I ran across the Galston book over the weekend, watched the Brookings youtube interview with Galston and Rauch, which was excellent. I'm one chapter in, and loving it. IMHO, it is absolutely the right diagnosis. I think it aligns closely with James Baldwin's thesis as well. I was planning to recommend the book to the Unpopulist to review, and you were miles ahead on this. Thank you for this! Highly recommend.
A wonderful handful of book summaries! As a conservative I have never had much faith in human nature. A skepticism only reinforced the longer I live. Maintaining a Stoic perspective keeps me from falling into cynicism and nihilism.
The Republican vision of a permanent Republican majority began to gain traction with the election of 1992 when Bill Clinton was sworn into office. The mid-term election of 1994--- which was the first public relations campaign based on a national party propaganda piece called "The Contract With America." Newt Gingrich understood that as long as Tip O'Neill's adage about all politics being local prevailed Republicans could never get the power to dominate the government. Like Trump's "Project 2025" the Contract was formulated by The Heritage Foundation. Only 13% of the Contract's promises were ever met. "Project 2025" has been much more successful.
The Democrats in response also began to increasingly nationalize their campaigns. From then on forward the only thing that mattered was securing a chamber majority and negotiating (compromising) with the other party as little as possible if at all. The goals of both parties became dis-empowering the other. Voters had to hate and distrust one or the other of the parties. The acrimony increased into the hyper-partisan revenge fest we see today.
The 21st Century National Socialists in ascendancy today see their primary purpose to permanently dis-empower what they call "The Left." "The Left" is an elastic term which basically includes anyone who questions or tries to challenge whatever their agenda is on any given day. Conservative firebrand Liz Cheney is "left." John McCain is "left." Mitt Romney is "left." and so on so forth blah, blah, blah. All of which is intellectually dishonest and irrational but a simple and convenient way to dispose of any meaningful engagement with ideas dangerous to the "inner party." Just call it "woke" and pay no more attention to it.
The goal of the election of 2024 is to dis-empower the Democratic Party permanently at the federal level and in the states where they currently hold absolute power. But even if they fail, even if the Democrats were to win back a slim majority in the House and Senate they will still be stopped by Trump's veto power and The Republican Supreme Court. The Democrats will never have the power to undo the damage that has been done in two years without winning every general and mid-term election--- for at least a decade. And probably not without a demagogue of their own.
Recovery from rage is possible. However the people who need recovery most will, like their alcoholic brethren, deny they have a problem. They also get too many benefits from their rage
Trump is the consequence, not the cause, of the political establishment’s failure to provide for the safety and general welfare of most working Americans.
Starting with the political parties, it has been asserted that we have a duopoly, that is, two parties in complete control of who makes as a candidate. Add to this that the national party has enforced lockstep compliance from its elected ones, when in the past each party had regional differences, it was inevitable that this type of governance would arrive. It has already arrived at the state level. Katherine Gehl and Mark Porter has preposed using a Pick Five primary using ranked voting and Ranked voting for the election. Insures a majority vote.
What really happened was that our institutions were subverted by Leftist ideologues. The Democratic Party of the 1990s was controlled by centrists with classic Liberal principles. It was able to work with Republicans. It passed tough immigration laws with broad bipartisan support. It provided funding for police and passed a strong crime bill. It had fiscal discipline and passed a balanced budget. It preached unity, not identity politics. It represented the working class and helping the country advance technologically.
Two decades later it had betrayed all that. It was the repressive force tearing the nation apart with intersectional identity and cancel culture censorship. It pushed illegal immigration and police defunding. Their media and institutions spewed bogus narratives and hoaxes. They allied themselves with radical Islamists. They demanded boys be allowed in girls locker rooms and declared men could transform into women and vice versa. They repressed, censored, deplatformed, and set up DEI bureaucracies to enforce a new orthodoxy that was anti-American and hostile to classic Liberalism. They ignored the plight of the American working class.
Similar betrayals happened in other Western countries. Elites embraced uncontrolled immigration and governed in hostility to the interests of their own workers. They favored international globalist policies and rejected nationalism.
What we see now are populist movements in most Western countries fighting against the unholy illiberal alliance of Leftist Woke radicals, BLM race hustlers, Islamists, LGBTQ/Trans activists, Climate Change fearmongers, internationalist elites, and deep state bureaucrats. The people are sick of the totalitarian repression and abuse of our institutions. They see through the lies and propaganda narratives. What people like about Trump is his willingness to take on this corrupt regime and to fight for the people. He’s an imperfect messenger who makes mistakes, but he’s got the right message. A large swath of Americans of all races and religions want him to keep going even more vigorously until all illegals are gone, no kids are mutilated by transgender procedures, all DEI slots are eliminated, and so on through the whole apparatus of the system.
