Doug Wilson is a slimy Christian theocrat who think women should lose the vote and that marital sex means men conquer, women submit. He thinks race relations in America were best under slavery and says he would have fought for the Confederacy — but totally not because of slavery. Sorry, Mr. Wilson, if you were fighting for the Confederacy you would have been fighting to protect slavery and against abolition. The CSA was quite open about slavery as a fundamental principle of their government. And here’s his latest deep insight:
“Citizenship is more of a privilege, dependent upon ancestry, background, how long you’ve been here, whether you meet the qualifications or not,” Wilson said as he insisted citizenship was not a right. “And if America is a creedal nation, then you have to have creedal standards. So anybody who voted for Mamdani should lose their citizenship.”
This is two contradictory arguments. The idea of America as a creedal nation is that we don’t base citizenship on things like ancestry or background, we base it on whether you can accept the Constitution, embrace “all men are created equal,” believe in inalienable rights. Ancestry is irrelevant. But like so many on the right, Wilson’s worldview is that the creed is Christianity, therefore Muslim=Unamerican. It’s his country, not someone like Zohram Mamdani. Of course even by that logic, depriving people of citizenship for voting for Mamdani makes no sense — except for a power-hungry religious tyrant, which I think he is.
In other words, he’s much further from the American creed than Mamdani. I am embarrassed to share my faith with Doug Wilson (technically they’re two different, incompatible versions of Christianity, but still). Where Wilson sees an apocalyptic battle between his theocracy and Islam, Christianity and Islam (and Hinduism, atheism, etc.) can coexist just fine, as they always have. Abdul El-Sayed, the Democrat running to be senator from Michigan, is not coming for our culture. Sharia law is not going to take over. Nor did El-Sayed dismiss 9/11 as unimportant.
Michael Savage, a would-be Rush Limbaugh (he never came close to the same success) who wants Mamdani deported is as far from the American creed as Wilson. Ditto the vapid yet venomous Ben Shapiro who speaking of Muslim immigrants asks “What has been the the vast boon to the American taxpayer from these people? What has been the great cultural reawakening that has occurred because of these people who despise the country?” A)We don’t allow people to immigrate because of some “vast boon to the American taxpayer” — and if that was a standard for judging people, Shapiro hardly qualifies. B)America has always been a nation of immigrants. If he despises that, he despises America, just as Republicans despise America for giving equal rights to gays, POC, Muslims, women … Republicans are the barbarians they imagine they’re fighting.
Mamdani meanwhile forges ahead with his policies, including plans to open grocery stores in food deserts. This may not work for a variety of reasons: expense, effectiveness, groceries suing to block the project (which they are). There’s some good discussion here including what I thought was an excellent point: “if they work well we figure out how to scale and if they don’t then oh well.” It’s a pilot project, a test. Try it, tinker with it if it needs improving, give it up if it fails. That’s okay. In fact it’s probably a healthy approach. As I’ve said before, more people should study Mamdani and learn from what he’s doing and how he’s tackling things. And responding to criticism, like claims the rich will flee his tax policies. His response: “When we talk about taxing rich we hear about fear of capital flight- flight of Black New Yorkers who can’t afford it has happened for years… Dems were branded as ‘SoCiALisT’ forever — Obama was called one…”
