Ross Douthat responds to attacks on populists by arguing they didn’t support the Iran war. Is he right?
Iran is not Iraq; there was no foreign policy elite consensus in favor of the war. Responsibility for it rests with one man, Donald Trump, who owes his position primarily to a base full of populists. As a result, if you have to attach blame to one side or the other instead of a single dude, it belongs to the populists, even though a few of them don’t support the war.