Given Trump’s crypto trading I think we elected the mother of all corrupt criminals. Who has he pardoned? The thugs who killed people at the capitol! All of those dire threats are Fox News propaganda. You sound like a bad imitation of the orange man. Please read these books
The only person killed at the Capitol on Jan 6 was Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed female Air Force veteran shot without warning by a Capitol police officer.
You seem unaware of the bipartisan 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act.
I am making the point many have made that the Democratic Party has veered sharply left and disowned many of the policies it once supported and enacted. Immigration is a clear example. The Democrats are obstructing enforcement of the law they advocated and which a Democratic Party President signed. A much more democratic approach would be to pass a new immigration law. But the Democrats don’t have the votes for democracy to work in their favor.
I think the democrats were absolutely wrong about immigration in the Biden administration and his mental state did not help him stand up to the extremist activists who wanted literally decriminalizing of border crossings. I totally agree that the democrats were way too lax and even Latino communities in Texas voted Trump. So yes I agree on that point 😎
“Too often, liberal optimists are blindsided by ambitious leaders’ ability to mobilize the public’s anger, humiliation, resentment, fear, and desire to dominate, and to turn these qualities against liberal democracy itself,”
Politicians claiming to be a “liberal standard bearer” have consistently betrayed their constituents over the last several decades to the point that they decided they had to find an alternative. This includes the working class, minorities, veterans, the middle class - the groups the liberals took for granted as they enriched themselves.
Enter Trump stage door left.
The country is reaping what the corrupt duopoly has sowed.
Any book on modern US politics that doesn’t start with acknowledging the betrayal of the political caste isn’t worth the time - no matter how clever your friend is.
This essay makes me think about the paradox at the heart of today’s politics. If the real lesson is that liberal democracy must reckon with human fallenness, you’d expect America’s most religious citizens—those who explicitly affirm the doctrine of human sin—to be the strongest allies of restraint, humility, and forgiveness. Yet in practice, the most religious voters are often the most loyal to Trump, whose politics sanctify anger and revenge.
Instead of channeling fallenness into humility and self-restraint, much of American religion has been rechanneled into grievance, tribal loyalty, and retribution. That’s exactly the inversion the Founders feared: passions not contained, but unleashed—and now wrapped in religious justification.
If the antidote to liberal naïveté is recognizing human fallenness, then we also need to ask: why has so much American religion stopped restraining the dark passions and started amplifying them?
Thanks for writing - I enjoyed it reading it, as I'm one of the liberals tribe (mostly). Still - can't but think "you are too easy on yourself".
Procedurally - eye for an eye is not a bad cooperating strategy. In fact, on repeated prisoners dilemma, the tit-for-tat is a very solid strategy. (maybe even the best) This is excellent on that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mScpHTIi-kM. The idea that US liberals (different from UK liberals) failed b/c of "too rosy view of human nature" is tad too self-serving, don't you think? Maybe this mea culpa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSa52TR9tCA by David Brooks will be useful as a refresher? In pursuit of virtue, one is especially blind for their own failings. "Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience." (AS)
I live in the UK, and here the process of introspection is further behind. I have only seen this one https://ft.com/content/b82bb503-21bb-4d64-8f72-6c6801f3b196. There are more skeletons in that closet of pants shitting cowardliness. Didn't think liberals of old actually had super sunny view of human nature. Why would they - they were fighting for freedom, that was sorely lacking in most of human history up to the point. As for contemporaries having "too sunny view" - maybe they are of a different kind. Or maybe they just say they do, but most of the time their revealed preferences tell somewhat less flattering story. Ukrainians seems to me to be the last liberals with a fire in their bellies, of the "Give me freedom or give me death" kind.
To come back to the question as to "why". More likely the answer is because the system stopped improving the lives of ever greater numbers of people.
I think popular culture has also played a role in where we find ourselves. I remember seeing, during Trump's first term, an image of Trump superimposed on a Game of Thrones poster (which came, I think from the administration) and thinking to myself, I thought our system was designed to transcend the warring despots of the Middle Ages? Is that where we want to go as a country? We'll see if the center holds...It would help of regular people would get up off their couches and speak up in defense of our democracy. Extremist rhetoric and a docile populace, goes hand in hand.
Donald Trump and his semi-fascist MAGA movement seem like invasive transplants from Europe’s bloodlands. How could they take root in American soil? Reread that statement you immediately you discredit yourself with a blatantly biased assertion .
Interesting! This could explain certain developments: “Your brain on revenge looks like your brain on drugs”. We probably have to see what's happening just now as a revenge for ... Yes, we have to find out what the offence was.
I ran across the Galston book over the weekend, watched the Brookings youtube interview with Galston and Rauch, which was excellent. I'm one chapter in, and loving it. IMHO, it is absolutely the right diagnosis. I think it aligns closely with James Baldwin's thesis as well. I was planning to recommend the book to the Unpopulist to review, and you were miles ahead on this. Thank you for this! Highly recommend.
