I also have become less of a news consumer. We discontinued print editions of the NY Times and WaPo because the cost kept going up. I would read both papers each morning over breakfast. Now I just use my tablet to skim things and read the articles of interest. At least the WaPo still has a great selection of comics to read. We don't have cable TV service anymore either, and I don't do much streaming of anything political.
My biggest concern is how we are ignoring all the public health lessons that accumulated over the past century. I worked on B. pertussis (whooping cough) when I was at NIH and a couple other infectious organisms as well. The whole anti-vax stuff is deeply troubling. We are starting to see illness and deaths from diseases we thought were close to eradication. This will only increase. Maybe this is all accounted for in "gold standard science."
My guess is that Homan did not declare it on his tax return. Call it a hunch.
What would be interesting is to think about what he did with the money, assuming that the alleged crime happened. $50K is a lot of money to keep in a house. If he put $10K or more into a bank account, that would trigger an automatic report. If he put amounts smaller than $10K into a bank account, and did that a few times, he could be accused of "structuring." So interesting dilemma he must have faced.
Good point. As you probably know, average people pulled over by a cop often have large sums of cash seized by the government, on the assumption that no one could have a legitimate use for that much cash. I recall the Institute for Justice has defended some of these people.
Thanks. Yes, IJ has been great on this, which is one of the reasons I give them money each year. There was one case in the South (I think) in the last year or two that, when the local police found out that IJ was on it, they gave the money back within days.
Given that he had a consulting business, if he kept the money, you *really* don’t think it likely he reported it as consulting income?
The NYT story notes that he accepted larger sums to lobby during that time period. And that of course he was not at the time a government official, nor was it even a given that Trump would win.
And in fact if you could bring yourself - I know that you cannot - to claim that the “outrages” of BOTH the Trump Administration and the Biden Administration were “much worse” than previous outrages, I could agree with you on that.
IMO it was Obama who started with the outrages, but no doubt by number there were clearly smaller than both Trump’s and Biden’s (well, more precisely, the folks pulling the strings under Biden).
And probably only Obama’s Iran policy (including the pallets of cash) could break into a Top 10 utterly dominated by Biden and Trump.
[Well, maybe the Russia collusion stuff could make the list too. But while *clearly* non-zero attributed to Obama himself, since most of it occurred after he was out of office, that one at best arguable to “count” as Obama’s.]
Without defending any of W’s specific policies, what “outrages” did he “do”?
I mean this sincerely, I genuinely do not understand the point you are making.
The only thing I can guess is that you think he knowingly lied about Saddam and WMDs (even though that was the same belief/position that Bill Clinton had).
He did something worse. Giving billions to Iran to fund terrorists with no compelling - frankly, even any - U.S. interest in return.
That said, thank you. I don’t feel anywhere near as strongly about that topic as you do, but I acknowledge one could indeed quite reasonably consider that an outrage.
It's always bizarre how some homeless neocons consistently try to single out Obama and Biden when both men are much more similar in demeanor to Dubya, McCain, and Romney than any of these men are to Trump. What's weird about this obstinate blame-shifting is that it undermines what could be a unique perspective. Neocons lost their party to outrage populists; they more than anyone should be aware of what actions NOT to take in order to avoid future Trump-like figures. But rather than freely acknowledging their errors so others can learn from their wisdom of experience, they seem hell bent on avoiding any accountability.
Perhaps we are simply talking at cross purposes, I cannot say.
I’m not a neocon, but I’m surely not the opposite of one.
If this is only about “demeanor” / vulgarity, that Orange Man uniquely Bad, then I have no interest in any discussion whatsoever.
If you want to claim that Obama was more like those predecessors and presidential candidate opponents, I can even accept that.
But claiming that what happened under Biden is more like “the before” than like under Trump, if the discussion is what Scott started about “outrages”, is either hyperpartisan or outright clueless.
Because it has nothing to do with Biden the man (or the man he was 6, 10, 20 years ago), and everything to do with the actions taken under his presidency, just little to none of Biden’s own impetus, and an unknown large percentage without his full cognition.
If you want to argue that Biden was egregiously and disastrously bad and unlawful, and so is Trump, then even though I disagree I guess I don't care because Biden is gone and Trump is here right now. But then why are you even bringing it up? Only to apologize for and enable Trump.
I will admit I was not that concerned about Trump because he had already been president once and it was ok. But the second term has been an unmitigated catastrophe. Far worse than the first term. A continual assault on the rule of law. I pray SCOTUS steps in and contains the descent towards tyranny.
