The Left’s Outrageous Attacks on House Speaker Mike Johnson Could Backfire

As The New American suggested on Tuesday, Politico’s attacks on newly minted House Speaker Mike Johnson have served only to sully its own reputation. Other members of the fourth estate haven’t learned their lesson. And Bobby Jindal, former governor of Louisiana, writing at Newsweek the next day, thinks such attacks “can only backfire”on the Left.

As Jindal noted, “It is … shocking to liberals that Republicans elected a speaker who shares many of the views held by their voters.” He added:

The [mainstream] press loves community organizers like Barack Obama, but only when they are organizing for the right types of communities. They have no patience for a man who actually believes in and lives by the conservative principles he sells to voters.

But, because of his faith in Jesus Christ, Who promised that “in the world you shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33), Johnson, wrote Jindal, “is … uniquely immune from the establishment’s praises and criticisms.”

And that’s a very good thing considering that the slings and arrows from the Left are coming in thick and fast. The New York Times wrote, “The new House speaker has put his faith at the center of his political career, and aligned himself with the newer cohort of conservative Christianity that some describe as Christian nationalism.”

An MSNBC journalist wrote, “Mike Johnson’s Christian nationalist track record isn’t a mystery — it’s a tragedy.”

CNN did a deep dive into Johnson’s history, reviewing more than 100 of his interviews, speeches, and public commentary dating back decades. And the far-left network had nothing good to say about what they uncovered:

“One of the primary purposes of the law in civil government is to restrain evil,” Johnson said on one radio show in 2010. “We have to acknowledge collectively that man is inherently evil and needs to be restrained.”

And this:

“The arrows in the culture war are particularly directed at our youth, where the Enemy often has the greatest effect,” read the 2005 webpage for “God & Country,” a Christian local radio show co-hosted by Johnson. “We cannot lose our children to the forces of darkness. Be aware and get active in your kids’ schools.”

And this:

“There are laws on the books that prohibit discrimination against people for their immutable characteristics, their race and creed and that kind of thing,” Johnson said in a 2009 radio interview. “There’s a difference — and the law has recognized a difference — between that and homosexual behavior. As something that you do, not an immutable characteristic of what you are.”

Regarding abortion, CNN uncovered this:

“It is truly an American holocaust,” Johnson said in May 2022 on local DC radio. “The reality is that Planned Parenthood and all these big abortion (providers), they set up their clinics in inner cities. They regard these people as easy prey. I mean, it’s true.”

Most disturbing, however, for CNN at least, was this:

During a church service in 2022, reflecting on the conclusion of Roe v. Wade, Johnson remarked that much of the credit belonged to Trump.

“There is a lot of credit to go around, but you have to acknowledge, Donald Trump for all of his, peccadillos, okay? Bless him,” Johnson said. “He was true to his word.”

NBC News weighed in with the “five things to know about [Johnson]” which included:

[He argued] that certain states’ changes to their voting procedures during the Covid-19 pandemic were unconstitutional….
[His] voting record has earned him a lifetime rating of 92% from the American Conservative Union and 90% from Heritage Action….

Johnson has a spotless history of voting against legal abortion, earning an “A+” rating from Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America….

Johnson authored legislation called the Stop the Sexualization of Children Act of 2022, which “prohibits the use of federal funds to develop, implement, facilitate, or fund any sexually-oriented program, event, or literature for children under the age of 10.”…

He has Trump’s stamp of approval.

Vitriol also appeared at the far-left Daily Kos, which wrote that what CNN had uncovered was “too kind” in its criticism of the new speaker. It called him out for stating the inherent sinful nature of man. During a radio interview in 2010, Johnson affirmed that “One of the primary purposes of the law in civil government is to restrain evil. We have to acknowledge collectively that man is inherently evil and needs to be restrained.”

This, of course, is why the Founders forged the chains of the constitution. Wrote Jefferson: “In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.”

But to Dan K, the author of the screed at Daily Kos, this is new news:

The idea that human beings are “inherently evil” is a fundamentalist Christian one; we are all depraved sinners without hope unless we accept our depravity and call on Jesus to save us. This is Luther and Calvin. This is Jonathan Edwards thundering at “sinners in the hands of angry God.”

It is not what most Americans believe, nor is it reality.

The author concludes that Christians too easily feel persecuted for their beliefs and that, through Trump, they want not only to be vindicated but to get even:

This is part of Trump’s appeal to the evangelicals and the fundamentalists, even though his behavior goes entirely contrary to their Bible. He speaks their language of persecution (“I’m being indicted for you!”) and promises to restore them to their rightful place — their foot on everyone else’ s neck. The “persecuted” will once again get to be the persecutors. That is true evil.

Perhaps the most odious attack on Johnson was launched by David Rothkopf at the Daily Beast, who wrote, “The most dangerous movement in American politics today is not Trumpism. It is Christofascism.”

He explained what he meant:

The term Christofascism may seem inflammatory. It is not. It is intended to provide the most accurate possible definition of what Johnson and those in his movement wish to achieve.

Like other fascists they seek to impose by whatever means necessary their views on the whole of society, even if that means undoing established laws and eliminating accepted freedoms.

Christofascists do so in the name of advancing their Christian ideology, asserting that all in society must be guided by their views and values whether they adhere to them or not.

This perfectly exemplifies the “reality” of the hard-core Left. Yet as Jindal wrote in Newsweek, such attacks “can only backfire” on the Left.