Are the fears of the base, well, baseless? Let’s look at the evidence supporting the seven propositions listed in my previous post:
- It is certainly true that white Christian men played an enormous role in the construction of America as we know it today. It is equally true that other groups played a large role, as well. Can you imagine American culture without their contribution today?
- The belief in entitlement to perpetual power is incompatible with liberal democracy. It is an ideology fit for the Confederate States of America, not the United States of America. Hence, the popularity of Confederate flags and statues on the right.
- The demographic and ideological changes that so frighten the right are a fact, although reactionaries make them much worse than they need to be by embracing racism and attempting to impose their views on young people by force.
- The left is, in fact, largely a coalition of women, seculars, and ethnic and sexual minorities who have been the victims of discrimination in the past. As to their objectives, see #5.
- The reactionary fear here is mostly projection, as the left, unlike the right, actually supports American liberal democracy in spite of its innumerable historical failures. To the extent that the nightmare is supported by any evidence, it consists of the public health measures enacted during the pandemic and the rantings of a handful of activists at the local government level and on Sewer. The former were temporary, and no longer exist, to the regret of no one; the latter do not represent the opinions of any nationally prominent left-leaning figure, including AOC and Bernie Sanders.
- As with #2, this view is incompatible with American liberal democracy. The interesting thing here is that most of the angry right has evaded the illiberal democracy question by pretending the 2020 election was stolen. Only a handful of activists have openly admitted that the rules of the game have to be changed dramatically in order to give themselves a monopoly on power; the majority still use liberal democratic rhetoric even if they don’t actually believe it because they can’t imagine a better alternative.
- This is where the base parts ways with DeSantis. Unlike Trump, they don’t trust him not to sell them out, because he has gaudy establishment credentials, and he works to corrupt the system from within rather than burning it down.