JD Vance’s wife, Usha, has defended her husband’s “childless cat women” remark as a “quip.” Unfortunately, and not unexpectedly, the Guardian, CNN, MSNBC, and our network channels won’t accept that explanation for what they denounce as an outrage. Vance’s remark shows he’s “weird” and should not be on a presidential ticket, unlike Tampon Tim, who the corporate press as well as Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) assure us is “a heartland-of-America Democrat.”

No matter what nutcase positions Tim Walz and Kamala Harris have taken in their radical left political careers — including expressions of sympathy for the arsonists who burnt down Minneapolis during the “Summer of Love” — there is no reason, according to the media, to find these politicians objectionable. Even if Walz has enacted laws to place tampons in boys’ restrooms and to enable sex mutilation operations on children even without their parents’ consent, it’s doubtful that many of those “childless cat women” would object. After all, don’t these women believe in gender fluidity, fighting the “patriarchy,” and like Walz and Kamala, imposing diversity, equity, and inclusion on everyone?

To believe that Vance will lose feminist votes because of what he said several years ago is ridiculous. The women who are ranting against him would never vote for Trump or for him.

It makes no difference that Vance has said his “quip” was not referring to women who couldn’t have children or who didn’t have husbands with whom they could produce them. He was referring to a now-common human type, and it’s one that I encountered more than once as an academic for over 40 years. Many embattled feminists view childbearing as a surrender to masculinity and consider unlimited abortion rights essential for striking back against what they perceive as a male-dominated society. And some women discourage reproduction as environmentally evil and are certainly vocal about sharing their opinions.

To believe that Vance will lose feminist votes because of what he said several years ago, the truth of which seems obvious to me, is ridiculous. The women who are ranting against him would never vote for Trump or for him. They’re ecstatic to be able to vote for the radical woke alternative and feel utter loathing for those running on the Republican ticket. Moreover, Republicans should be no more horrified by Vance’s remark than Democrats are by hearing their candidates dump on pro-life Christians or white workers with terminal high school degrees who object to public school teachers sexualizing the young.

Despite the double standard that the left has imposed on us, I noticed the usual suspects in the Murdoch media empire agonizing over the question of whether the GOP can afford to keep Vance on the presidential ticket after his seemingly unpardonable faux pas. If there is a supposed virtue that our Republican establishment has represented for decades, it’s a fetishistic attachment to social respectability. This establishment holds to its fixation no matter how radical and outrageous the other side becomes. People claim we can’t afford to alienate anyone whom decent individuals wouldn’t want to offend. This includes culturally radicalized college women and those in the other camp who might join us if they see us shunning the “far right.”

The problem is the other side doesn’t triangulate that way. It is ruthless and amoral in its pursuit of power, and it would laugh at the idea of maintaining armies of gatekeepers to keep out “extremists.” The left is not in any way burdened by an unhygienic fixation on niceness, and this allows it to inflict quite cynically its double standard on the timid and “respectable” who yap about “common ground.”

Noting the silver lining in this otherwise bleak situation, I am heartened by younger conservatives who are escaping this niceness cult. I loved how Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) responded to being hectored by George Stephanopoulos for not repudiating Trump’s suggestion that Kamala’s blackness was just a convenient pose. Donalds ignored the predictable leftist bullying and changed the subject to Kamala’s well-known opportunism. Since Donalds is unmistakably black and not just packaging himself as such on the basis of having some black-looking ancestor, this clash was particularly enjoyable to watch. Although Trump should not have let himself get sidetracked over Kamala’s race, Donalds was correct not to concede any ground to his angry, righteous inquisitor.

Having underlined the need for aggressive counterattacks in dealing with the left and its media harem, I would also stress the distinction between a calculated assault and running at the mouth.

When Donalds, DeSantis, and Vance hit back at their adversaries, they measure their words. They are not just venting anger. But one may have a different impression when Donald Trump goes after the Republican governor of Georgia, who, by the way, is supporting him for the presidency, on charges from four years ago. One may also get annoyed when Trump calls Kamala Harris a “lunatic” or “low-IQ” opponent. Those are not intelligent uses of firepower but a form of self-indulgence that does nothing to set the opposition on its heels.

Be ruthless against a dishonest, vindictive enemy but avoid childish gestures!