Many times, we hear from candidates for public office, “This is the most important election ever!”  For most politicians seeking election or reelection, it’s a recurring appeal.  After all, their jobs are on the line, and for them, it’s important.

But the vote before us now far exceeds the triviality of a politician seeking longevity.  If Virginia legislative Democrats are successful in this grossly unjust effort to literally wipe Republican districts off the face of the map, it will demonstrate the absolute corruptibility that comes with absolute power.  We must vote “NO” in the 21 April referendum.

Our system of government is a Constitutional Republic, brilliantly conceptualized to (among other things) allow the minority a voice. The Virginia far-left progressives seek to eliminate the minority opinions of most of the rural population of the state.  They want the extremely liberal and densely populated counties of NOVA to overshadow the more conservative voters of the Shenandoah Valley and the southwestern parts of the state.  Instead of 6 out of the 11 congressional districts leaning Democratic, the Governor and Democratic legislators want 10 of the 11 districts to lean Democratic. They are seeking to silence conservative voters, all to counteract more Republican districts in other states.  This is punishing Virginians to compensate national Democrats.  It’s an appalling, hypocritical abuse of power.  As this picture above depicts, it’s simply unfair.

I am aware that not everyone who reads my weekly updates agrees with my conservative worldview.  That’s fine by me.  People must do their own thinking in life, and wise people accept diverse thoughts in a free society.  But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t make the effort to share with others where they may be wrong.  And to be sure, if you’re voting for the Democrats’ scheme, you are very wrong. 

Some have a strong dislike for President Trump.  But you would be very wrong if you vote for a corrupt plan that is motivated by hate. You should understand that supporting partisan Gerrymandering undermines the very non-partisan redistricting approach that many of us—including Democrats—supported in 2020.  Don’t let hate decide. Maintain fairmindedness.

And my point?  If it was wrong to have partisan redistricting before 2020, it is still wrong today.  It is for that reason that I ask you to be sure to vote.  Find at least 10 others and recruit their “NO” vote with yours.  Share this email with them and make the point that when Virginia passed its non-partisan redistricting requirement in 2020, in short order, our state was rated as having one of the most fairly drawn congressional maps in the nation.  Now, partisan Democrats want to destroy that evenhanded approach.

It may seem trite to suggest this is “the most important election ever,” but it absolutely is.  We must oppose blatant corruption that results from a brazen power grab.  You can do that.  But only if you vote.

“Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result.”

For a young ambitious man, such an experience was exhilarating.  Yet this week, Americans were not exhilarated when an assassin’s bullet nearly killed Donald J. Trump.  They were horrified.  And unlike Churchill’s characterization, the attempted assassination of President Donald Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania will have a major result. 

When Trump was struck in his right ear by the bullet and fell to the ground, the Secret Service rushed to cover him.  He wasn’t in a cowering mood.  He was in a defiant one.  And in short order, rally-goers would see him standing, fist raised, blood streaming across his face, and mouthing “fight, fight, fight!”  In that moment, he and his campaign were dramatically changed.

To be sure there is much ahead of his reelection.  As is said of politics, a week can be a lifetime.  But this week was unlike any other in recent presidential history.  Looking back over time, few political leaders have been so demonized as Donald Trump.  Many who oppose Trump truly abhor him.  It’s personal for them.  Policy has little to do with their disposition toward Trump.  His original sin was that he beat the left’s preferred female candidate for President, Hillary Clinton. 

When Trump defeated her in 2016, those who despised him took to the streets in protest.  They literally howled to the sky like wounded animals. They protested his inauguration. Indeed, members of Congress were calling for his impeachment before he took the oath of office.  This was not an ordinary kind of hatred.  It was the sort of animus that doesn’t require facts. Only emotion and resentment were needed for Democrats and their allies ensconced in Washington’s bureaucracy to develop false narratives and theories they would use to proffer impeachments. 

Those efforts failed because they were based on lies designed to soothe the wounded feelings of those who hate Trump.  And when he left office after the 2020 election loss to Joe Biden, Democrats took smug comfort in their efforts. Trump was gone.  It was a bright day for America.  But in reality, it wasn’t bright at all.  It has been a nightmare.

The characters and actions of that frightening dream are many.  Open borders that permit dastardly criminals to mix unnoticed and uninterrupted among others illegally entering the United States.  An inflation rate that is far worse today than it was four years ago.  A foreign policy that is in disarray, causing doubt among our allies and delight among our adversaries.  The rise of despicably antisemitic voices from people who seethe in their hatred of America and its founding.  A land where reverse racism has been cynically promoted to compensate for long past racist wrongs.  These things and others have done more to revitalize the presidential ambitions of Donald Trump than could be imagined.  Biden’s utter failure has been Trump’s faithful ally in making the case for the latter’s reelection. 

And when Trump announced his reelection effort, the Biden Department of Justice—rather injustice—and other rogue prosecutors brought a host of charges against him before biased judges and stacked juries.  In time all of this will fail too, just as the impeachments deflated.  But use of the courts to pursue political enemies causes no discomfort for Democrats if Trump is the object of them.  Lady Justice is blind no more.  She now peeks and smirks at an accused person, especially if it’s Trump.   

But on 13 July 2024, everything changed.  It was no longer the issues or the false prosecutions that enlivened Trump’s campaign.  No longer was it the recrimination.  It is now the man.  A man who has been reviled by his distractors to the point of being compared to Hitler.  This past Saturday evening, a man struck by a bullet—that would also kill and wound nearby spectators—stood up, blood smeared, and signified a defiance that is now the tapestry of the Trump reelection campaign.  One iconic picture is worth all the words that can be assembled to describe a fighter.  It symbolizes the hopes and dreams of those of us who seek to renew the American dream.

When Donald Trump was hastened from the stage and rushed to the hospital—his fist reaching skyward amid the squad of Secret Service agents surrounding him—he sent a message to Americans amounting to this:

I’m not done. Nor will I be done in. I’m fighting for you and, yes, me also.  I will not be intimidated.  I will win because we must win. And we shall.

On 13 July 2024, Donald J. Trump was reelected the 47th President of the United States.