could rely on fearmongering to swing elections, preventing progressives from becoming district attorneys, and keeping reform bills off the books. But now,across the country, amovement away from incarcerationhas been a rare point of consensus among Americans who can agree on little else.

These calls for criminal justice reform have led police to panic, making these sorts of campaigns against reforms more common. Just as conservatives, going back to the Nixon era, have used debates over the lawfulness of abortion, homosexuality, and pornography to portray themselves as besieged by a liberal elite, police unions, too, now claim they are on the losing side in an ideological struggle,writes Melissa Gira Grantfor the New Republic. It represents a return to the culture wars origins, she explains, which lie with policing. Provoking anxiety over law and order helped usher Nixon into the White House in 1968. Where today police unions cast Black Lives Matter activists as their persecutors, conservatives under Nixon pointed to black power activists and the anti-war left. James Davison Hunters 1991 book, Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America, brought the term culture war into the broader lexicon. Hunter says he wasinspiredafter reading a news story about the arrests of clergy at an abortion protest. He frames the struggle emerging from 1960s social change as a matter less of specific issues than of progressivism versus orthodoxy more broadly.

But throughout the 1990s, many who were at odds with one another when it came to other issues, such as abortion or gay rights, were largely in agreement on defending the power of policewhether that meant uniting against Ice Ts Cop Killer song or more sweeping policy proposals,writes Grant. But the Obama years saw the start of a profound shift. In demanding accountability from police who kill, the Black Lives Matter movement highlighted the ways in which the system of policing makes such accountability nearly impossible. Leaders of the movement argued that police unionsshieldpolice from discipline for brutality. And when the officers who killed Michael Brown and Eric Garner were not indicted, activists pointed to the power held bydistrict attorneyswho rely on police to help them win convictionsin convening and persuading grand juries.

By the 2016 election, Democrats had backed off from the Clinton-era tough-on-crime consensus. Contenders in 2016 madeabolishing the death penaltypart of their platforms, Grant writes. By then, it was more common to hear that criminal justice reform was a bipartisan issuealbeit in a limited sense, with centrist overlap on a few modest reforms like creating alternatives to pre-trial detention. Many of the Democratic candidates of 2020 havepledgedunprecedentedlyprogressive criminal justice plans. And stalwart defenders of harsh law enforcement tactics such as Michael Bloomberg have been forced to walk back those decisions in order to gain any traction with the Democratic base.

Some on the right seem dedicated to stoking the flames of the culture wars. U.S. Attorney General William Barrsaidlast week that if some communities dont begin showing more respect to law enforcement, they may lose police protection. Whilegiving a speechat the Attorney Generals Award for Distinguished Service in Policing, Barr said, I think today, American people have to focus on the sacrifice and the service that is given by our law enforcement officers. And they have to start showing, more than they do, the respect and support that law enforcement deservesand if communities dont give that support and respect, they might find themselves without the police protection they need.

But even some purported leftists have played into police unions victimhood narrative in similar ways. Last week, a thin blue line flag was spotted on NYPD property. The flags, featuring a horizontal blue line surrounded by black, are closely linked toBlue Lives Matter, countermovement formed in response to Black Lives Matter,writes Jake Offenhartzfor Gothamist. Police reform groups claim that the flag denotes racism and a culture of misconduct. In recent years, the flag has appeared frequently at neo-Nazi and white supremacist rallies, including thedeadly Unite the Right rallyin Charlottesville. During a press conference, Mayor Bill de Blasio brushed off questions about whether it is appropriate for the NYPD to fly the thin blue line flag on government property. Later in the day, during the swearing in of new NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea, de Blasio left little room for police criticism. To the doubting Thomases, to the naysayers, if you doubt, then you dont truly respect the NYPD. Jeffrey Fagan, a law professor at Columbia University who specializes in police accountability and criminal law, said he was not surprised by de Blasios remarks. The mayor is still the lapdog of the police unions, Fagan said.

