Steve Bannon
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Rule of Law vs. Law and Order
Authoritarian nations come in many different stripes, but they all share a fundamental characteristic: The people who live in them are not allowed to freely choose their own leaders. This is why Republican Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, in his speech announcing his vote to convict on the first article of impeachment, said that “corrupting
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Drift toward Authoritarianism
I am sympathetic to those who think that liberal democracy is failing, was, in fact, always doomed to failure. After all it gave us Trump, who presently is at an all time high approval rating with Gallup at 46%. The U.S. had a flawed but good run for a good quarter millennium. But it's time
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Edsall on White Identity
In this morning’s NYT. Key grafs: In a 2005 paper, Cara Wong, a political scientist at the University of Illinois, and Grace E. Cho, a psychology professor at St. Olaf College, found that many whites identified with their race, but “white racial identity is not politically salient.” Wong and Cho went on, however, to make what
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Understanding Breitbart
If we're going to fight the political Right effectively, you need to understand it. It's not a monolith. Most Liberals stereotype Breitbart as a platform for populist demagoguery. It is party that, but it cannot be dismissed so easily as only that. It's certainly not how they see themselves. This New York Time profile of
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Bannon Out, Allies with Mercers to go to War
According to Axios. We'll see how this plays out, but it looks like Bannon will not go quietly as Priebus and Scaramucci did. A look at the Breitbart website this afternoon makes it appear that the bond between it and Bannon is as strong as ever: This article about Ann Coulter's tweets points to the
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Elites vs. Bannon/Trump
If Bannon goes, then the elites will have won. If he stays, then it will be interesting to see if Kelly and others stay. It might come down to some variation on some key establishment type saying either Bannon leaves, or I do. If Bannon stays, it will be because Trump realizes that he cannot
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Some Thoughts on the Events in Charlottesville
On the morning of the Charlottesville riot Saturday, I just finished reading Devil’s Bargain: Steve Bannon, Donald Trump, and the Storming of the American Presidency, by Josh Green. It’s essential reading if you want to understand the crossroads we’re at in this moment of our history. If you think the influence of the Right wing
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Trump v. the “Deep State”
For my conservative friends: So in his escalating clashes with Beltway institutions, what we’re watching is not the “deep state” trying to reassert control over policy and bring a tribune of the people low. If so I would be more often on Trump’s side (as I welcomed Brexit and entertained the case for Marine Le
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GOP Fails First Legislative Test
The House Republican health care bill is a pure top-down document. It was not molded to the actual health care needs of regular voters. It does not have support from actual American voters or much interest in those voters. It was written by elites to serve the needs of elites. Donald Trump vowed to drain
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Whither Bannonism?
The Trump budget is an even more devastating assault on Bannon-style populism. It eliminates or cuts organizations like the Appalachian Regional Commission and the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative that are important to people from Tennessee and West Virginia up through Ohio and Michigan. It cuts job-training and road-building programs. It does almost nothing to help