“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter,” goes the saying. Achieving such cynicism only took 2 ½ minutes at an Iowa caucus site, however, when a woman who’d voted for Pete Buttigieg was shocked to learn he was in a homosexual relationship and consequently wanted to rescind her vote. A Buttigieg operative then tried to reverse her thinking, using arguments that inspire lines about five-minute conversations.
It was Monday at Crestwood High School in Cresco when a Democrat caucus voter and Senator Amy Klobuchar supporter, identified only as “Geert,” had agreed to join Buttigieg acolytes in voting for the 38-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana. But then she overheard other backers mention the man billed as the candidate’s “spouse,” Chasten Buttigieg, in a conversation. This sparked an exchange that went, in part, CNBC reports:
“Are you saying that he has the same-sex partner? Pete?” the voter said on a video of her electoral about-face that went viral Tuesday after it was posted on Twitter by filmmaker Annabel Park.
“Are you kidding?” she said.
“Yes,” replied Nikki van den Heever, who was wrangling votes for Buttigieg at the caucus. “He’s married to him.”
“Then I don’t want anybody like that in the White House,” the voter said. “So can I have my card back?”
“I never knew that,” she added .
Given that caucus-goers must devote great time to the event, it’s striking that someone wouldn’t know Buttigieg’s story. Not exactly in the closet, he has made a point to actually kiss Chasten on stage. The pair also graced a Time magazine cover, made a March appearance on ABC’s The View, and have figured prominently in the news.
In a refreshing departure from the increasingly common leftist phenomenon of violence, nasty rhetoric, and incivility (Nancy Pelosi made a point to tear up a copy of the State of the Union Speech on camera, standing behind President Trump last night), both Geert and van den Heever remained civil and respectful during the exchange. Unfortunately, van den Heever’s argumentation was no better than Geert’s candidate knowledge.
For example, van den Heever said while pleading Buttigieg’s case, “The whole point of it is, though, he’s a human being, right? Just like you and me, and it shouldn’t really matter.”
Of course, Hitler was a human being, too, as is every serial killer; this is a state of being, not a job qualification. One wonders if van den Heever would apply her standard if interviewing job applicants: “Ah, you’re human! You’re hired!” Just make sure the creature isn’t a Venusian or Mantis Shrimp (or a shark if hiring an attorney) and you’re good to go.
While you can watch the short video for all the details, van den Heever claims to be Christian herself but apparently has a flexible relationship with scripture and two millennia of Christian teaching, claiming that the biblical stand on homosexual behavior is a question of “interpretation.”
What such people don’t realize is that in their effort to be politically correct, they’re not just rubber stamping one anomalous sexual behavior — they’re helping collapse the whole Christian model for man’s sexuality.
After all, the sexual devolutionaries are essentially asking Christians to say: Adultery is a sin, fornication is a sin, self-gratification is a sin, cohabitation is a sin, indulging impure thoughts is a sin, but homosexual behavior is… what? A lifestyle choice — like living on a houseboat?
This is folly. Rubber-stamping homosexual behavior means that everything below it in the hierarchy of sexual transgressions — which encompasses a lot (e.g., adultery, fornication) — would also be legitimized. Virtually every sexual demon would be loosed from man’s closet.
For Geert’s part, one wonders how she squares her apparently traditional Christian beliefs with supporting any Democrat presidential candidate, as they all advocate prenatal infanticide — sometimes to the point of birth.
Even more tragic, since an informed electorate is necessary to perpetuate a healthy government “of the people,” is that the two women are likely more informed than many. Just consider the newly released Campus Reform video showing how college students hated “State of the Union” Trump quotations — until they found out they were actually from Democrats.
One young man actually admitted, “Twitter informs a lot of my political decisions.” Another said, “That’s just flat-out racist!” when hearing a Joe Biden line about how the other side will put black people “back in chains” — until he learned it was a Democrat’s utterance. Then he stated that “it makes more sense in that context now, and who ever said that, that is concerning” (video below).
This is why I wrote the 2008 piece “Why Most Voters Shouldn’t Vote.” In “democracy’s” birthplace, ancient Athens, only about 10 percent of the population cast ballots, and that’s probably close to ideal. For thinking “full voter participation” makes the republic better is like supposing that giving everyone a chance at a Boeing 787’s helm somehow makes air travel better. Both have the same result, though crashing a whole civilization is even more tragic.
Image of voter who changed her mind: Screenshot of CNBC YouTube video
Selwyn Duke (@SelwynDuke) has written for The New American for more than a decade. He has also written for The Hill, Observer, The American Conservative, WorldNetDaily, American Thinker, and many other print and online publications. In addition, he has contributed to college textbooks published by Gale-Cengage Learning, has appeared on television, and is a frequent guest on radio.
