In the Age of Trump, where Trumpservatism has replaced conservatism within the Republican party, many of those once heralded for their “strident” defense of conservative values have come out of the closet — politically speaking — to publicly admit their same-politics attraction to the Far-Left.

One such “conservative” is Gutless On Principles Hall of Shame enshrinee, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT).

Over the past two years, Lee has developed a political infatuation with Ivanka Trump’s socialist feminist agenda and has worked to advance many of the same policies promoted by Hillary Clinton during her 2016 campaign.

Lee, along with Marco Rubio, were same-politics partners with Daddy’s precious to “help” working families by using so-called tax reform to increase their dependency on the federal government via the tax code.

Thank you @IvankaTrump for leading the fight for real working family tax relief! https://t.co/O9otb88Mf5

— Mike Lee (@SenMikeLee) October 31, 2017

A few months ago (Nov 2018), Lee was same-politics partners with Ivanka and Van Jones — yes, THAT Van Jones — to promote and eventually pass the First-Step Act, a law that Conservative Review’s Daniel Horowitz said gave drug traffickers and gun felons early release from prison, emasculated police and prosecutors, and made America less safe.

This brings us to Lee’s most recent out-of-the-closet moment.

In his 2018 State of the Union, Trump pushed a big-government agenda even Barack Obama would love, and his wish-list of progressive priorities included Hillary’s and Ivanka’s paid family leave. Following the SOTU, Lee, Rubio and Ivanka engaged in another political affaire de coeur to create a so-called “budget neutral” scheme that would allow individuals to borrow from their future Social Security benefits in order to take several paid weeks off work for the birth or adoption of a child.

Though temporarily put on the back burner until after the 2018 mid-terms, Trump again promoted paid family leave in his recent SOTU. And just as before, Mike Lee got to work to make it happen, this time with a new same-politics partner, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA).

Known as the CRADLE Act (Child Rearing and Development Leave Empowerment Act), Lee and Ernst have proposed a plan that will allow America to “catch up with other countries” by creating a cradle-to-grave welfare state sure to bring a smile to Ivanka’s face.

.@SenJoniErnst & @SenMikeLee are unveiling a new proposal for paid family leave.

The "Cradle Act" would allow new parents to use Social Security savings to pay for time off after birth/adoption. Users would then delay their retirement to pay the money back.

📺 Only @CBS Wed. pic.twitter.com/2r5hsSF6a8

— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) March 12, 2019

Conservatives know that creating a new entitlement is a bad idea for a host of reasons. But when you add the U.S. debt crisis, the unfunded liabilities of $123 trillion dollars and growing already on the books for entitlements, and the fact that Social Security is projected to be bankrupt in 15 years, Lee’s socialist-friendly proposal is epitome of out-of-control big government.

Mike Lee has officially come out of the closet to declare his same-politics attraction to the Far-Left. Meanwhile, the search for a “straight” conservative in Washington continues.

Originally posted on StridentConservative.com.

David Leach is the owner of The Strident Conservative. His daily radio commentary is distributed by the Salem Radio Network and is heard on stations across America.

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Will you help revive the American Conservative Movement?

You’ve heard the stories. Free speech isn’t actually a thing on college campuses around the country. There seems to be certain types of protected speech, such as anything that embraces the leftist narrative of these progressive indoctrination centers, but any views that are considered to be too conservative for the delicate eyes or ears of college students are quickly stifled.

But it’s not just the administrators, professors, and other far-left employees of the colleges. The students themselves are opting out of free speech willingly. Sure, they’d probably complain if anyone intruded on their rights to espouse hyper-leftist ideologies or spew out progressive talking points, but that won’t happen. Why? Because those who may be opposed to their ideas are the same people who embrace limited government, free speech, and our rights as Americans. Therefore, the people who have an incentive to quash leftist notions are the very people who are against quashing anyone’s notions at all.

It’s a conundrum for conservatives because the same courtesy is not paid to them. Free speech (or any of our rights, for that matter) is neither appreciated nor sacred to leftists. So we’re stuck trying to protect our own rights to free speech while defending the left’s rights to the same. Meanwhile, they don’t have to defend their right to free speech because nobody’s trying to deny them of this right, but they’re busy trying to prevent any conservative ideas from seeping through to the collective conscious of their precious university environment.

This video by Campus Reform shows leftist students doing everything they can to prevent conservative ideas from being seen, let alone appreciated. This is important to them to stop ideas from being observed and potentially discussed, but they believe the reason they do it is to stop “hate speech.” The definition of “hate speech” on college campuses throughout America has become anything that’s contrary to their own progressive philosophy. Therein lies the real reason free speech is so hated.

