My latest for @liberalcurrents.com We need to stop listening to commentators who spent a decade being arrogantly wrong about the fascist threat www.liberalcurrents.com/trump-alarmi... - ThreadSky

polphilpod.bsky.social • 17 hours ago

My latest for @liberalcurrents.com

We need to stop listening to commentators who spent a decade being arrogantly wrong about the fascist threat

https://www.liberalcurrents.com/trump-alarmists-were-right-we-should-say-so/

Comments

maxross.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Seems like you’re saying Bernie Sanders voters are simultaneously the cause and solution to our current predicament.

Sorry for the defections in 2016, you’re welcome for the rallies.

pineconecowgirl.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Straight from “wine moms and girl bosses were right so cry about it, lefties“ to quoting a marxist. Never change

markshore.bsky.social•15 hours ago

[according to Jon Stewart] all we had done “over the past ten years was cry wolf.”

crying wolf: also known as clearly foreseeing the current democratic and constitutional crisis early enough that things could have been done to prevent it

tnbskts.bsky.social•17 hours ago

There's been far too much "oh it could never happen here, we're exceptional" going on in the USA. Nobody is that exceptional.

joseph-arrieta.bsky.social•16 hours ago

One way to look at it is that we're on our third try with a constitution. The AOC failed, then in 1789 we got a mess that busted into conflagration in 1860--six generations ago.

The civil war amendments gave us our third cycle and try, of course layered with reconstruction failure. No purity here.

canteach.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Andrew Coyne of CBC comes to mind. He mocked me and shared one of my tweets talking about fascists and Nazis in Canada to his followers during the convoy which resulted in a huge pile on by the right. Now it’s undeniable that those forces were at work.

man-o-man.bsky.social•8 hours ago

Literally decades ago, I would tell my friends that if you scratch the surface of a conservative, you will find a fascist. They would laugh and dismissed me as an extremist, alarmist, and dystopian. Even some who didn't even know what fascism was mocked me. Some people are oblivious to the obvious.

canteach.bsky.social•7 hours ago

My friends made fun of me when I was so upset about Trump’s first election. I knew this was coming.

fleromor.bsky.social•15 hours ago

What's even more infuriating about these commentators who insisted for 8 years we were being alarmists about what trump would do is that he said he was going to do it! He said in plain English he wanted to do all this and we're somehow 'alarmist' for taking what he said seriously!

rhtorres.bsky.social•8 hours ago

May I ask you a question?
I got into a "discussion" the other day with someone about Progressivism vs Liberalism. TBH, I really didn't know there was that much of a difference, but I've learned that there is. Is your topic related? Can you speak to it?

waltercrankyte.bsky.social•11 hours ago

I'm not a commentator, I'm not paid to write. I'm just an old white dude that is very tired of being ruled by old white dudes. Even I saw this coming; damn right I called it. These are just a few posts from a word search for "galvanizing," so I was way into seeing it coming.
https://bsky.app/profile/waltercrankyte.bsky.social/post/3lhks2fyzfc2t

douglas-strihm.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Past performance is not a predictor of future success. Besides, to whom should I listen: the person who was calling Trump a clown in 2015, the one who said he was a threat in 2016, or the one who called him an authoritarian in 2017? Evaluate facts, data, and, yes, history, and only on that.

nexdude.bsky.social•14 hours ago

Past performance is not a predictor of future success? What? That's true if the outcome is random. If we're talking about a person's ability to judge a situation then having made a load of right or wrong calls in the past is a pretty strong indicator of, y'know, whether they're any good at it

150plus.bsky.social•16 hours ago

We were right? No shit

joshroman.bsky.social•16 hours ago

“I cannot tell you how much I loathe this kind of politics.[…] I loathe its operatic-ness, the way it performs concern and care when all it really is about is narcissism and a desperate desire for a fix.”

Tell me you don’t understand Trumpism, or how to respond, without telling me…

joshroman.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Great piece, btw! The dissembling and minimization in their “I got it wrong, but who could have known, and here’s why I’m still (mostly) right” takes are infuriating and prove that they simply do not understand the moment.