See the original post here:
Police Play The Victim When Voters Choose Reform - The Appeal

Twitter brings us glimpses of the world we might otherwise not know about. We're especially fond of the medievalists who share bizarre marginalia from illuminated manuscripts, like weird (non-white) mermaids or violent rabbits. Along similar but far less pleasant lines, yesterday a tweet brought to our attention a bizarre opinion piece at the American Conservative site, in which a dude gripes about how "postmodernism" destroyed his church. That horror was exemplified, among other things, by the time a guest sermon by a mean identity-politics black person said it was "sinful" to point out the simple fact that the slave trade brought millions of Africans to Christ.

See? Every bit as odd as medieval mermaids.

The piece was an anonymous letter to editor and columnist Rod Dreher, the conservative thought leaderer who has previously explained that liberal women are too busy masturbating to love their children, and who mourned the death of George Michael by wishing the singer had been straight. No way Dreher will one day meet him in heaven now! Dreher prefaces the lengthy letter by noting the writer gave permission to run it anonymously, and offers this semi-disclaimer:

So don't you go around saying Rod Dreher believes slavery was a real shame but at least it brought souls to Jebus. He merely ran a guest opinion insisting slavery was a real shame but it brought souls to Jebus.

We'll spare you the bulk of the letter's jeremiad against the pernicious effects of "postmodernism," mostly because the writer takes his definition of "postmodernism" from a Jordan Peterson video about "Cultural Marxism," which he quotes at length. You silly degenerates may think PoMo is a literary theory about the subjectivity of interpretation and the interplay of texts, but that's merely because you've been hypnotized by international jouissance.

Peterson explains that postmodernism is really about RAW LEFTIST POWER to destroy traditional values by calling anyone who opposes them a "racist." It's the same damp, warmed over culture wars garbage you'd expect, and now some tedious Peterson fan will show up in the comments and tell us we've got it all wrong because we've oversimplified Peterson's simplistic reductionism, and we need to go watch 57 hours of videos to really get the point.

Really, the writer just doesn't like all the liberalism seeping into his church and ruining it for normal people.

He explains that he and his wife had to abandon their former church because it got "woke." In the Before Times, while the church "had some management issues," it at least had sound doctrine:

Ah, but then the pernicious influence of postmodernism (evil woke commies) arrived!

It's not like the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was a preacher or anything. But he's fine with the Civil Rights Movement, as long as those people aren't having civil rights out in public where children can see. He could have lived with a single sermon on history, he guesses, if only the guest speaker hadn't been so identity-political about it.

Fact check: Why yes, the Southern Baptists did split from the abolitionist northern Baptists over slavery. That is an actual history fact, and not in dispute, even if you put scare quotes around "racist."

But the dude's real conniption is over the notion that it's "racist" to be joyful that all those enslaved people were brought to Jebus. Don't get him wrong, he knows that doesn't justify slavery, he's not saying that. But "facts" are "facts":

He may not wince at racism, slavery, or genocide, but he damn well winces at having a cherished belief called problematic or racist. God's plan clearly included slavery, because God's a mysterious fucker that way, and how dare these Marxists deny that The Blacks got saved, unfortunate though all the forced labor, torture, murder, rape, and dehumanization may have been. He goes on to be Very Concerned some more:

There's a lot more, some about race (Jesus may have been swarthy but he wasn't "black," for instance -- no mention of White Santa Claus at least), and some about women, and some about esoteric theological matters, but it all comes down to a long whine about how sad it is that the Left took over his church. Somebody should remind him that only liberals care about "feelings."

We'd recommend the poor distressed fellow hole up with some nice Christian history textbooks for kids, so he can be reassured that the best thing about slavery was that it promised freedom in heaven, and also gave us some beautiful spirituals, and yes, hooray, as one book for 8th-grade homeschooled kids says, he's absolutely right about how slavery spread the word of God:

That same textbook, we should note, also argued that while the Trail of Tears was certainly a bummer for all those Native Americans sent on death marches across the continent, it had a terrific upside:

Still, sad wingnut dude does have a point, of sorts. People who think like he does no longer have a monopoly on cultural power. We bet God is just all broke up about that.

[American Conservative via "Christian Vanderbrouk" on Twitter]

Yr Wonkette is supported entirely by reader donations. Please send us money so we can give wingnuts a good kick right in the Derrida.