I thought Trump the first time around had very good policies (other than spending like a Democrat), despite his vulgarity, and in fact very few “outrages”. IMO Salena Zito was dead on in her “take him literally but not seriously” critique of Trump’s critics.
I thought Biden was disastrous both in policy and in the outrages that occurred under his “watch” (of course the word is in quotes because the man himself we now know did very little, and was likely barely aware of many of the outrages).
Trump this time around is not nearly as good as the first time around, I 100% agree, and while he has done some good things and is distinctly better than still having Biden, I agree he has done some bad things and several “outrageous” things.
I brought Biden up in my initial comment because I have a huge problem with people claiming Trump uniquely has brought “outrageousness” to the presidency in the 21st century.
We are very far apart. Even first term Trump was far worse than Biden. I covered that extensively over at TheMoneyIllusion, and my views have not changed.
And as I have noted previously, despite this I read you anyway, because on any topic not DJT you usually have things to say I find intelligent and interesting . 😀
We are talking quantities of outrage “incidents”, not merely existence thereof. Though I suppose to a lesser degree levels as well.
I was reacting to the claim that Trump is unique on either levels or quantities of “outrageous”. My bigger point was the absurdity of not putting the Biden Admin in the same league; my smaller is that Obama kickstarted the “normalization” of these.
I don’t defend the first two episodes you cite, and only partially the third.
I was around for all of those, but I confess I only really started paying attention early on in Clinton.
But in comparison I’d actually side with Scott that none of those presidencies rises to the level of multiple / repeated “outrages”.
We can always find policies or actions we disagree with, even strenuously, from any presidency.
Okay, in general I'll agree. Though Clinton also had the Elian Gonzalez affair. I was addressing the "who started with the outrages".
Whether or not the hoi polloi is in a position to even notice an outrage occurring comes down to the press and the vocalness, and spin, of the political opposition. As a person who voted for Obama in 2008, I never noticed any particular outrage (though later on I did hear about him shilling for the Flint water supply, which was outrageous given the givens). Personally I think it would be nice to go back to a time when 'minor' 'outrages' were functionally invisible.
Repeating one final time that I think in toto Obama’s outrages were less numerous than either Biden’s or Trump’s, here are two VDH columns that list many of them:
I avoid commenting on "short form" social media like Twitter because I know it will rot my brain, and more importantly I'll end up wasting lots of time. I enjoy reading, and occasionally commenting on, "medium form" media like this blog and others. I enjoy "short form" media from certain people like Yglesias, Taleb, and Anne Applebaum because they actually have smart things to say and it gives me an opportunity to read something longer by them. I also like that it's fresh information.
Something I'm trying to figure out is how the Economist is staffed by such good writers and editors and yet British politics is a complete shambles. Did the magazine absorb the best minds of the United Kingdom?
The world is full of mysteries. Why is Chile better governed than Argentina? Why is Switzerland better governed than Germany? Why is the Netherlands better governed than the UK? I have no answers.
Speaking of mysteries, what do you think of the movie "Inherent Vice"--I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. The best I can come up with is that it's 2/3 of a great movie.
They are not "suspected". They are "known" drug dealers. The boat was carrying 200 grams of cocaine. Allow intelligence officers to do their job. They know. You don't. It's called assymmetric information.
You're a bit weak, and that kind of weakness makes hard times. Old quote, but still relevant.
Here is some homework. Watch Deep Space Nine, Season 6, Episode 19. It's titled: "The pale moonlight." It's one of the greatest shows of all time. And the last scene is one of the greatest scenes of all time, when Garak (realist) tells the captain (idealist).
"If your concience is bothering you, you may soothe it with the knowledge that you may have saved the entire alpha quadrant and all it cost was the life of one Romulan Senator, one criminal, and the self respect of one starfleet officer".
If that doesn't give you goosebumps, nothing will. Stop being an over-the-top idealist with delusions of how the world really works.
I'm no expert on the drug trade, but isn't it odd that they'd use a large boat with a crew of 11 to transport a quantity of cocaine that could fit in your back pocket?
Or is it possible that you got your facts wrong?
And is it possible the government got its facts wrong? The same government that put out misinformation about Kirk's killer before finally catching the right guy? The government that leaks our plans to attack Yemen to the media before the attack actually occurs? A government that claims it just concluded a peace treaty between Cambodia and Armenia?
de Quincey also had another great murder quote: "A golden mean is certainly what every man should aim at. But it is easier talking than doing; and, my infirmity being notoriously too much milkiness of heart, I find it difficult to maintain that steady equatorial line between the two poles of too much murder on the one hand and too little on the other."