Aux barricades!

vivian-m-lumbard.bsky.social•7 hours ago

I wrote this the day after he was elected the first time.

https://martinlady.wordpress.com/2016/11/09/embarrassed-ashamed-and-afraid/

And this the day before the last election.

https://martinlady.wordpress.com/2024/11/04/checks-and-balances/

I may have not used the word fascism, but I did call out the danger.

santacruzmag.bsky.social•13 hours ago

This piece was SO GREAT! Thank you for writing it. Thank you for taking the words out of my mouth. Thank you thank you thank you. WE WERE FUCKING RIGHT!

aastevens.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Thank you!!! This is my number one concern right now!

davidneiwert.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Ahem. I can attest to the reality that those of us who were right also remain professional outcasts. The people who were wrong will never admit it.

But hey, retirement is rather nice.

https://open.substack.com/pub/davidneiwert/p/the-road-to-fascism?r=37dbf&utm_medium=ios

ehowell.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Spot on. This sums up my feelings (and my experience) perfectly. Totally right.

rozorosso.bsky.social•10 hours ago

I would be interested to see a policy-focused version of this -- I don't think the resurgent fascism in the US would have been possible without decades of Democratic unwillingness to shutter guantanamo, revoke the Patriot Act, or lessen executive emergency powers.

rozorosso.bsky.social•10 hours ago

the policymaking counterpart of this anti-alarmism has broadly been the perception with center-left policymakers that one needs to wait for the 'right time' to take concrete action against far-right gains, and if the democrats regain power in 2028 they must not fall back on simple harm-reduction.

rozorosso.bsky.social•10 hours ago

of course, the way that Trump's administration has used the Democrats' demonization of pro-Palestinian protesters as carte blanche to start rounding people up in unmarked vans should also be taken as an enormous failure.

rozorosso.bsky.social•10 hours ago

... and there's also the fact that 'abolish ICE' as a demand has been well vindicated by this point. there's a perception that politicians can/should only do things that are politically expedient given current polls, but public opinion shifts if you make your case: https://stringinamaze.net/p/the-tyranny-of-public-opinion

quin664.bsky.social•14 hours ago

Back in the day I commented to one of the current leading anti Trump writers something along the lines of "Trump is batshit effing crazy" and he commented back that what I said was "puerile". I wish I still had the comment and could send it back to him.

joe460.bsky.social•14 hours ago

The media wants fascism in America because it would be big news for them. Imagine the books and stories about this.

publicwrx.bsky.social•1 hour ago

The left has been sounding the alarm since the 1950s.

mattprorok.bsky.social•10 hours ago

A lot to like here, but I wouldn't put the left into the non-alarmist bucket so quickly. It's not that they didn't see Trump as dangerous, it's that they didn't see him as uniquely dangerous, but as the culmination of a long trend. They were sounding the alarm, they just started earlier.

kaelik.bsky.social•6 hours ago

I'm reminded of the Mike Gravel tweet that if you elect Biden in 2020 you get a much worse Trump 2 in 2024.

No one was more anti alarmist then Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris tied for second, but Joe Biden has the ability to literally just fucking lock this guy away, or have seal

kaelik.bsky.social•6 hours ago

team 6 take him out, explicitly okayed by Trump's own claims in front of the Supreme Court, and yet what he actually did was get a promise from Garland to do nothing, and then 2 years in finally forced to begin a case.

nrvschultz.bsky.social•14 hours ago

This is very good.👍

polphilpod.bsky.social•17 hours ago

For some of my terminology here, I'm drawing from this 'political compass' I made for the anti-trump coalition -

explained in this longer audio essay (& more on how we ascribe agency to the right)

https://www.politicalphilosophypodcast.com/mapping

polphilpod.bsky.social•17 hours ago

I'm arguing that we should listen to people who saw this coming - &, for those of us who did, actively highlight that

I've been trying to practice what I preach, even if it feels a bit weird. This thread has some receipts of me 'calling it' from the very start:

https://bsky.app/profile/polphilpod.bsky.social/post/3ln3xctwaqk2q

ehowell.bsky.social•16 hours ago

I've gotten quite a bit of pushback and derision for my "I take no pleasure in this but I told you so" moments. It feels awful to say it, because it feels petty yes but also because while most of the time I love being right (ha) this time not so much

jurisdudence.bsky.social•16 hours ago

I just wanna say I genuinely appreciate you vindicating those of us who saw this for exactly what it was in 2015, and didn't waiver.

