THE LEFT'S NEW TACTIC WILL ASTONISH YOU
By ama jamus
The survivors of the shooting at the Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland Florida are being hailed as the new leaders (leaders with no life experience and no leadership experience) of the gun control debate ousting the adults. These students are supposedly filling in the gap left by the adults but hey, don’t you dare criticize them because they are traumatized children who watched their friends die at the hands of a student who, by the way was bullied by the very same students lauded by the mainstream media; this is the new argument being pushed by the MSM.
Don’t speak against the “children”
though because you will be deemed someone who doesn’t care about the death of the Parkland students. This is bad advice because a person can’t act as the ultimate authority on gun control and gun policy or on any political stance for that matter and then expect no criticism; that’s not the way life works. There will always be disagreements and criticisms, even when you are right. If you don’t believe me then watch how the MSM treats President Trump.
The left has been arguing, at least trying to argue on and off for the last few years that 16 year olds should be able to participate in voting, which has always been considered as the gateway to adulthood. This is most evident by the recent shooting at Stoneman Douglas High. The voice of the left, that would be the MSM is saying that these students as well as most 16 and 17 year-olds have sensible things to say about public policy so in turn they should be able to vote.
This isn’t a new idea. It has been floating around for decades if not longer, they are even entertaining this idea in the UK and in some countries of the EU. Several municipalities in the United States allow 16 and 17 year-olds to vote in local elections. Takoma Park, Maryland, was the first city to lower the voting age, and Hyattsville and Greenbelt Maryland are following suit. It’s ironic that the advocacy efforts of youth themselves convinced the local city councils that they should have a voice in local governance.
One of the most common arguments for lowering the voting age is that 16 and 17 year-olds is that tests show that the brain of an average 16 and 17 year-old is fully formed for "cold cognition," or reasoned, deliberate decision making, by age 16, which is the kind of thinking needed for voting and the Parkland teenagers are proving this point.
What would be the outcome if 17 year-olds are able to vote? It wouldn't be larger voter turnouts. It wouldn’t be a more informed voter. It wouldn’t even mean that politicians could be held to their campaign promises. The reality of under 18 voters are more votes for the Democrats, at least that’s what the left is hoping for.
What the left would do is turn all voters under 18 years-old into a protected minority group. Then they will be offered victim status and they would then be susceptible to the same old promises that the left promises other minorities: lowered standards, special programs (affirmative action, etc,), and government handouts.