Top 10 Inconvenient Facts You Can Use to Rile Up a Republican

The "Big Lie" is just that, a lie. Every single objective review (and even the partisan audits), legal case, and investigation that relied on real evidence has confirmed there was no large-scale fraud that altered the results of the election. There was no algorithmic vote switching. Dead people did not vote in droves. Democrat voters were not bussed across state lines. In fact, many of the cases of small-time election fraud that have been uncovered were committed by Republican voters.

Yes, more people voted for Donald Trump in 2020 than any other candidate had been voted for in history... except for President Joe Biden. A very inconvenient fact for the 60% of Republicans who have been duped by Trump, Fox News, and others into believing otherwise.

"We, the General Assembly of Virginia, do enact that no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever..." - Thomas Jefferson

"When all men of all religions... shall enjoy equal liberty, property, and an equal chance for honors and power... we may expect that improvements will be made in the human character and the state of society." - John Adams

"The religion, then, of every man must be left to the conviction and conscience of every man. And it is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate." - James Monroe

"Spiritual freedom is the root of political liberty..." - Thomas Paine

"I have ever regarded the freedom of religious opinions and worship as equally belonging to every sect." - James Madison

And let us not forget, the two references to religion in the Constitution contain exclusionary language. The First Amendment says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..." and in Article VI, Section III, "...no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

When founded in 1854, the Republican Party supported classical liberalism, a national banking system, and opposed the expansion of slavery. Lincoln himself was a religious skeptic and a classical liberal who favored government support for economic growth and federally funded infrastructure. He also came to realize that the nation needed to reckon with racism for the good of its future.

Despite ongoing claims from the former president about his massive popularity and the difficulty Republicans face in getting elected through the Electoral College, the fact is that the Electoral College system actually benefits Republicans. It is the reason Trump made it into office. A minority of Americans lean right, but because of this antiquated system, the votes of the minority carry more weight. As a result, the majority is often ruled by a leader they did not vote for.

Before it became a lobbying organization protecting the profits of gun manufacturers (and allegedly laundering Russian funds to buy Republican politicians), the NRA was a sporting club that supported and helped write common-sense laws. These laws aimed to stop the spread of machine guns, enforce waiting periods, and require gun sellers to share information with the police.

Modern Republicans try to muddy the waters by linking Democrats with slavery, the KKK, and opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In doing so, they try to paint Democrats as a racist party. What they conveniently ignore is the fact that the Democratic Party prior to the mid-20th century was more akin to the modern Republican Party in composition and philosophy. It was the party of conservatives. However, even that is misleading because the liberal vs. conservative, left vs. right party structure we have today is a relatively recent trend.

The 1964 Civil Rights Act wasn't passed along party lines. Instead, it was supported by 92% of lawmakers in Union states and only 5% of senators from the South. It was a North/South issue, not a Democrat/Republican issue. What happened after that, however, was that those who opposed the CRA switched from Democrat to Republican and vice versa. This kickstarted a process that resulted in the current dynamic of the conservative Republican Party and the liberal Democratic Party.

Republicans love to criticize Democrats for rampant spending, out-of-control entitlements, and disastrous fiscal policies. However, the numbers tell a different story. Whether due to financing wars or ill-advised tax cuts (primarily benefiting the rich), Republican presidents have been the ones to allow deficits to grow, leaving it to Democrats to bring them back under control.

The current system is not working. People are sick with no recourse. People are dying of preventable conditions. Americans do not have the highest life expectancy. Americans do not have the lowest infant mortality rate. No system where private companies record record profits while citizens who get sick or injured face financial ruin is a humane and effective system. Healthcare should not be some sort of reverse lottery where people either break even, lose some, or lose everything.

However, conservatives are so opposed to anything they deem "socialism" that they're literally willing to die from the cause. "Universal healthcare doesn't work," they claim, despite every other first-world country proving them wrong. "It would never work in the United States," they predict, as if they aren't constantly touting the capabilities of the greatest country on Earth. "Why should I have to pay for someone else?" they cry, despite the fact that they are already subsidizing the healthcare of non-payers.

So Americans continue to live and die in a system where collective profits are more important than individual lives.

Despite claiming to be the "King of Debt" who would eliminate the yearly deficit, begin paying down the national debt "like it's water," and get the nation out of the red in eight years, Trump's 2017 tax cut and tariffs instead did what just about every economist not drinking the Kool-Aid predicted they would. The tax cuts did not have the required effect on economic growth to offset the loss of revenue. The revenue from tariffs was minimal, and a large amount of it was sent directly to the farmers who were hurt by the trade war.

Unlike other presidents who were dealing with recessions or funding wars, Trump managed to take a booming economy and double a deficit that had been falling under the previous administration. The Trump administration added $2.2 trillion to the national debt by the end of 2019 (before COVID) with nothing to show for it.