joe460.bsky.social•14 hours ago

Kamala Harriscsaw this coming and told you, but people wanted a white man who is a criminal. Any discussions on how he cheated to get back in? He didn't really win that election.

polphilpod.bsky.social•16 hours ago

It occurs to me I should follow this up with some sort of list/ starter pack/ whatever of "commentators who called it"

It seems people agree, so translate that into something actionable

Watch this space - also, suggestions?

polphilpod.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Alright, here's my starting point -people, from different factions, who called this

If you want a simple action, hit 'follow all' & share

Welcome suggestions

https://go.bsky.app/V3pizzL

evanhurst.substack.com•14 hours ago

Gonna be super-humble and nominate myself, I definitely saw it from day one.

polphilpod.bsky.social•14 hours ago

Added!

elgriseus.bsky.social•13 hours ago

📌

revmagdalen.bsky.social•15 hours ago

It does feel weird to highlight yourself, but I not only was alarmist from the start, I predicted that January 6 would be an attack on the Capitol.

polphilpod.bsky.social•14 hours ago

added

jennew1961.bsky.social•14 hours ago

Yes, finally! A mutual admiration society for Trumpdumpers!
I love you!

stuartshapiroblou.bsky.social•15 hours ago

At the risk of self promotion, I'd love to be added. My credentials: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Normal-Progressives-Trumps-Election/dp/197963467X and https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-22079-1

polphilpod.bsky.social•15 hours ago

This whole thing is about self-promotion - well mutual promotion of people on the right side, added!

polphilpod.bsky.social•15 hours ago

CC: @jacobtlevy.bsky.social @adamgurri.liberalcurrents.com @iandunt.bsky.social @chrislhayes.bsky.social @kevinmkruse.bsky.social @kjephd.bsky.social @paulcrider.liberalcurrents.com @donmoyn.bsky.social

Who would you add to this? I feel like you'll know who else (you're all on there)

adamgurri.liberalcurrents.com•15 hours ago

@radleybalko.bsky.social for one. @dandrezner.bsky.social for another

polphilpod.bsky.social•12 hours ago

This has now grown quite a bit with (really good) suggestions

One-stop-shop for people who saw our current moral & political decline coming

https://go.bsky.app/V3pizzL

dawnalene.bsky.social•14 hours ago

I was already following all. Feeling smarticle and proud atm

philbc3.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Could I be cheeky and ask for an add? Some evidence ...

https://averypublicsociologist.blogspot.com/2024/11/the-insanity-of-american-politics.html

https://averypublicsociologist.blogspot.com/2024/12/elon-musks-attack-on-philanthropy.html

https://averypublicsociologist.blogspot.com/2025/01/donald-trumps-expansionist-threats.html

baldzera.bsky.social•15 hours ago

It says "big and small," so may I suggest the obscure @hillaryclinton.bsky.social to add to your list of much bigger names

michaelklaas.com•15 hours ago

I would suggest adding @anandwrites.bsky.social

valentinexyz.bsky.social•13 hours ago

In 2018 I wrote an essay for a freshman college English class calling Trump a fascist.

It basically amounted to me quoting Eco’s “Ur Fascism” and going “Hmmm, sounds like Trump, doncha think?” but in doing so, I was apparently more prescient at 19 than a post-J6 Jon Stewart.

mlow.bsky.social•11 hours ago

SARAH KENDZIOR @sarahkendzior.bsky.social

polphilpod.bsky.social•11 hours ago

already in

joelreinstein.bsky.social•14 hours ago

"That is the truly dangerous side of Trump’s rhetoric. And it’s what is missed in the gotchas and demolition jobs on his incoherence and poor grammar." @leninology.bsky.social in 2017

joelreinstein.bsky.social•14 hours ago

then in 2020 describing the global trend MAGA is a part of:
"For now, this constellation of forces is still unstable. But if unchecked, we may soon recognise it as the beginning of a fascist resurgence." Since then he's developed the concept into a book

jhoward.bsky.social•15 hours ago

I love that idea! there’s a how-to from the team here for starter packs https://bsky.social/about/blog/06-26-2024-starter-packs

dadsof3.bsky.social•16 hours ago

I was looking through my old Facebook and I called the GOP capitulating days after he won his 1st primary almost a decade ago. I think that's what is so frustrating; so many millions of Americans saw it coming, were screaming about it, & we were told we were hysterical. The Russia supplication too.

