You don’t have to be a fan of President Donald Trump to understand why many in the electorate chose him over Hillary Clinton on November 8, 2016.

Trump, the billionaire playboy, managed to represent the regular folks throughout the nation. Like many in flyover country, he is an outsider. Supporters were enchanted by the non-politician. They didn’t appreciate the continued Leftist assault on traditional, home-grown values, and made this clear at the polls.

If you are an objective observer of American politics, no matter your political persuasion, you have not missed these crucial elements.

In this era, there is extremism on both sides. Often, what we see emanating from The Left only serves to remind us of two things:

1. Why Trump was elected in the first place

2. Why he has a great shot at getting reelected

Many on The Left can’t help themselves. They’re like children. Even if they know they shouldn’t do something, they do it anyway. It’s an underlying feature of their mentality. Short-term pleasure or gain replaces any long-term progress in the direction they’d like to head.

What do they want? To take back Congress and eventually the White House. What do they want right now? To score points against Republicans on the national stage and appear to be the tolerant individuals they believe themselves to be.

Senator Cory Booker’s behavior during Mike Pompeo’s confirmation hearing on Thursday is a perfect example of when The Left’s actions only help The Right. Booker grilled Pompeo on his personal feelings about…gay sex. At a confirmation hearing. For secretary of state.

What do Pompeo’s personal convictions about homosexuality have to do with the position he was being considered for? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. But Booker, ever the hysterical politician, had to get a few digs in as he spat all over the microphone.

Check out this exchange…

Pressed by Sen. Cory Booker on whether he still believes gay sex is a "perversion," Mike Pompeo says, "My respect for every individual, regardless of their sexual orientation, is the same." https://t.co/RSsxFIm0kz pic.twitter.com/TaJS0yHYp9

— ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) April 12, 2018

Much to his credit, Pompeo remained calm as Booker repeated himself and his asinine line of questioning.

How utterly normal that Pompeo would hold personal views that might conflict with someone else’s opinion or actual lifestyle, but not allow that to impact his treatment of others. Respecting individuals who you might personally disagree with is an actual thing, but people like Cory Booker, a card-carrying member of The Thought Police, refuse to accept that.

And you know what? That only helps the entity he is battling against; The Right.

When regular Americans see an exchange such as this, it confirms the assault on their freedoms no matter what their personal opinion is on the subject matter. The topic is almost beside the point. What they take away from Booker grilling Pompeo, or any other version of the same, is that the murky D.C. swamp is filled to the brim with people who want to take away your rights and hold you accountable for what goes on inside your brain. In these voters’ minds, we don’t need less of Donald Trump, we need more of him. And since President Trump is the head of the GOP, whether that’s literally true or not, the likelihood of supporting Republicans in November grows stronger.

Passion truly fuels action. And even those on the other side notice that the continuing Leftist trend toward extremism only improves chances for Republicans.

In his New York Times op-ed entitled When Liberals Become Progressives, Much Is Lost, Greg Weiner states the following:

In recent decades, the label “progressive” has been resurrected to replace “liberal,” a once vaunted term so successfully maligned by Republicans that it fell out of use. Both etymologically and ideologically, the switch to “progressive” carries historical freight that augurs poorly for Democrats and for the nation’s polarized politics.

Because progress is an unadulterated good, it supersedes the rights of its opponents…

This is one reason progressives have alienated moderate voters who turned to Donald Trump in 2016. The ideology of progress tends to regard the traditions that have customarily bound communities and which mattered to Trump voters alarmed by the rapid transformation of society, as a fatuous rejection of progress. Trump supporters’ denunciation of “political correctness” is just as often a reaction to progressive condescension as it is to identity politics.

Politicians like Cory Booker and Kamala Harris, and actress-turned-candidate Cynthia Nixon, all represent the Progressive side of The Left. They are all caught up in political correctness, identity politics, and thought-policing. They are not the more moderate members of the party. They are extreme in their views, and those viewpoints do much to help their opponents.

The full, election-year impact of this brand of extremism remains to be seen. But writhing about on screen as you berate an American citizen (nominee or not) for holding personal opinions that do not impact his job can’t be good for The Left’s cause.

And that’s just fine with Republicans.

Follow Kimberly Ross on Twitter: @southernkeeks.