How about the killing ofpeople who are sitting in a tent, with a sign that says "prove me wrong." and bullets inscribed with the words "catch fascist". I noticed you convienantly left that one out. Or how about the Biden white house pressuring google to remove the YouTube accounts of eminent scientists during the pandemic, which Google admitted to in court documents. You don't want to talk about that?
They also admitted, in the same court documents to banning accounts of political pundits due to political pressure from the Biden white house. Not important?
Instead of focusing on important things, you seem to be outraged over a bunch of drug dealers sent to Davy Jones locker. That's kind of weird.
Writing about current politics has all the traps you mentioned. Especially American politics.
But you can do political analysis about past politics, and perhaps less charged politics in other places. (Eg your work on the Midas Curse comes to mind.)
The smart reader will infer lessons for their own time and jurisdiction.
What gets me is when people make categorical pronouncements regarding groups of people and don't think they're talking politics just because they aren't mentioning political parties or elected politicians.
Regarding the PPS: If exigent circumstances don't make it lawful, then it isn't lawful.
Living in Florida during covid was a trip because everybody was suddenly an expert on where I live. At some point I realized that in addition to the 20 million residents there are over 100 million visitors, so there are over 120 million different versions of Florida in just the actual physical visitors and resident's minds.
Lots of good points. This really resonated with me:
"I can remember people teasing him that he could make a lot more money if he quit teaching and got a union job at the Ford assembly plant in Mahwah."
When I starting teaching in 1981, my salary was probably lower than many autoworkers. Over the next few decades, the pay of college professors like me rose far faster than the pay of autoworkers.
I think a lot of the polarization that you talk about - the MAGA's, the progressives, with moderates losing out - can be explained with simple game theory. If you have a more extreme faction on both sides that can win primaries, then you can have an equilibrium where each side has an incentive to not moderate, even though moderating would increase their party's chance of victory. As long as both parties feature policies and rhetoric that appeal to the more extreme faction, each party will be unpopular, but still have a ~50% chance of winning.
If one party moderates, they will defeat the other party easily, as long as the other side does not moderate also. But the people in the more extreme faction may strongly prefer the lower chance of winning with the "right" policies to the higher chance of winning with the "wrong" policies.
There's much more that could be said, but that's the basic idea.
Matt Yglesias is, I think, the most prominent pro-moderation voice on the left. Echoing Scott Sumner's preference for a "calm, dispassionate, above the fray approach" and praise of Yglesias for making points "more humorously," you don't even have to read this (which I can't, it's for paid subscribers) - just *the idea* or frame ("An investigation") of this piece constitutes an almost absurdly dry riposte to (and lampoon of) his leftist critics.
Thank you. I will read your links. One thing you didn't mention is the insane primary process, which makes everything much worse. My big question is why anyone want to be a Senator or representative if you have to spout propaganda you don't believe or suck up to autocrats (ie sell your soul.)? Who are these people?
I also have become less of a news consumer. We discontinued print editions of the NY Times and WaPo because the cost kept going up. I would read both papers each morning over breakfast. Now I just use my tablet to skim things and read the articles of interest. At least the WaPo still has a great selection of comics to read. We don't have cable TV service anymore either, and I don't do much streaming of anything political.
My biggest concern is how we are ignoring all the public health lessons that accumulated over the past century. I worked on B. pertussis (whooping cough) when I was at NIH and a couple other infectious organisms as well. The whole anti-vax stuff is deeply troubling. We are starting to see illness and deaths from diseases we thought were close to eradication. This will only increase. Maybe this is all accounted for in "gold standard science."
My guess is that Homan did not declare it on his tax return. Call it a hunch.
What would be interesting is to think about what he did with the money, assuming that the alleged crime happened. $50K is a lot of money to keep in a house. If he put $10K or more into a bank account, that would trigger an automatic report. If he put amounts smaller than $10K into a bank account, and did that a few times, he could be accused of "structuring." So interesting dilemma he must have faced.
Good point. As you probably know, average people pulled over by a cop often have large sums of cash seized by the government, on the assumption that no one could have a legitimate use for that much cash. I recall the Institute for Justice has defended some of these people.