donkadooballs.bsky.social•10 hours ago

This guy saw it coming.

lurkermclurkface.bsky.social•11 hours ago

I don't have my Twitter anymore but my Facebook still has some pretty excellent pulls from the early era. #Humblebrag? #JustABrag 😜

nerdma.bsky.social•13 hours ago

This is so helpful in understanding my older lady relatives, who mostly hate Trump because he's physically disgusting. Which, true, but if Matthew McConaughey were disappearing people, would they be on-side?

I'm curious where "the system will save us" commentators go on that map.

saren-masto.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Great piece. From one early “alarmist” to another, thank you.

lurks-no-more.bsky.social•15 hours ago

See also: the people on social media who insisted there was no meaningful difference between Harris and Trump, Democrats and Republicans, so you shouldn't bother to vote. Or who went so far as to claim that Trump would be better than Harris. Liars, fools, and lying fools, the lot of them.

rolodexpropaganda.bsky.social•17 hours ago

This is a great essay. Totally agree. Clearly there’s a list of people who got it right—who are they? We can’t elevate them if we don’t know who they are! I can think of Ezra Klein and Chris Hayes as both having gotten it right. Who else?

leeroy-jenkins.bsky.social•17 hours ago

Me. I called this 30 yrs ago.

jasontoon.bsky.social•15 hours ago

@sarahkendzior.bsky.social got it more right than anyone else

sarahkendzior.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Nov 2016: https://thecorrespondent.com/5696/were-heading-into-dark-times-this-is-how-to-be-your-own-light-in-the-age-of-trump/1611114266432-e23ea1a6

March 2016: https://thediplomat.com/2016/03/trumpmenbashi/

But what do I know, I'm just a woman with a PhD in the exact subject matter relevant to the topic and decades of journalism about US decline 🙃

nabalkattu.bsky.social•14 hours ago

"Finally, there’s an irreducibly temperamental component. Men—and they usually are men—who just can’t stand to be corrected. It's not (or not merely) that their paradigm was wrong, there was a flat refusal to ever consider how the world looks from within another. "

adreamofamemory.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Good to see you link to The Correspondent again. I love your writing but still think your accusations towards them at the time about deleting your articles were outrageous.

polphilpod.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Added!

bartiddu.bsky.social•15 hours ago

You are a sort of 21st century Nostradamus🧙
Except, unlike him, your prophecies are rapidly (and regrettably) proving all too accurate

sarahkendzior.bsky.social•15 hours ago

https://bsky.app/profile/sarahkendzior.bsky.social/post/3lnid7kkrq22e

dogefort.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Underappreciated word play as well

polphilpod.bsky.social•15 hours ago

done!

brad-carpenter.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Off the top of my head:

People to read
@sarahkendzior.bsky.social
@juliusgoat.bsky.social
@dennycarter.bsky.social

YouTube channels that do great explainers
@somemorenews.bsky.social
@lastweektonight.com
@acollierastro.bsky.social
@garyseconomics.bsky.social
@darkmatter2525.bsky.social

pepgiraffe.bsky.social•12 hours ago

📌

brad-carpenter.bsky.social•13 hours ago

I'd like to give an example of all of those on the list, just to make it easier to find their work (I feel it's very important the voices who've been right over the years get their due rather than continued reliance on a questionable corporate media)

/1

rolodexpropaganda.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Just followed them all!

brad-carpenter.bsky.social•13 hours ago

First up @sarahkendzior.bsky.social

I've read a few of her books ("Hiding in Plain Sight" and "They Knew") and would recommend them both.

