While the inaugural address was being delivered ... devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war – seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.

The smirk by Chuck Schumer spoke volumes, and the full-blown identity politicians showing their true colors remind one of Abraham Lincoln's potent lines when on March 4, 1865 he penned the following:

We are not in a hot civil war at this time, but, as Charles R. Kelser has written, "cold civil war is better than a hot civil war, but it is not a good situation for a country to be in. Underlying our cold civil war is the fact that America is torn increasingly between two rival constitutions, two cultures, two ways of life."

Consider Nikki Randhawa, a Sikh who represented the very best of America when she was the United States ambassador to the United Nations. Most of us know her as Nikki Haley. Her marriage to Michael Haley was a "measure of respect for their individual backgrounds – the colorful Sikh ritual was followed by the Methodist ceremony." Her husband is an officer in the South Carolina National Guard. She was a governor of South Carolina – clearly two proud Americans who serve their country with distinction.

Reflect now on the newly elected Democratic Muslim women who embody the creeping sharia that is enveloping the world. Ilhan Omar (Minnesota) used American immigration law to her advantage by marrying her brother in 2009. The "motivation for the marriage points to possible immigration fraud and student loan fraud. What's more she swore to apparent falsehoods in court."

Tashida Tlaib (Michigan) has vociferously called for the impeachment of Donald Trump. According to Tlaib "President Donald Trump is a direct and serious threat to our country." She asserts that "[o]n an almost daily basis, he attacks our Constitution, our democracy, the rule of law and the people who are in this country. His conduct has created a constitutional crisis that we must confront now."

The Democrats can always be counted on to project what they are actually engaging in.

It is they who are creating the constitutional crisis, not the other way around. In addition, both these women show their absolute animus for Israel.

Omar has "long been a harsh critic of Israel. On November 16, 2012 – just a few days after Gaza-based Hamas terrorists had launched more than 150 deadly rockets into the Jewish state, prompting an Israeli military response – she tweeted that 'the apartheid Israeli regime' had 'hypnotized the world' in order to conceal its own 'evil doings.'"

Tlaib was the Arab-American coordinator for Obama's 2008 campaign in Michigan. In addition, she has ties to the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Then, "[i]n 2013-14, she received numerous financial donations from individuals affiliated with CAIR, the Islamic Society of North America, the Muslim Students Association (MSA), and the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC)." Moreover, "[i]n an October 2015 tweet, Tlaib linked to an article in The Nation lauding Black Lives Matter activists in Chicago for supporting 'a Palestinian woman threatened with deportation.' The woman in question was Rasmea Odeh, a Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist who had played a central role in a deadly 1969 terrorist bombing in Jerusalem, and had committed felonious immigration fraud in the U.S. years later."

Tlaib and Omar have insinuated themselves into American politics. They personify the anti-freedom, Jew-hatred, sharia intolerance that is integral to the tenets of the Quran, the very book that Tlaib rested her hand on when she was sworn in! Tlaib and Omar are symptomatic of the leftist-Islamic (Red-Green) anti-American connection that keeps gaining traction in the country. The left (Progressives) believe in the notion of a "living Constitution" and work to create "administrative agencies" that circumvent the limitations that the original Constitution set in place. Likewise, Muslims wish to substitute sharia law for the Constitution, making the absurd claim that they are similar. If so, why change the law in the first place?

Then there is the "prevailing liberal doctrine of rights [which] traces individual rights to membership in various groups – racial, ethnic, gender, class-based ... which are undergoing a continual process of consciousness-raising and empowerment."

Consequently, Omar, with the help of the "useful idiot" Nancy Pelosi, wore a hijab despite a 181-year congressional headwear ban. Hats have "been banned from the House chamber of the Capitol [but] ... under a new proposal from Democrats, the rule would be relaxed to allow religious headwear, like a hijab[.] The change was proposed jointly by Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi, , Incoming Rules Chairman Jim McGovern and member-elect Ilhan Omar as part of a larger overhaul package."

Leftists – now known as the Democratic Party – count on people's ignorance of what these two women actually believe and want to enact. It is how Americans will be duped.

The Muslim Brotherhood has made the Islamic cause abundantly clear. Consequently, America is in the throes of "an even more toxic danger than jihad warfare – a stealthy and pre-violent form of warfare aimed at destroying our constitutional form of democratic government and free society. The Muslim Brotherhood is the prime-mover behind this seditious campaign, which it calls 'civilization jihad.'"

No matter how many news outlets turn this into a fashion moment, no matter how many babies they hold while in the chambers of Congress, these two women are the tip of the iceberg of this seditious campaign. This is not diversity; it is transformation leading to the slow destruction of these United States – just as leftist, Muslim-loving Barack Hussein Obama asserted not too long ago.

Like their leftist counterparts, Muslims in the Islamic world are "interested in transforming free speech into what they call equal speech." Thus, they favor the "narrowing of the First Amendment for the sake of redistribution of speech rights from the rich to the poor." The Muslim world has already shown that any criticism about Islam is tantamount to a crime, and punishment will ensue. Why would things be different in America as Islam gains ascendancy?

Josef Zboril writes, "The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) – made up of 57 mostly Muslim-majority states (56 plus "Palestine") wants to ... "[h]old the media accountable for perpetuating hate speech and extremism." The OIC's Media Strategy in Countering Islamophobia and its Implementation Mechanisms describes one part of its strategy as a "call [to] media professionals to develop, articulate and implement voluntary codes of conduct to counter Islamophobia."

But "[u]nfortunately, many in the Western media have been acceding to such demands, either because they agree that being critical of radical Muslims constitutes 'Islamophobia,' or out of fear of being accused of it. The social media giant, Facebook, for example, often uses a selective definition of 'hate speech' to justify censoring certain pages and posts."

Once again, the left partners with the Islamic world to effectively criminalize the most cherished of American freedoms: the freedom of speech and press. Connecting the dots, remember that Tlaib has cultivated noteworthy ties to a number of Islamist organizations such as the Hamas-linked Council on American Islamic Relations, praising its "invaluable and vital advocacy." Who would be so naïve as to think she does not advocate the silencing of critics?

In Gaza (emphasis mine), "the freedom of expression is unacceptable ... as Hamas intimidates and imprisons writers." Now recall that "in 2015, Tlaib noted approvingly that the head of Islamic Relief USA – a branch of Islamic Relief Worldwide, – ... designated as a terrorist organization by the United Arab Emirates – had come to Detroit to discuss 'water relief from Gaza to Detroit.'"

Brigitte Gabriel, speaking of Muslim Saba Ahmed, who ran for Congress in 2012, stated, "We must recognize figures like Ahmed for what they are: Islamists who spout patriotic platitudes, but who justify acts of Islamic terrorism, and whose intent is nothing less than a worldwide caliphate that would undo America from within, with Sharia formally established as the standard for Muslims."

If we are to preserve the Union, it is incumbent upon us to boldly expose these new representatives and their ilk.

Eileen can be reached at middlemarch18@gmail.com.