Thanks. Yes, IJ has been great on this, which is one of the reasons I give them money each year. There was one case in the South (I think) in the last year or two that, when the local police found out that IJ was on it, they gave the money back within days.
Given that he had a consulting business, if he kept the money, you *really* don’t think it likely he reported it as consulting income?
The NYT story notes that he accepted larger sums to lobby during that time period. And that of course he was not at the time a government official, nor was it even a given that Trump would win.
Homan was on Bill Maher's show Friday night. I wish that Maher would have asked him what he did with the $50K.
Why is that so surprising? NJ Senator Menendez kept hundreds of thousands of dollars in gold bars in his house.
Don't be naive. Obviously Homan is a Pimp.
I suggest you read the great American social critic: Iceberg Slim
Pretty good post.
I agree with your “it’s both” point.
And in fact if you could bring yourself - I know that you cannot - to claim that the “outrages” of BOTH the Trump Administration and the Biden Administration were “much worse” than previous outrages, I could agree with you on that.
IMO it was Obama who started with the outrages, but no doubt by number there were clearly smaller than both Trump’s and Biden’s (well, more precisely, the folks pulling the strings under Biden).
And probably only Obama’s Iran policy (including the pallets of cash) could break into a Top 10 utterly dominated by Biden and Trump.
[Well, maybe the Russia collusion stuff could make the list too. But while *clearly* non-zero attributed to Obama himself, since most of it occurred after he was out of office, that one at best arguable to “count” as Obama’s.]
"IMO it was Obama who started with the outrages"
Remind me, which president came before Obama?
I don’t understand your point.
Without defending any of W’s specific policies, what “outrages” did he “do”?
I mean this sincerely, I genuinely do not understand the point you are making.
The only thing I can guess is that you think he knowingly lied about Saddam and WMDs (even though that was the same belief/position that Bill Clinton had).
How about torture? Did Obama do anything that bad?
He did something worse. Giving billions to Iran to fund terrorists with no compelling - frankly, even any - U.S. interest in return.
That said, thank you. I don’t feel anywhere near as strongly about that topic as you do, but I acknowledge one could indeed quite reasonably consider that an outrage.
Well, if you are going to just make things up . . .
I made up that Obama enabled billions to go to Iran? Including some sent in cash on pallets?
It's always bizarre how some homeless neocons consistently try to single out Obama and Biden when both men are much more similar in demeanor to Dubya, McCain, and Romney than any of these men are to Trump. What's weird about this obstinate blame-shifting is that it undermines what could be a unique perspective. Neocons lost their party to outrage populists; they more than anyone should be aware of what actions NOT to take in order to avoid future Trump-like figures. But rather than freely acknowledging their errors so others can learn from their wisdom of experience, they seem hell bent on avoiding any accountability.
Perhaps we are simply talking at cross purposes, I cannot say.
I’m not a neocon, but I’m surely not the opposite of one.
If this is only about “demeanor” / vulgarity, that Orange Man uniquely Bad, then I have no interest in any discussion whatsoever.
If you want to claim that Obama was more like those predecessors and presidential candidate opponents, I can even accept that.
But claiming that what happened under Biden is more like “the before” than like under Trump, if the discussion is what Scott started about “outrages”, is either hyperpartisan or outright clueless.
Because it has nothing to do with Biden the man (or the man he was 6, 10, 20 years ago), and everything to do with the actions taken under his presidency, just little to none of Biden’s own impetus, and an unknown large percentage without his full cognition.
If you want to argue that Biden was egregiously and disastrously bad and unlawful, and so is Trump, then even though I disagree I guess I don't care because Biden is gone and Trump is here right now. But then why are you even bringing it up? Only to apologize for and enable Trump.
I will admit I was not that concerned about Trump because he had already been president once and it was ok. But the second term has been an unmitigated catastrophe. Far worse than the first term. A continual assault on the rule of law. I pray SCOTUS steps in and contains the descent towards tyranny.
You and I differ, surely, but mostly in degree.
I thought Trump the first time around had very good policies (other than spending like a Democrat), despite his vulgarity, and in fact very few “outrages”. IMO Salena Zito was dead on in her “take him literally but not seriously” critique of Trump’s critics.
I thought Biden was disastrous both in policy and in the outrages that occurred under his “watch” (of course the word is in quotes because the man himself we now know did very little, and was likely barely aware of many of the outrages).
Trump this time around is not nearly as good as the first time around, I 100% agree, and while he has done some good things and is distinctly better than still having Biden, I agree he has done some bad things and several “outrageous” things.