Here's a link to one of her more recent Substack articles:

https://sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/the-black-place

brad-carpenter.bsky.social•13 hours ago

@juliusgoat.bsky.social is next. Author of two great books ("The Revisionaries" and "Very Fine People") and The Reframe, where he writes amazing weekly articles.

https://www.the-reframe.com/the-unmovable-sink/

rudymadrox.bsky.social•12 hours ago

I’ve become a big fan of The Reframe in recent times. I consider some of it to be highly recommended reading.

brad-carpenter.bsky.social•13 hours ago

@dennycarter.bsky.social writes great, sometimes funny political takes at the bad faith times, and gets extra points for knowing Fantasy Football! Either way, you'll want to look powerfully into his writing...

https://bad-faith-times.ghost.io/these-guys-are-so-soft/

woodthestoryteller.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Any list containing A.R. Moxon is a list worth subscribing to.

I don't know their Bluesky handle, but the YouTube channel Innuendo Studios has the same perspective / content, but in short, profound video form.

hongpong.bsky.social•10 hours ago

could you clarify which policies under Democratic Party leadership led to the current situation? (eg Clinton started throwing people in Guantanamo in the 1990s)

hissong4mo.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Seeing Trump as a danger did not take a lot of insight. We should be promoting people who got it right, but just to state the obvious, being right about Trump doesn’t make you a savvy political commentator. It just means that you passed a critical litmus test.

hissong4mo.bsky.social•15 hours ago

To me, the converse is more important. If you were a “left“ political commentator, and you minimized or normalized the threat of Trump, you should probably be ignored.

donkadooballs.bsky.social•10 hours ago

This is for sure. There was so much animosity toward anyone left of Bill Clinton when they started warning people in the Reagan years, and we still hear nonsense like "Tankie" and "Purity test" from people who only started to care about Gaza after Jan 20th.

ravenonthill.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Just BTW, David Brooks has been a covert fascist cheerleader for his entire career; @proleftpodcast.bsky.social did a six-part series on him. Generally, they are good on the media failures that have led into this moment.

eddiethebulldog.bsky.social•15 hours ago

He’s annoying AF. Dreaming that Trump would somehow re-invent Reagan “any day now”. Pretending the GOP have some “real patriots” instead of the cadre of obstructionists and vote suppressing fascists that said the plan out loud.
F*ck him.

lejanaysola.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Adam Gopnik called Trump a fascist threat in May 2016.

sondermonster.bsky.social•16 hours ago

good piece, but the thing you're missing, imo, is how trump is a symptom of the broken system, not the cause for it.

trump is the logical end-step of late stage capitalism and it's need for infinite growth.

trump was predicted in all but name ~150 years ago in Das Kapital

kenjaminsol.bsky.social•16 hours ago

I’ve had discussions with sincere Republicans who said, “I don’t like Trump but I’m for the policies”. I hope every one of them gets a dirty taste of the cruelty and chaos of the dictator’s character.

kaelik.bsky.social•10 hours ago

It's so funny to be like "we need to stop listening to people who were wrong" and then divert into arguing that we should listen to liberals and not leftists when most "nonalarmists" were liberals and most leftists have been alarming the while time.

garbagefriend.bsky.social•10 hours ago

If you check out the authors twitter posts pre-election, he's scolding senator Sanders and Chapell Roan for making statements that Harris' campaign is disconnected from the public

maiett.bsky.social•8 hours ago

Yes, these are the last people who should be leading, especially given the demographic tension at play: Most (not all) of the finger waggers are straight white men who never experienced marginalization by the state, and tend not to listen to the rest of us. See also, Dem Party leaders & consultants.

mikethemadbiol.bsky.social•16 hours ago

📌

ruthcallaghan.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Excellent piece - and as Cassandra learned on the battlements, those who refuse to see (or find it more financially rewarding to close their eyes) never cede the point. The key takeaway for me “someone who still feels this way is not who we want defining our response now.”

justinlawguy.bsky.social•17 hours ago

Wait was that the same Baby Posner who wrote the mea culpa about the Supreme Court? Lmao.

nexdude.bsky.social•11 hours ago

I feel like "don't shoot the messenger" is a message we've all heard enough times to take on board.

