The markets are responding positively to a vast shift in the direction of the Trump economic policy direction (a little change that I’ve been calling for since well before Liberation Day). I’m very happy about it as well.
There’s a reason that’s vitally important: Right now, the Republicans have a lot of running room, and one of the reasons they have a lot of running room is because the Democrats continue to be insane.
I don’t just mean they’re insane in terms of their policy preferences, although many of those policy preferences are quite crazy. I mean, culturally speaking, the Democrats seem determined to do ridiculous things. People on the Left in big cities continue to push ridiculous policies and imagery that is going to make them more unpopular, which gives Republicans a lot of running room.
Here’s the latest bizarre example, although it’s symptomatic of a broader crisis inside the Democratic Party, courtesy of Times Square in Manhattan.
There is a brand-new 12-foot statue in Times Square titled “Grounded in the Stars” by an artist named Thomas J Price. What is this 12-foot tall statue that is “grounded in the stars?”
It appears to be a slightly to moderately overweight black woman wearing jeans that are too tight for her, wearing a T-shirt that she apparently got at Walmart, and staring angrily at the cashier at CVS.
There’s nothing about this that is aspirational. There’s nothing about this that is inspiring. This person is completely anonymous. We have no idea what makes her a hero or heroine.
WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show
Apparently, just being kind of grumpy in front of a TSA agent is enough to make you one of the heroes of American society. The statue was meant to be a stark contrast to two other statues in Duffy Square: One of Father Francis Duffy and the other of George M. Cohan, the founder of Broadway, the Great White Way.
Father Duffy was a Canadian-American soldier, a Catholic priest and a military chaplain who served in the 69th Infantry Regiment on the Western Front in France during World War I. Duffy Square is named for him.
These are actual-heroic and world-changing figures.
But the new statue is meant to be a contrast, because this person is just a person who might need a dose of Ozempic and looks frumpy and mad and uninspiring.
According to the website for this particular work, the statue was created with the idea of “disrupting traditional ideas.” The Left is constantly attempting to disrupt traditional ideas.
But perhaps a traditional idea is good, such as, “You should have to do something heroic for us to build you a statue.” It shouldn’t just be a random black lady, although I do understand that for the Left, the basic idea is that every hero of the past is actually a villain, and the only person for whom you put up a statue is a person who is completely anonymous, has no background, no bad social media posts, and never did anything. Those are the people to whom we should build statues.
There’s nothing from the statue that makes this person in any way important to anyone else, and yet this self-centered statue is supposed to represent the future of America and the future of Western civilization.
According to the website, “Price’s work offers viewers a unique opportunity to experience Times Square in a new light and share in a moment of personal reflection and empathy amidst the hyperactivity of the district.”
That’s ridiculous. The whole thing is ridiculous. If you just want to see random people standing around in Times Square, you could do that with random, actual humans. You don’t need a 12-foot statue to accomplish this.
It’s silly, but that silliness has an underlying depressing message: There is no such thing as heroism. There is no such thing as iconic status that can be achieved by accomplishment. The only thing worth worshiping is a bizarre narcissism of do-nothingism.
If that’s the sort of stuff the Left wants to embrace, the Right has a lot of running room.