I brought Biden up in my initial comment because I have a huge problem with people claiming Trump uniquely has brought “outrageousness” to the presidency in the 21st century.
We are very far apart. Even first term Trump was far worse than Biden. I covered that extensively over at TheMoneyIllusion, and my views have not changed.
I know well that this is your opinion.
And as I have noted previously, despite this I read you anyway, because on any topic not DJT you usually have things to say I find intelligent and interesting . 😀
Including this piece.
My comment above was replying to “Freedom”.
Word of advice. If you don't want others to think you're a pretentious ass, stop writing like one.
Thank you Mr. pot, sir.
How old are you? Waco was under Clinton, Ruby Ridge under Bush I, and the Iran-Contra affair under Reagan.
We are talking quantities of outrage “incidents”, not merely existence thereof. Though I suppose to a lesser degree levels as well.
I was reacting to the claim that Trump is unique on either levels or quantities of “outrageous”. My bigger point was the absurdity of not putting the Biden Admin in the same league; my smaller is that Obama kickstarted the “normalization” of these.
I don’t defend the first two episodes you cite, and only partially the third.
I was around for all of those, but I confess I only really started paying attention early on in Clinton.
But in comparison I’d actually side with Scott that none of those presidencies rises to the level of multiple / repeated “outrages”.
We can always find policies or actions we disagree with, even strenuously, from any presidency.
Okay, in general I'll agree. Though Clinton also had the Elian Gonzalez affair. I was addressing the "who started with the outrages".
Whether or not the hoi polloi is in a position to even notice an outrage occurring comes down to the press and the vocalness, and spin, of the political opposition. As a person who voted for Obama in 2008, I never noticed any particular outrage (though later on I did hear about him shilling for the Flint water supply, which was outrageous given the givens). Personally I think it would be nice to go back to a time when 'minor' 'outrages' were functionally invisible.
Repeating one final time that I think in toto Obama’s outrages were less numerous than either Biden’s or Trump’s, here are two VDH columns that list many of them:
https://www.investors.com/politics/columnists/obama-scandals-inspector-general-clinton-email-irs-fast-furious/
https://www.nationalreview.com/2014/05/obama-administrations-ethics-problem-victor-davis-hanson/
I don’t think that all of the things VDH mentions would rise to he level of “outrages”, but surely many do.
Presumably Scott would disagree about most of them, but you and I would agree on some, disagree on others.
I avoid commenting on "short form" social media like Twitter because I know it will rot my brain, and more importantly I'll end up wasting lots of time. I enjoy reading, and occasionally commenting on, "medium form" media like this blog and others. I enjoy "short form" media from certain people like Yglesias, Taleb, and Anne Applebaum because they actually have smart things to say and it gives me an opportunity to read something longer by them. I also like that it's fresh information.
Something I'm trying to figure out is how the Economist is staffed by such good writers and editors and yet British politics is a complete shambles. Did the magazine absorb the best minds of the United Kingdom?
The world is full of mysteries. Why is Chile better governed than Argentina? Why is Switzerland better governed than Germany? Why is the Netherlands better governed than the UK? I have no answers.
Speaking of mysteries, what do you think of the movie "Inherent Vice"--I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. The best I can come up with is that it's 2/3 of a great movie.
They are not "suspected". They are "known" drug dealers. The boat was carrying 200 grams of cocaine. Allow intelligence officers to do their job. They know. You don't. It's called assymmetric information.
You're a bit weak, and that kind of weakness makes hard times. Old quote, but still relevant.
Here is some homework. Watch Deep Space Nine, Season 6, Episode 19. It's titled: "The pale moonlight." It's one of the greatest shows of all time. And the last scene is one of the greatest scenes of all time, when Garak (realist) tells the captain (idealist).
"If your concience is bothering you, you may soothe it with the knowledge that you may have saved the entire alpha quadrant and all it cost was the life of one Romulan Senator, one criminal, and the self respect of one starfleet officer".
If that doesn't give you goosebumps, nothing will. Stop being an over-the-top idealist with delusions of how the world really works.
"The boat was carrying 200 grams of cocaine."
I'm no expert on the drug trade, but isn't it odd that they'd use a large boat with a crew of 11 to transport a quantity of cocaine that could fit in your back pocket?
Or is it possible that you got your facts wrong?
And is it possible the government got its facts wrong? The same government that put out misinformation about Kirk's killer before finally catching the right guy? The government that leaks our plans to attack Yemen to the media before the attack actually occurs? A government that claims it just concluded a peace treaty between Cambodia and Armenia?