A wonderful handful of book summaries! As a conservative I have never had much faith in human nature. A skepticism only reinforced the longer I live. Maintaining a Stoic perspective keeps me from falling into cynicism and nihilism.
The Republican vision of a permanent Republican majority began to gain traction with the election of 1992 when Bill Clinton was sworn into office. The mid-term election of 1994--- which was the first public relations campaign based on a national party propaganda piece called "The Contract With America." Newt Gingrich understood that as long as Tip O'Neill's adage about all politics being local prevailed Republicans could never get the power to dominate the government. Like Trump's "Project 2025" the Contract was formulated by The Heritage Foundation. Only 13% of the Contract's promises were ever met. "Project 2025" has been much more successful.
The Democrats in response also began to increasingly nationalize their campaigns. From then on forward the only thing that mattered was securing a chamber majority and negotiating (compromising) with the other party as little as possible if at all. The goals of both parties became dis-empowering the other. Voters had to hate and distrust one or the other of the parties. The acrimony increased into the hyper-partisan revenge fest we see today.
The 21st Century National Socialists in ascendancy today see their primary purpose to permanently dis-empower what they call "The Left." "The Left" is an elastic term which basically includes anyone who questions or tries to challenge whatever their agenda is on any given day. Conservative firebrand Liz Cheney is "left." John McCain is "left." Mitt Romney is "left." and so on so forth blah, blah, blah. All of which is intellectually dishonest and irrational but a simple and convenient way to dispose of any meaningful engagement with ideas dangerous to the "inner party." Just call it "woke" and pay no more attention to it.
The goal of the election of 2024 is to dis-empower the Democratic Party permanently at the federal level and in the states where they currently hold absolute power. But even if they fail, even if the Democrats were to win back a slim majority in the House and Senate they will still be stopped by Trump's veto power and The Republican Supreme Court. The Democrats will never have the power to undo the damage that has been done in two years without winning every general and mid-term election--- for at least a decade. And probably not without a demagogue of their own.
Recovery from rage is possible. However the people who need recovery most will, like their alcoholic brethren, deny they have a problem. They also get too many benefits from their rage
BTW, this was a great review, will take a look at Galston's book!
The Science of Revenge? Well, that’s a very interesting theme.
Trump is the consequence, not the cause, of the political establishment’s failure to provide for the safety and general welfare of most working Americans.
The truth is he found a parade and got in front. We were/are a broken people.
Rich in stuff, bankrupt in life
Starting with the political parties, it has been asserted that we have a duopoly, that is, two parties in complete control of who makes as a candidate. Add to this that the national party has enforced lockstep compliance from its elected ones, when in the past each party had regional differences, it was inevitable that this type of governance would arrive. It has already arrived at the state level. Katherine Gehl and Mark Porter has preposed using a Pick Five primary using ranked voting and Ranked voting for the election. Insures a majority vote.
What really happened was that our institutions were subverted by Leftist ideologues. The Democratic Party of the 1990s was controlled by centrists with classic Liberal principles. It was able to work with Republicans. It passed tough immigration laws with broad bipartisan support. It provided funding for police and passed a strong crime bill. It had fiscal discipline and passed a balanced budget. It preached unity, not identity politics. It represented the working class and helping the country advance technologically.
Two decades later it had betrayed all that. It was the repressive force tearing the nation apart with intersectional identity and cancel culture censorship. It pushed illegal immigration and police defunding. Their media and institutions spewed bogus narratives and hoaxes. They allied themselves with radical Islamists. They demanded boys be allowed in girls locker rooms and declared men could transform into women and vice versa. They repressed, censored, deplatformed, and set up DEI bureaucracies to enforce a new orthodoxy that was anti-American and hostile to classic Liberalism. They ignored the plight of the American working class.
Similar betrayals happened in other Western countries. Elites embraced uncontrolled immigration and governed in hostility to the interests of their own workers. They favored international globalist policies and rejected nationalism.
What we see now are populist movements in most Western countries fighting against the unholy illiberal alliance of Leftist Woke radicals, BLM race hustlers, Islamists, LGBTQ/Trans activists, Climate Change fearmongers, internationalist elites, and deep state bureaucrats. The people are sick of the totalitarian repression and abuse of our institutions. They see through the lies and propaganda narratives. What people like about Trump is his willingness to take on this corrupt regime and to fight for the people. He’s an imperfect messenger who makes mistakes, but he’s got the right message. A large swath of Americans of all races and religions want him to keep going even more vigorously until all illegals are gone, no kids are mutilated by transgender procedures, all DEI slots are eliminated, and so on through the whole apparatus of the system.