We could do with an equally snappy phrase for "don't ignore the message because you find the messenger annoying"

tangmu.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Imagine my frustration as a never-Trump Republican. "My" side has been coopted by the fascists, which has been clear at least as far back as VOICE, and the liberals I've never been able to get fully on board with are infighting.

It's never been this lonely being this right.

curiouslyclever.bsky.social•14 hours ago

My thoughts exactly. It's been infuriating to watch late night comedy shows treat Trump as a joke, diminishing the very real threat and validating his 'relevance. He should have been a pariah.

differance.bsky.social•14 hours ago

I think it's important to point out that the "anti-alarmists" on the left had a more specific motive: Robin, Dean et al really think that fascism is the "socialism of fools" that would not arise if "liberals" took class antagonism more seriously. Iow, they think Trump voters are basically right.

differance.bsky.social•14 hours ago

the cover to the 2nd edition of The Reactionary Mind literally boasts that it's "The book that predicted Trump."

stemthebleeding.bsky.social•16 hours ago

We also need pundits to admit that the economy overall wasn't bad. THEIR economy was bad because people didn't tune in breathlessly every day to see what Biden broke next.

The media had a financial incentive to ignore the signs historians and economists were highlighting and foist Trump upon us.

sondermonster.bsky.social•16 hours ago

we need everyone else to admit that the economy overall actually sucked the whole time and any attempt to prove it was "doing good" was straight propaganda. billionaires wealth increased by 200% JUST during biden's term. that alone proves the economy fucking sucked for everyone else.

stemthebleeding.bsky.social•15 hours ago

And yet the actual poor, not the (cosplay poor with 6 figure incomes living in NYC) saw the biggest increases in wages since the New Deal. And racial inequality decreased.

Yes, the wealthy got wealthier. That's because you kept taking your increased wages and buying their shit.

Now sit down.

whisperingsage.bsky.social•13 hours ago

So when was the federal minimum wage increased?

stemthebleeding.bsky.social•13 hours ago

It was increased to $17.75 by Biden for all federal employees.

And Trump brought it back down.

And states and cities developed their own minimum wages to make the federal minimum wage a moot point.

This isn't the own you think it is.

whisperingsage.bsky.social•13 hours ago

https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2021/04/30/2021-09263/increasing-the-minimum-wage-for-federal-contractors

Contractors are not employees.

sondermonster.bsky.social•13 hours ago

lol democrats doing a "states rights!" to own leftists. perfection.

sondermonster.bsky.social•15 hours ago

that is not reality if you actually KNOW any poor instead of looking at charts. and you can't measure "racial inequality" but that's also not true, biden deported more people than any one term president EVER.

the wealthy got wealthier because they were talking more and more of our wages. dumb shit

mimi9324.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Not really, the wealthy will always get a boost because most companies are monopolies (as far what you’re talking about). Inflation in the U.S. was the lowest of all the “first world” countries. Ppl literally had more money but items were also more expensive because Covid shut down everything.

mimi9324.bsky.social•15 hours ago

The news should’ve contextualized that instead of telling Americans it’s their god given right to cheap prices and labor no matter the material circumstances. I sympathize with your opinion as someone who is poor. It’s just not as simple as Biden didn’t do enough to lower prices.

sondermonster.bsky.social•14 hours ago

More people ignoring the material reality to cite charts

luis593547.bsky.social•15 hours ago

"My anecdotal evidence is stronger than data pulled from the entire US, often containing granular detail that can be separated and contextualized"

sondermonster.bsky.social•15 hours ago

material reality is more important than cherry picked data.

data is easily manipulated and if you need someone to explain that for you, i can't help you

jamesbelcher.bsky.social•13 hours ago

"We also need pundits to admit that the economy overall wasn't bad."

Oh?

ksfreeman.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Mitch. Mitch could have impeached him. The Heritage Foundation is in charge. Evil fascism has many knees on our throats.

jrf314.bsky.social•16 hours ago

This is a weird article because all you really do is talk about different factions of liberals as far as I can tell, some of who got it right and some who didn’t. And that you were one that got right, so we are supposed to listen to you now.

jrf314.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Your attempt to bring the “left” into it is inaccurate too. For example, online “leftists” saying “orange man bad” was a critique of the Democratic Party’s messaging and lack of policies that differentiated them from Trump (like Gaza). It wasn’t because nobody felt like Trump was a threat.

recombobulating.bsky.social•16 hours ago

The singular collective 'we' of liberalism only includes liberals.