Perhaps Mary is being sarcastic.
Like they knew about WMDs in Iraq...
de Quincey also had another great murder quote: "A golden mean is certainly what every man should aim at. But it is easier talking than doing; and, my infirmity being notoriously too much milkiness of heart, I find it difficult to maintain that steady equatorial line between the two poles of too much murder on the one hand and too little on the other."
Yup, I used that one last year:
https://www.econlib.org/nepotism-and-global-politics/
Scott.
I think it has less to do with the internet than with the smartphone. See this post for interesting stats and arguments:
https://jmarriott.substack.com/p/the-dawn-of-the-post-literate-society-aa1
Yes, that's plausible.
How about the killing ofpeople who are sitting in a tent, with a sign that says "prove me wrong." and bullets inscribed with the words "catch fascist". I noticed you convienantly left that one out. Or how about the Biden white house pressuring google to remove the YouTube accounts of eminent scientists during the pandemic, which Google admitted to in court documents. You don't want to talk about that?
They also admitted, in the same court documents to banning accounts of political pundits due to political pressure from the Biden white house. Not important?
Instead of focusing on important things, you seem to be outraged over a bunch of drug dealers sent to Davy Jones locker. That's kind of weird.
"That's kind of weird."
Trial by jury? Innocent until proven guilty?
If you say so.
"Outraged by unconstitutional extrajudicial executions without process of law"
"Northern Exposure" is a fun show (at least the first few seasons)
Here's one signal about how much things have changed since the 1990s:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wetEKGZdUo
History is no longer over.
Fukuyama is always worth reading.
Great post!
Writing about current politics has all the traps you mentioned. Especially American politics.
But you can do political analysis about past politics, and perhaps less charged politics in other places. (Eg your work on the Midas Curse comes to mind.)
The smart reader will infer lessons for their own time and jurisdiction.
Good point.
What gets me is when people make categorical pronouncements regarding groups of people and don't think they're talking politics just because they aren't mentioning political parties or elected politicians.
Regarding the PPS: If exigent circumstances don't make it lawful, then it isn't lawful.
Hi Scott, is there a way to reach you via email?
Do you still use this email? ssumner@bentley.edu
I want to start a real world project involving level targeting regime.
Living in Florida during covid was a trip because everybody was suddenly an expert on where I live. At some point I realized that in addition to the 20 million residents there are over 100 million visitors, so there are over 120 million different versions of Florida in just the actual physical visitors and resident's minds.
Your point about only human was spot on. No one appreciates how good we have it
https://charles72f.substack.com/p/the-tribe-has-spoken
Lots of good points. This really resonated with me:
"I can remember people teasing him that he could make a lot more money if he quit teaching and got a union job at the Ford assembly plant in Mahwah."
When I starting teaching in 1981, my salary was probably lower than many autoworkers. Over the next few decades, the pay of college professors like me rose far faster than the pay of autoworkers.
I think a lot of the polarization that you talk about - the MAGA's, the progressives, with moderates losing out - can be explained with simple game theory. If you have a more extreme faction on both sides that can win primaries, then you can have an equilibrium where each side has an incentive to not moderate, even though moderating would increase their party's chance of victory. As long as both parties feature policies and rhetoric that appeal to the more extreme faction, each party will be unpopular, but still have a ~50% chance of winning.
If one party moderates, they will defeat the other party easily, as long as the other side does not moderate also. But the people in the more extreme faction may strongly prefer the lower chance of winning with the "right" policies to the higher chance of winning with the "wrong" policies.
There's much more that could be said, but that's the basic idea.
Matt Yglesias is, I think, the most prominent pro-moderation voice on the left. Echoing Scott Sumner's preference for a "calm, dispassionate, above the fray approach" and praise of Yglesias for making points "more humorously," you don't even have to read this (which I can't, it's for paid subscribers) - just *the idea* or frame ("An investigation") of this piece constitutes an almost absurdly dry riposte to (and lampoon of) his leftist critics.
https://www.slowboring.com/p/ive-been-right-about-some-things
Here's another tweet that touches on this idea, I think:
https://x.com/cafreiman/status/1957572756549095823
Thank you. I will read your links. One thing you didn't mention is the insane primary process, which makes everything much worse. My big question is why anyone want to be a Senator or representative if you have to spout propaganda you don't believe or suck up to autocrats (ie sell your soul.)? Who are these people?