“Moral” Left Mobilizing Activists for Agitation, Principled Opposition Needed

RALEIGH – Just a few short years ago, Monday evenings on Jones Street could predictably result in a dozen arrests of protesters refusing police orders to vacate the General Assembly. Hundreds of shouting Leftists would assemble each week to protest polciiess like Voter ID, and the Republican legislative majority in general. It was a social justice movement lead by the North Carolina NAACP along with a bevy of professional agitation outfits from the Left. The media usually clamored to shower the ‘Moral Monday’ protesters with love and airtime, themselves openly hostile toward Republicans.

The manufactured House Bill 2 controversy provided them a platform to air their grievances and incite the Left’s base, but after several years the movement waned. However, the popular passage of Voter ID laws, among other things (anything with an ‘R’ attached to it), and a still extant Republican majority is inspiring these groups to attempt to rekindle the fervor and smear campaigns against Republicans.

Currently, the NAACP is laying out plans for the ‘Mass Moral Monday March on Raleigh,’ to take place February 9. While these groups have not been inactive in recent years, they have gained energy from advents like Voter ID, redistricting, President Trump opposition, and continued power struggles between Democratic Governor Roy Cooper and Republican legislative majorities. They are seeking to exploit that energy this year with a 5 week ‘mobilization plan’ that reads like a community organizers master agitation plan.

This is what the NAACP does, mobilize mobs to advance the Left’s agenda and smear anyone who opposes it. You can bet that the Raleigh-area media, sympathetic to the political Left and prone to push their narratives, will give an inordinate amount of coverage to the event.

What they won’t likely talk about during their favorable coverage is the merit and implications of the policies these groups would implement if they had their way. If an election was held and Democratic super-majorities were elected in the state legislature, the burden on taxpayers would increase exponentially. Education funding would go through the roof, while education results remained stagnant; taxes would progressively target the “rich,” while the State’s revenue coffers ran dry; restrictive regulations would spread like wildfire, while businesses and economic activity would flee lest the be scorched.

That is the world the Leftist agitators would make a reality should they get in power. Right now they are still stuck in the phase of making as much noise as possible, falsely claiming the moral high ground, and pushing the fantasy that they speak on behalf of ‘the people.’

The fact that they are protesting on the mall and not legislating from the chamber floors should not be overly comforting, though, considering the Democrats’ progress in damaging the Republican majorities(Or Republican leadership’s apparent inability to stop the bleeding). They have taken the governor’s mansion, the N.C. Supreme Court, made huge inroads into the lower courts, and dominated the metropolitan narratives with the help of sympathetic media.

The only way to confront this movement is with principled individualism, conservative policies, and liberty-minded champions in public service. Such a clear distinction would allow North Carolinians to see clearly, and choose wisely, but too often the Republicans in power have blurred the lines between constitutional governance and power-hungry cronyism. Unless we want a ‘Mass Moral Celebration’ of a new Democratic majority on Jones Street, that has to change, and quickly.