Everyone else is an uncivilised beast.

nwgarcia.bsky.social•16 hours ago

"Orange Man bad" is a critique invented by the right and centrists circa 2017 for saying the left was irrationally positioned against Trump to the point they couldn't give him credit for anything "good" he did. It was adopted by online leftists in the last 2 years, but that's not where it comes from

jrf314.bsky.social•16 hours ago

I don’t remember it this way and don’t care enough to search who first used it; but if this is true then it is an ever worse example to support this guy’s terrible claim.

nwgarcia.bsky.social•16 hours ago

I don't see why that makes it worse, but I can tell you for certain that smug centrists and MAGA chuds were hurling "Orange Man Bad" at me on Twitter very early in Trump's 1st term.

jrf314.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Because if you are correct (and I don’t think you are), he doesn’t even have one supposed example of the left not taking Trump seriously, it was from centrists/right wingers. Muting this now.

outpacingzeno.bsky.social•14 hours ago

One thing I feel is true is the fact that because mainline liberals are *normatively attuned* to liberalism's superiority to other systems, the possibility of other ideologies taking control is salient to us, naturally leading us to lend more attention of all kinds to the rise of fascism [1/2]

outpacingzeno.bsky.social•14 hours ago

which helped our understanding of what was actually going on. I don't think non-alarmists had great obstacles to predicting this, it's just bc they were focused on the comparatively minor problems of the liberalism du jour that they didn't care to think about if what the right was doing was worse

poormarlowe.bsky.social•14 hours ago

"Progressive liberalism is true" is why progressive liberals are responsible for all the good things in the United States, and the American psyche has wanted to believe literally anything else since the first Make America Great Again campaign (1980)

2btheleaves.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Well I’m not a journalist but I’ve been pointing out the severity of what Trump has done and the plans to carry out all the worst things I feared. I wouldn’t mind people around me saying “sorry” after years of being patronized and viewed as an over emotional alarmist. So I say yes to this.

alsowonderwoman.bsky.social•15 hours ago

📌

czarmikhail.bsky.social•15 hours ago

Fascist threat is real.
The Nazi hold upon power is real.
Nazi control our ports, our escape routes, our embassies.
Vote when able.
I do not want a Nazi King overlord
Not a damn thing I can do about
Vote
Protest
Write opinions
No others listen
Do not write for followers
Motivate others

nathankalmoe.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Very in line with… https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691178288/expert-political-judgment

embeessem.bsky.social•9 hours ago

God this

supermills.bsky.social•17 hours ago

In a party full of Neville Chamberlains, be a Wilt

wombative.bsky.social•15 hours ago

I really liked the following quote: "Essentially the ‘trick’ to liberalism is being able to understand complexity and values pluralism, without collapsing into relativism."

katwitdown.bsky.social•16 hours ago

Has Nichols used the f word yet?

kgdaly.bsky.social•14 hours ago

He has. He's just 10yrs too late

busrules.bsky.social•15 hours ago

This is excellent. Being told we were crazy hysterics (yes, I chose a feminized word) has been equally infuriating and exhausting. But we were right.

trixienorton.bsky.social•12 hours ago

I always use "hysterical" to refer to how we were treated by the media pundits because it was so misogynistic. I'm glad that was touched on in this article.

adamcain.bsky.social•8 hours ago

From a British POV that was of much more direct relevance to this side of the pond than I'd expected and helped clarify my instinctive liberalism.

Thank you.

iddybud.bsky.social•14 hours ago

➡️Talking people through the most terrifying political moment of our lifetimes is some bizarre combination of all three and they have shown they’re not up to it.

Thank you, Toby.
I needed to read this today.

nateo.bsky.social•17 hours ago

Huh, it’s like you read my mind

johnweeks.bsky.social•16 hours ago

@sarahkendzior.bsky.social Tidbit

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