By Michael Schwarz October 28, 2024 at 12:34pm
No matter its outcome, the 2024 election almost certainly will test our commitment to Christian forgiveness.
In the meantime, Republican vice-presidential candidate J.D. Vance has shown how to blunt even the sharpest and most slanderous attacks.
Monday on the social media platform X, Vance posed a simple question that exposed the insanity of the latest “Hitler”- and “Nazi”-related smears against former President Donald Trump and his supporters.
In a clear sign of desperation, Vice President Kamala Harris and her allies have spent the closing weeks of the presidential campaign falsely accusing Trump of admiring Adolf Hitler’s generals and even insinuating that the former president aspired to govern like the Nazi dictator.
On Sunday, for instance, Trump held a mega-rally inside New York City’s iconic Madison Square Garden. Unhinged leftists likened the event to a Nazi rally held in that venue in 1939.
(Of note, while still technically Madison Square Garden, the 1939 Nazi rally took place in a different building in Manhattan.)
The whole Hitler/Nazi narrative reeks not only of lies but also — perhaps especially — of reckless disregard for human life. After all, the former president has already survived two assassination attempts since July.
Vance, therefore, would have had good reason to erupt in outrage and denounce the Harris-led smears.
Instead, the GOP’s impressive vice-presidential candidate responded with his characteristic levelheadedness.
Are Democrats and the mainstream media causing further division with their irresponsible rhetoric?
“Who do you actually think the gross majority of the men who stormed the beaches at Normandy would vote for?” Vance posted to social media platform X.
“The answer is obvious: Donald J. Trump,” he added.
There are so many reasons this is ridiculous, but here’s one:
Who do you actually think the gross majority of the men who stormed the beaches at Normandy would vote for?
The answer is obvious: Donald J. Trump. https://t.co/r0aPaRoaSG
— JD Vance (@JDVance) October 28, 2024
Vance, of course, made a mostly unassailable argument.
Admittedly, one cannot know for certain what the men of 1944 would think about the 2024 election.
On the other hand, we do know that modern military veterans have overwhelmingly backed Trump.
In fact, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted in September, veterans prefer Trump to Harris by a margin of 24 percentage points, 61-37.
Furthermore, that number aligns with recent trends. In the 2020 election, for instance, veterans preferred Trump to President Joe Biden, 60-39. In 2016, veterans gave Trump a whopping 26-point edge over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, 61-35.
Thus, unless World War II veterans somehow qualified as more woke than their modern-day counterparts, we might safely assume that the men who fought actual Nazis would also have supported Trump.
Alas, one glaring problem remains. Namely, Vance dealt in argument and persuasion, as he always does.
But Harris and her allies have resorted to something quite different — something so absurd and vicious that one wonders how, short of direct intervention by the Holy Spirit, one could possibly muster forgiveness toward those who have so much hatred in their hearts that they would compare you and others like you to history’s most grotesque mass murderers.
Michael Schwarz holds a Ph.D. in History and has taught at multiple colleges and universities. He has published one book and numerous essays on Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the Early U.S. Republic. He loves dogs, baseball, and freedom. After meandering spiritually through most of early adulthood, he has rediscovered his faith in midlife and is eager to continue learning about it from the great Christian thinkers.
Michael Schwarz holds a Ph.D. in History and has taught at multiple colleges and universities. He has published one book and numerous essays on Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the Early U.S. Republic. He loves dogs, baseball, and freedom. After meandering spiritually through most of early adulthood, he has rediscovered his faith in midlife and is eager to continue learning about it from the great Christian thinkers.
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