American Right
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The Difference between Republicans & Democrats
Today’s Republican Party … is an insurgent outlier. It has become ideologically extreme; contemptuous of the inherited social and economic policy regime; scornful of compromise; unpersuaded by conventional understanding of facts, evidence, and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition, all but declaring war on the government. The Democratic Party, while no
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Reaganism Finds Its Fulfillment in Trumpism
“We have it in our power to begin the world over again.” —Ronald Reagan quoting Thomas Paine in his speech accepting the GOP nomination in July 1980. The increasing divergence—and antagonism—between the red nation and the blue nation is a defining characteristic of 21st-century America. That’s a reversal from the middle decades of the 20th
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I was Wrong about Trump–and Some Thoughts about Cassidy Hutchinson
On January 7, 2020, I wrote a post entitled "Trump the Coward". Here's an excerpt: If I knew anybody who was part of the riot yesterday, the first thing I'd ask him is why wasn't Trump with you when you made your assault? He said that he would parade with you the capitol, but instead
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Bremerton Coach Wins His Crusade
Speaking of religious fanaticism and the courts, I wrote about this guy in May in response to David French's defense of his right to pray on the fifty yard line. He won his day in court 6-3 with Gorsuch writing the majority opinion. Here's how I concluded in my piece in May: It's not clear
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The Woe of Roe 2
Setting aside the record of insincerity from Alito himself and the other conservative justices, the reason not to trust his disclaimer is that the Supreme Court has become an institution whose primary role is to force a right-wing vision of American society on the rest of the country. The conservative majority’s main vehicle for this
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Making Sense of Rusty Bowers
As another of my colleagues, Juliette Kayyem, wrote recently, the January 6 hearings offer an off-ramp to Trump-ambivalent Republicans. But not enough of them are taking it. Many Republican leaders have talked themselves into the position that the policy views of Democrats are so dangerous, or Trump’s policies are so good, that it is more
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Constitutional Jump Ball
If it wasn't clear already, it is now. January 6 was a coup attempt, and it had a good chance of working had Mike Pence been the wimp that Trump always thought he was. Pence is reported to have thought of himself as on a mission from God, and maybe this was it: to stand
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The Case against Trump–and the GOP
Liz Cheney's indictment as summarized by Amanda Carpenter: Trump’s misinformation campaign provoked the violence on January 6th. Trump corruptly planned to replace the Attorney General of the United States so the U.S. Justice Department would spread his false stolen election claims. Trump pressured Vice President Mike Pence to refuse to count electoral votes on January
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Quote of the Day: Nate Hochman
Today’s culture war is being waged not between religion and secularism but between groups that the Catholic writer Matthew Schmitz has described as “the woke and the unwoke.” “Catholic traditionalists, Orthodox Jews, Middle American small-business owners and skeptical liberal atheists may not seem to have much in common,” he wrote in 2020. But all of