WATCH: SNL-Derided War Hero Dan Crenshaw Says, 'Attack Each Other's Ideas, But Not Each Other'

 

 

On Sunday, Jake Tapper welcomed previously-derided-by-SNL Rep. Dan Crenshaw to a panel on CNN’s State of the Union. During the segment, Dan offered up a novel idea on the issue of civility in American political discourse.

Advertisement

Dan — by the way — was all class with his appearance on SNL (see below). He did the GOP proud.

Jake began with a question to the group of newly-elected congresspeople:

“A lot of people [are] talking about civility. But things here in Washington and the nation really seem nastier than ever, and I’m wondering if you think your class will try to usher in an era of cooperation, bipartisanship, and civility?”

House Democrat Deb Haaland (NM) fired off:

“Well, first of all, I feel like some people’s definition of ‘attacked’ is different than ours and what we’ve seen this week. We have all worked together extremely hard. … I feel like we’ve all been very cooperative and, actually, quite civil to each other.”

Jake then looked to Crenshaw.

“What do you think? You’ve been in the barrel, as it were.”

Dan said he thinks everyone’s a bit too touchy:

“I echo that sentiment, of what [does] it really mean to be attacked? And, you know, my whole message last week was, ‘Was I really attacked? Was I really offended?’ That doesn’t mean that what was said wasn’t highly insulting and should be addressed, but I don’t need to feel attacked. And I think that was the message we [were] trying to send.”

Advertisement

Furthermore, Dan proposed something a whole lot of people aren’t much for these days, but some folks used to quite like:

“And the other message we’re trying to send also is just, ‘Don’t insult people,’ you know? We can attack each other’s ideas, but not each other as people. That should be the goal moving forward.”

Oh — the ol’ ad hominem attack. Maybe put the kibosh on it.

Sounds like a good idea. The Right could surely use such an implementation. And hey — as for the Left, maybe they sorta could stop calling conservatives close-minded, greedy, fearful, intolerant, deplorable, sexist, angry, hateful, sociopathic, homophobic, Islamophobic, transphobic (here), misogynistic, bigoted, xenophobic, psychotic, fascistic (here), racist (here), exploitative, evil (here), Nazi (here), murderous (here), genocidal maniacs.

Maybe that’s too much to ask, but it sure would be cool.

 

Relevant RedState links in this article: hereherehereherehere, and here.

See 3 more pieces from me: CNN vs. stinking, China vs. Winne the Pooh, and crazy A.J.

Find all my RedState work here.

And please follow Alex Parker on Twitter and Facebook.

Advertisement

Thank you for reading! Please sound off in the Comments section below. For iPhone instructions, see the bottom of this page.

 

 

If you have an iPhone and want to comment, select the box with the upward arrow at the bottom of your screen; swipe left and choose “Request Desktop Site.” You may have to do this several times before the page reloads. Scroll down to the red horizontal bar that says “Show Comments.”

Recommended

Join the conversation as a VIP Member

Trending on RedState Videos