Given Trump’s crypto trading I think we elected the mother of all corrupt criminals. Who has he pardoned? The thugs who killed people at the capitol! All of those dire threats are Fox News propaganda. You sound like a bad imitation of the orange man. Please read these books
The only person killed at the Capitol on Jan 6 was Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed female Air Force veteran shot without warning by a Capitol police officer.
You seem unaware of the bipartisan 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act.
https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/illegal-immigration-reform-and-immigrant-responsibility-act-1996-iiraira
I am making the point many have made that the Democratic Party has veered sharply left and disowned many of the policies it once supported and enacted. Immigration is a clear example. The Democrats are obstructing enforcement of the law they advocated and which a Democratic Party President signed. A much more democratic approach would be to pass a new immigration law. But the Democrats don’t have the votes for democracy to work in their favor.
I think the democrats were absolutely wrong about immigration in the Biden administration and his mental state did not help him stand up to the extremist activists who wanted literally decriminalizing of border crossings. I totally agree that the democrats were way too lax and even Latino communities in Texas voted Trump. So yes I agree on that point 😎
“Too often, liberal optimists are blindsided by ambitious leaders’ ability to mobilize the public’s anger, humiliation, resentment, fear, and desire to dominate, and to turn these qualities against liberal democracy itself,”
Politicians claiming to be a “liberal standard bearer” have consistently betrayed their constituents over the last several decades to the point that they decided they had to find an alternative. This includes the working class, minorities, veterans, the middle class - the groups the liberals took for granted as they enriched themselves.
Enter Trump stage door left.
The country is reaping what the corrupt duopoly has sowed.
Any book on modern US politics that doesn’t start with acknowledging the betrayal of the political caste isn’t worth the time - no matter how clever your friend is.
Self awareness in liberal land is zero point zero zero. It’s been 10 years ffs. Look in a mirror.
This essay makes me think about the paradox at the heart of today’s politics. If the real lesson is that liberal democracy must reckon with human fallenness, you’d expect America’s most religious citizens—those who explicitly affirm the doctrine of human sin—to be the strongest allies of restraint, humility, and forgiveness. Yet in practice, the most religious voters are often the most loyal to Trump, whose politics sanctify anger and revenge.
Instead of channeling fallenness into humility and self-restraint, much of American religion has been rechanneled into grievance, tribal loyalty, and retribution. That’s exactly the inversion the Founders feared: passions not contained, but unleashed—and now wrapped in religious justification.
If the antidote to liberal naïveté is recognizing human fallenness, then we also need to ask: why has so much American religion stopped restraining the dark passions and started amplifying them?
Thanks for writing - I enjoyed it reading it, as I'm one of the liberals tribe (mostly). Still - can't but think "you are too easy on yourself".
Procedurally - eye for an eye is not a bad cooperating strategy. In fact, on repeated prisoners dilemma, the tit-for-tat is a very solid strategy. (maybe even the best) This is excellent on that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mScpHTIi-kM. The idea that US liberals (different from UK liberals) failed b/c of "too rosy view of human nature" is tad too self-serving, don't you think? Maybe this mea culpa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSa52TR9tCA by David Brooks will be useful as a refresher? In pursuit of virtue, one is especially blind for their own failings. "Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience." (AS)
I live in the UK, and here the process of introspection is further behind. I have only seen this one https://ft.com/content/b82bb503-21bb-4d64-8f72-6c6801f3b196. There are more skeletons in that closet of pants shitting cowardliness. Didn't think liberals of old actually had super sunny view of human nature. Why would they - they were fighting for freedom, that was sorely lacking in most of human history up to the point. As for contemporaries having "too sunny view" - maybe they are of a different kind. Or maybe they just say they do, but most of the time their revealed preferences tell somewhat less flattering story. Ukrainians seems to me to be the last liberals with a fire in their bellies, of the "Give me freedom or give me death" kind.
To come back to the question as to "why". More likely the answer is because the system stopped improving the lives of ever greater numbers of people.
Thanks Mr. Rauch. Very insightful observations. My guess is you can pronounce acetaminophen.
I think popular culture has also played a role in where we find ourselves. I remember seeing, during Trump's first term, an image of Trump superimposed on a Game of Thrones poster (which came, I think from the administration) and thinking to myself, I thought our system was designed to transcend the warring despots of the Middle Ages? Is that where we want to go as a country? We'll see if the center holds...It would help of regular people would get up off their couches and speak up in defense of our democracy. Extremist rhetoric and a docile populace, goes hand in hand.
Donald Trump and his semi-fascist MAGA movement seem like invasive transplants from Europe’s bloodlands. How could they take root in American soil? Reread that statement you immediately you discredit yourself with a blatantly biased assertion .
Which part of it is wrong?
Interesting! This could explain certain developments: “Your brain on revenge looks like your brain on drugs”. We probably have to see what's happening just now as a revenge for ... Yes, we have to find out what the offence was.