“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster.” Those words from philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche capture the fear that the struggle against the ideas and people we oppose will twist us into the very thing we hate.

For Democrats, that moment has come in an age of rage against former President Donald Trump in particular and conservatives in general. It’s an age when reason and restraint are strangers.

In various areas, Democrats have embraced repellent concepts in the effort to silence or even jail their opponents. What is most striking is that legal arguments now used by the left were once used against the left.

[And the abyss is staring back at them, as Turley notes in his conclusion, quoting the well-known passage from Nietzsche. They are becoming what they profess to abhor, undermining elections and pursuing blacklists and speech restrictions to protect their own power. We are sliding into authoritarianism a little at a time, as populism on both sides erodes the institutions that protect us from our darker natures. — Ed]