Subheading: If the tiara don't fit, you must acquit!

This column may initially appeared dated, but read it in light of the Trump/Elijah Cummings dust up over "rat-infested" Baltimore, especially the leftist media's indignation over Trump's language. No one, even Cummings himself denies Baltimore's rat infested; the criticism is directed at his language.

Kathy Zhu, 20-year-old student at the University of Michigan named Miss Michigan was stripped of her title after barely one day. Her offense: she's a Trump-supporting Republican who has tweeted about her views in the past. Zhu was accused of racist, Islamophobic and insensitive" comments. What was so egregious you ask: did she use the n-word? Does she advocate lynching or fly the Confederate flag? Did she advocate the bombing of mosques or profiling Muslims?

Here's what she tweeted. "Did you know that the majority of black deaths are caused by other blacks? Fix problems within your own community first before blaming others."

So Zhu pointed out the statistically accurate fact that far more African-Americans are killed by their own than by the police. The media loathes reporting facts like this, but that doesn't change the facts.

The other read, "There is a 'try a hijab on' booth at my college campus. So you're telling me that it's now just a fashion accessory and not a religious thing? Or are you just trying to get women used to being oppressed under Islam?"

That's what passes for racism and Islamophobia these days. In case you missed it, the standards for what is or is not socially acceptable have moved seismically to the left.

If you don't think some baker should be forced to bake that cake by the government, you're a homophobe. If you voted against Hillary Clinton, you're a misogynist. If you mention the fact that human beings are born into one of two genders, both of which are required for reproduction, you're "transphobic."

Yes, that's a word now.

Maybe Zhu assumed she's immune to such charges because she's a racial/ethnic minority, but she was wrong. Zhu, a Donald Trump supporter and the vice chair of the University of Michigan's College Republicans group, pushed back at the organization, saying she was discriminated against. She said the tweets were "statistics and facts."

"This is about an organization discriminating against people with different opinions, calling people racist even when they're not," she said in a Twitter video Friday. "Just little attacks like those just really diminishes the value and the truth of the word racism."

The primary leftist boogeyman currently is: "Racism, White Supremacy, White Privilege." The later was Kristen Gillibrand's ploy for attention during the latest Democratic debate. Those are the labels used to stifle dissent. You support Trump? You're obviously in the Klan.

As has been obvious for a while now, if you want to wade into the beauty pageant game, you need to be a liberal. Even that's not good enough, really. You need to openly and vocally hate Donald Trump. Anything less is disqualifying. Unfortunately for the folks at Miss World America, they didn't do a good enough job of vetting and quietly eliminating any conservatives from contention before putting them on stage. That left them in the embarrassing position of having to take the crown away and expose their own biases in the process.

This reminds me of ESPN's Max Kellerman's interview with Tiger Woods in which Kellerman visually seethed with rage because Woods refused to condemn Trump as the rest of the self-righteous media has. As with the Colin Kapernick fan base, it isn't enough to be unapologetically leftist/progressive. You must stridently advocate the elimination of American values and culture. As with the Nazis, Soviets, and North Koreans, no dissent will be tolerated.

Because no one can be allowed to hurt the delicate feelings of the perpetually aggrieved, not only will opinions which dissent from politically acceptable dogma not be tolerated but also the facts that support that dissent. We're marching lockstep down a dangerous path to "1984."

This incident perfectly illustrates how progressives have now elevated themselves as spokesmen or proxies, acting on behalf of others, or acting in the role of a vanguard, in an effort to eliminate displays or recognition of dominant cultural symbols that are or "might be" offensive to some — most of whom, curiously, are never identified, and indeed, may be nonexistent.

By eliminating words like "alien," we are being herded toward the much coveted one-world concept of the Left.  Applying "racist" and "hateful" to everything not to liberal liking smothers dissent and alternative points of view.

Political correctness is a liberal mind control strategy intended to stifle any thoughts or actions inconsistent with radical liberalism.  It is the abrogation of free speech and the right to hold an opinion contrary to established liberal-socialist doctrine.

The great threat to our democratic republic of shared values and beliefs is not tyranny of the majority, but a burgeoning cultural-political tyranny of the minority.  A nation that allows an ideology that seeks, through an unaccountable coterie of identity politics practitioners, to squelch all dissent will drift further toward irreconcilable separation.