This election will not heal wounds or build bridges. The half of the country that does not want socialism and refuses to surrender its fundamental rights will be subjected to increasing oppression and restrictions by the ascendant Democrats nationally and on the state level. That is how socialism always deals with dissent.

I write this as it appears that Joe Biden will be our next President. The numbers may change, but he looks to be headed to the White House. I pray that I am wrong and all that follows is wrong.

With Biden and the openly totalitarian Kamala Harris in control it won’t just be restrictions on isolated aspects of gun ownership that we’ll see, something marketable to a broad audience. There will be an outright effort to prevent citizens from owning guns. That has always been the goal. Confiscation is around the corner. Criminals won’t comply, of course. It will be law-abiding citizens who lose their ability to defend themselves, not just from those outlaws who retain their arms, but from a government coming after their other freedoms.

The assaults on freedom will turn to speech, worship, and private property. Censorship to suffocate dissenting viewpoints and deprive citizens of information will accelerate, with Big Tech in bed with the Democrat majority it helped produce. The acceptance of censorship will be intellectualized and spread by Left leaning institutions. The Left leaning media itself will impose censorship on outlets that depart from the party-approved line. We are already seeing this happening and it will get worse because it benefits Democrats.

The assault on freedom of worship will strike at the heart of religious liberty. We are already seeing the COVID restrictions used to shut down worship, or determine how it is done. It used to be that the worship hour was a period of complete liberty but that is going to change. Not only will freedom of worship be limited to worship days–you can believe what you want on Sunday, but don’t live those beliefs the rest of the week–government will seek to eliminate certain beliefs and practices altogether through claims it is addressing discrimination.

The freedom of assembly is in for a rough time. That is because the party that has won power does not value the principle of dissent when that dissent challenges its control. Engaging in activism through the Internet will be more tightly regulated. “Fact checking” and “preventing dissemination of misleading information” will be the claims that excuse sharing of information and organizing on social media. It is already happening–even Mail Chimp is now prohibiting broadcasting information to which it has objection. In-person organizing–out on the streets and in public squares–is already under attack. We saw the Attorney General of Minnesota threatening venues offering to hold rallies for President Trump, even though he ignored marches and gatherings that promoted his political viewpoints. Jay Inslee ordered law enforcement to turn an I-5 bridge over to Black Lives Matter at the same time he was shutting down businesses and churches. And when dissenters step out into the public, they can expect more and more to be met with the physical violence of Democrats’ street thugs. As Seattle and Portland and Kenosha show, those who go to the streets for the Left’s causes and destroy property and injure others are treated leniently, while those who defend property and life against the Left’s mobs are quickly subjected to the full weight of the state’s coercive powers.

Private property will come under more attacks. It won’t be the billionaires who get hurt the most. They sit at the table with the powerful. Even in the old Soviet Union there was an upper class that lived well. It will be those who own businesses and farms, who don’t make their living in a virtual world, who will be told that “you didn’t build that” with all its implications. Under the guise of protecting the environment or battling “climate change” private property will be rendered a meaningless constitutional principle.

This election was never about actually getting anything done that made America a better, stronger nation. President Trump’s record of economic prosperity that spread to Blacks and Hispanics with historic improvements was not the issue. His renegotiating unfair trade treaties that crushed America factories was not the point of contention. His wars–exactly, what wars? He is the first President in forty years not to get us into a new war or military intervention.

His accomplishments were never much debated because at a more profound level the election was about turning this country towards socialism with its inevitable slide into totalitarianism. There is no reversing that course by the democratic processes socialists eviscerate in order to entrench their power. They don’t believe in the virtues of dissent, debate and democracy when their control would be challenged.

We can no longer say, “We all want the same thing, but just disagree on how to get there.” No, we don’t agree even on what America means any more. That makes for a much deeper divide than we have faced since our first civil war. We can acquiesce or surrender to the destruction of our liberties and freedoms, or we can fight at every point of conflict, with everything we have. The totalitarian Left has already made that choice. The question is whether the other half of the country gives up. The alternative is an America of nightmares.

Jim Scarantino

Jim Scarantino was the editor and founder of Port Townsend Free Press. He is happy in his new role as just a contributor writing on topics of concern to him. He spent the first 25 years of his professional life as a trial attorney, then launched an online investigative news website that broke several national stories. He is also the author of three crime novels. He resides in Jefferson County. See our “About” page for more information.