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Sad Wingnut Explains Slavery Saved Souls - Wonkette

WASHINGTON When President Trump nominated William P. Barr as attorney general a year ago, establishment Republicans who had chafed at Mr. Trumps takeover of their party were relieved. Between Mr. Barrs work in the Reagan White House and his fast-track career under George Bush, he could be a bridge to the Republican Party they knew and preferred.

How wrong they were.

Mr. Barr has eagerly embraced the most divisive and disputed aspects of the Trump agenda, much to the delight of the partys hard-line conservatives who see him as an indispensable ally in their fight to push the country further to the right on issues like religious liberty, immigration and policing.

Other conservative attorneys general shared Mr. Barrs relish for political battle. But as he attacks the Democratic Party, assails liberal culture and defends the president against accusations of abusing his office, Mr. Barr has wielded a maximalist view of executive power and adopted a blithely antagonistic, no-apologies style that set him apart from his predecessors.

That makes him a natural fit in a Republican Party that Mr. Trump has remade in his mold. But it worries critics in both parties who fear that Mr. Barr is eroding the Justice Departments traditional independence in law enforcement. They point to his handling of the Mueller report, which he summarized in a letter widely seen as more favorable to Mr. Trump, and his appointment of a prosecutor to re-examine the opening of the Russia investigation, which Mr. Trump has long impugned.

To the conservatives who make up the most solid foundation of the presidents base a wing of the Republican Party that is generally more uncompromising on social issues and enthusiastic about political combat with the left Mr. Barr is the template of the public servant they envisioned when Mr. Trump promised to give them greater influence in his administration.

He is a devoted Catholic who has said he believes the nation needs a moral renaissance to restore Judeo-Christian values in American life. He has been unafraid to use his platform as the nations top law enforcement officer to fight the cultural changes they believe are making the country more inhospitable and unrecognizable, like rising immigration and secularism or new legal protections for L.G.B.T. people.

Attorney General Barr represents an important conservative point of view that is really the heart of the Trump presidency, said Frank Cannon, the president of the American Principles Project, a social conservative organization.

A series of assertive public appearances in recent weeks, laced with biting sarcasm aimed at adversaries on the left, have brought a sharper focus on Mr. Barrs style and worldview, both of which share aspects with the presidents.

He has painted a picture of a country divided into camps of secularists those who, he said recently, seem to take a delight in compelling people to violate their conscience and people of faith. The depiction echoes Mr. Trumps worldview, with the us versus them divisions that the president often stokes when he tells crowds at his rallies that Democrats dont like you.

His politicization of the office is unorthodox and a departure from previous attorneys general in a way that feels uncomfortably close to authoritarianism, critics said.

Barr has believed for a long time that the country would benefit from more authoritarianism. It would inject a stronger moral note into government, said Stuart M. Gerson, who worked in the Bush Justice Department under Mr. Barr and is a member of Checks & Balances, a legal group that is among the attorney generals leading conservative detractors. I disagree with his analysis of power. We would be less free in the end.

Mr. Barr swats away those critics. Generally, no one really cares what they think, he said of Checks & Balances in a recent interview with New York magazine. An accompanying picture showed him grinning ear to ear with his feet propped up on his desk.

That defiance is one reason he has attained an almost heroic status among some on the right, particularly the religious conservatives.

Hes offering a fairly unabashed, crisp and candid assessment of the nature of our culture right now, said Leonard A. Leo, the executive vice president of the Federalist Society and a prominent advocate for socially conservative causes. Theres certainly a movement in our country to dial back the role that religion plays in civil society and public life. Its been going on for some time, Mr. Leo added. Thats not an observation that public officials make very often, so it is refreshing.

Mr. Barr helped make the case for conservatives to shift to war footing against the left during a speech at Notre Dame Law School in October that was strikingly partisan. He accused the forces of secularism of orchestrating the organized destruction of religion. He mocked progressives, asking sardonically, But where is the progress?

And while other members of the Catholic Church and Pope Francis have acknowledged that the sexual abuse crisis has devastated the moral authority of the church in the United States and is in part to blame for decreasing attendance, Mr. Barr outlined what he saw as a larger plot by the left and others. He said they have marshaled all the force of mass communications, popular culture, the entertainment industry and academia in an unremitting assault on religion and traditional values.