We appreciate everything Campus Reform and their parent organization does. We strive to deliver strong conservative perspectives for college students as well, which is why we remain a crowdfunded publication powered by donations of our readers. The only way to stop the censorship of conservative ideas on college campuses is to continue to spread the word. We have reality on our side, so the more we push the message, the easier it will be to break through their indoctrinated defense shields.

The bottom line for college leftists is deep down, they realize their arguments are wrong. Their only defense against thoughtful conservative perspectives is to prevent as many people as possible from hearing them. Why? Because they have no defense against the truth.

Will you help revive the American Conservative Movement?

I’m old enough to remember when the Drudge Report was the place to find some of the most important links on the internet. The site, which started before America Online became AOL, has been credited over the last couple of decades with breaking news so fast as to put mainstream media outlets to shame. But that was then. This is now.

For a while, perhaps three or four years, the conservative stalwart of news aggregators has been showing a bit too much of its left-of-conservative leanings. That’s not to say owner and operator Matt Drudge is a leftist, but he’s more of an anti-Democrat than a true conservative. There’s nothing wrong with that if there were no other issues, but there are three other things that often leave me (and other conservatives, I’m sure) scratching my head.

• First, the site rails against leftist mainstream media sites like WaPo, NY Times, and CNN, but continues to link to them profusely. I wrote a public letter once asking him to stop linking to fake news media, but it was ignored.
• Second, readers must sift through offbeat stories to get to the conservative news pieces. We’re just as likely to see a story from TMZ about Paris Jackson as we are to see a link about border security on Breitbart.
• Lastly, the only Christian news published is bad news. Christian persecution around the world gets widely ignored on Drudge, but if a pastor gets caught in a scandal, it’s plastered on the site with multiple links.

The alternative I strongly recommend is The Liberty Daily. It’s pro-conservative, pro-Christian, and absolutely fearless. I had the pleasure to talk to long-time friend and co-owner of the site, Matthew Burke. He owns and operates the site with his wife, Jennifer.

“My wife Jennifer and I started The Liberty Daily in 2015 as a conservative alternative to Drudge, which I felt needed some competition,” he said. “I was frustrated by the amount of traffic he was driving to left-wing publications like the New York Times and Washington Post. Plus, he wasn’t doing anything to help conservatives in the culture wars which we’ve been getting clobbered on by the Left for decades.”

In case that sounded repetitive, please keep in mind I had written my complaints about Drudge before asking Burke, and he hadn’t seen my own perspectives before replying.

What I’ve found at The Liberty Daily is everything I believe conservatives and Christians need to know on daily basis in order to navigate through the treacherous waters of online media. There’a a dangerous combination of propaganda on the internet today. There’s the left-leaning news outlets who essentially act as the opposition communications board for Democrats. Then, there’s the pseudo-right with news outlets that purport to be right-leaning but invariably distort the conservative message, dumbing it down to being right-light. These are the same sites that love to pretend to be conservative but who justify John Kasich’s existence and who believe Mitt Romney is still the future of the Republican Party.

The Liberty Daily doesn’t mess with any of that. The Burkes understand conservative media because they’ve lived in it for years. My first occasion to learn of them was seeing Jennifer on Fox News representing their previous venture.

“We had another conservative site, Politistick, which was beginning to get tamped down by Facebook censorship and we both saw the writing on the wall,” Burke continued. “We needed to have a site that wasn’t dependent on social media like everybody else. Almost all traffic to The Liberty Daily is direct or from people who are fed up with Drudge, found the site, and tell their friends.”

It isn’t just about the need for more conservative media, as we discuss on a regular basis. NOQ Report is a crowdfunded site that relies on donations, so we enjoy some editorial freedom that other sites might not get. But even ad-supported sites can be bold if they’re willing to follow their conscience instead of focusing on click-bait. The Liberty Daily does it right:

“I don’t get caught up in trying to post links to stories that get the most clicks like most websites. I want to put up stories that are pro-Christian, pro-Constitution, Pro-America, anti-Communism and try to fight the evil forces that are trying to destroy America through the culture.” – Matthew Burke

The site, which started out around 50 views per month and continues to grow beyond its current level of 2 million visitors per month, has no problem calling things the way they should be seen. Unlike “polite” news aggregators and opinion sources, The Liberty Daily is bold with the way they present the news without going down the road of hysteria or hyperbole.

My last question for Burke was, “What does America need the most, in one sentence?” He didn’t need a sentence. He didn’t even need a phrase. He summed it up in one word. “Jesus.” That’s the type of people I want running The Liberty Daily.

Will you help revive the American Conservative Movement?