There are perhaps two truisms regarding the ascendancy of the Trump phenomena.  The first is something what most of us here at this website know and write about: Trump is no true conservative despite those with which he surrounds himself.  That is not the point of this article.  Instead, it is the fact that Trump has changed the rules of the game known as politics and along the way, he has exposed the Left for the hypocrites we all knew they were.

The band of miscreants known as the Democratic Party invented the game of congressional obstruction during the latter half of the Bush II administration.  In fact, many like Harry “One Eye” Reid were open and blatant about it.  Some note that “turnaround is fair game” when the GOP seized the House in 2010 and the Senate four years later.  The result is the gridlock that has some defining it as “dysfunctional government” which has driven Congressional approval ratings into the basement.  Whatever the truth, the GOP insisted that they were performing their constitutional duties in checking the Executive branch and the overreach of the Obama administration.

Despite their initial, more mature assertions they would work with the incoming Trump administration, their liberal tendencies have taken over and they are now gearing up for protracted fights over trivial matters.  While no cabinet pick should get the obligatory rubber stamp treatment, the troika of Schumar, Franken and Warren seem determined to gum up the works.  This is all being done in the name of “due diligence” and “holding the Executive branch accountable-” some phrases we heard from the GOP Congressional leadership not too long ago and criticized as “obstruction” by the Democrats.

For years, we have heard that there is no voter fraud and to the extent it “may exist,’ it is so minute that it makes no difference.  In fact, the lack of fraud is what sets us apart from other countries and a great justification to combat or roll back voter ID laws and other electoral reforms.  Enter Jill Stein, the ventriloquist dummy sitting on Hillary “The Loser” Clinton’s lap and her expensive (can you say “scam?”) recount ploy.  And why is this recount necessary according to Stein?  It’s not necessarily a ploy to flip the election in battleground states, it is “to ensure the integrity of the electoral process.”  If the electoral process was so full of integrity when Obama was winning, why does it suddenly potentially lack integrity now other than the Left’s preferred candidate failed to sell the goods?

But nowhere is the hypocrisy more glaring than in the Democratic Party’s and the Left’s rediscovery of federalism and “state’s rights.”  A mere two years ago, the Left was insisting that if a politician as much as intimated that state’s had certain rights (a fact enshrined in the Bill of Rights), it was a “dog whistle” term for racism.  After all, wasn’t it the Confederacy who insisted that state’s rights allowed for slavery and later Jim Crow laws.   The historical amnesiacs obviously forget that state’s rights have played a large role in national elections outside the context of slavery (think: the Alien and Sedition Acts, the National Bank of the United States, labor laws, the New Deal, the Great Society, etc.).

Yet now, we have the mayors of major cities extolling the virtues of independence from the dictates of Washington and insisting their little liberal enclaves will retain sanctuary status.  Connecticut governor Dan Malloy has stated he will oppose and not enforce any Trump policies regarding immigration or those that conflict with state laws regarding guns, abortion, social services or LGBT discrimination policies.  Other states that have loosened their laws or made marijuana legal have also vowed to ignore the Trump administration invoking state’s rights as the reason.  There is even talk in California of secession from the Union!!

For the Democrats, this newfound resurgence of Jeffersonian/Jacksonian thought must face the stark reality that Republicans have the majority of Governors and control most state legislatures.  They take solace in the fact that three states passed three stricter gun control referendums, four passed minimum wage hikes and four legalized marijuana.  But what happens if vigorous drug enforcement occurs under a Trump administration, or if a more conservative Supreme Court strikes down these state gun laws?  Will we have a series of nullification crises?

The problem with the Left’s argument is that they cannot assume states are the laboratories of democracy (in the words of Louis Brandeis) when what that laboratory turns out is acceptable only to the Left.  One can expect states like California and Massachusetts where Democrats have big majorities in their legislatures to push the boundaries and be the flash points between an Trump administration and the states.

And the biggest question will be how the media portrays this.  They were largely silent over federal overreach during the Obama years.  Also being hypocrites, expect them to join the chorus of voices extolling the virtues of state’s rights.