At one point, he compared the denial of religious liberty protections for people of faith to Roman emperors who forced their Christian subjects to engage in pagan sacrifices. We cannot sit back and just hope the pendulum is going to swing back toward sanity, Mr. Barr warned.

Delivered on a Friday before a holiday weekend to a small, invitation-only crowd, the speech initially drew little attention in mainstream circles. But among politically active Christians, Mr. Barrs remarks lit a brush fire.

At a dinner with anti-abortion activists shortly after the speech, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told guests how striking and clarifying he found Mr. Barrs comments, according to two people who spoke with him.

It was one of the best speeches any attorney general has ever given, said Edwin Meese III, the attorney general under Ronald Reagan, who said that he not only liked Mr. Barrs style but also agreed with his diagnosis of the problems facing the country. Todays culture, Mr. Meese said, is more hostile than it was for conservative values when he was attorney general in the 1980s. And Mr. Barr is giving voice to those on the right who believe they cannot cede any more ground in the culture wars.

If you look back in history, there have been various points of renewal, Mr. Meese added. And I think his concern, which I would share, is were facing a time when the pendulum is not going to swing back.

Mr. Barr, who personally covers tuition for underprivileged New York City students who wish to attend Catholic school, has prioritized Justice Department cases involving religious institutions. In October, the department filed a brief in support of parents suing over a Maine law that bans religious schools from the states school tuition program. It has also argued recently that the Maryland State Education Department discriminated against a Christian academy that said same-sex marriage was wrong.

For the better part of three decades, Mr. Barr has been known in conservative legal circles as a sharp, tight-lipped lawyer who embodied the Reagan and Bush eras. A fair number of people who were more or less conservative said publicly that it was good that he was coming in because he was a real lawyer who would bring respectability to this administration, said Donald Ayer, who served in the Justice Department under Reagan and Mr. Bush.

But his longstanding relationships with Trump allies like Pat A. Cipollone, the White House counsel who is a founder of the National Prayer Breakfast and takes part in the anti-abortion March for Life, and Laura Ingraham, the Fox News host whom Mr. Cipollone introduced to Catholicism, suggest that he was always at ease in the world of social conservatives who have lined up behind Mr. Trump to take on liberals.

In a speech on executive power delivered at a Federalist Society conference last month, Mr. Barr argued that the lefts opposition to the president was a dangerous attempt to overturn the results of the 2016 election and weaken the power of the presidency.

Delivering such a speech amid impeachment proceedings was unusual. During the Clinton impeachment, Janet Reno, then the attorney general, did not castigate Republicans and defend the presidents behavior as Mr. Barr has with Mr. Trump.

Barrs language against the left and against progressives was not something wed normally hear in a speech by the attorney general, said Carrie F. Cordero, a national security expert and a co-founder of Checks & Balances who served as a top legal adviser to the director of national intelligence and in the Justice Department.

Its embedded in department culture to set those partisan views aside when doing your work and applying the law, Ms. Cordero said.

Defenders say Mr. Barr feels emboldened to criticize Democrats because he believes they crossed a line during his confirmation hearings when they accused him of being blindly deferential to Mr. Trump. The same general sentiment is one shared by the president, who also believes he is the victim of unfair attacks from the left.

Their critics went too far too fast, said Kellyanne Conway, the White House counselor who first met Mr. Barr years ago through Ms. Ingraham. And you reap what you sow.

Mr. Barr and Mr. Trump have both staked out far-right positions on issues like aggressive policing, with the attorney general serving as the polished ego to the presidents unbridled id.

Last week, for instance, Mr. Barr said that communities who criticized policing needed to show more respect or they may find themselves without the police protection they need.

Both conservative supporters and critics of Mr. Barr insist that he is not doing the presidents bidding, as many on the left suggest. Rather, they say, he is empowered by Mr. Trump, who has not interfered with an attorney general who provides him the legal justification for his instinct-driven approach to the presidency. That leaves room for Mr. Barr to carry out Mr. Trumps agenda through the prism of his own sweeping views of executive power.

Barr has an opportunity to test legal theories that no other president would give Barr the opportunity to test, Mr. Ayer said.

Continued here:
Barr Dives Into the Culture Wars, and Social Conservatives Rejoice - The New York Times