Concern-Trolling Meets the Pundit’s Fallacy
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Shorter Actual Bret Stephens: “The center is Dayton and Denver, not Berkeley and Burlington. The center is Harry Truman and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, not Eugene Debs and Michael Harrington. Democrats who want to win should know this.”
Ummm, Harry Truman’s Fair Deal had: jobs guarantee, universal health care, Social Security expansion, minimum wage hikes, expanded public housing, big public works. Truman later nationalized the steel industry to force owners to address worker demands. pic.twitter.com/MZZuTLg2EM
— Mike Konczal (@rortybomb) July 7, 2018
The whole piece is less a column than an exercise in free association. The rise of anti-immigrant parties in Europe proves that the Democrats can’t run simultaneously to Trump’s left on economic and immigration policy. Trump’s domestic policies, rather than predilection for obstructing justice, make him the new Nixon so the Democrats need to run a new Bill Clinton in 2000. The fact that Macron prevailed on a policy platform to bring France’s political economy closer to what left-wing Democrats want for the United States means… heck if I know.
When the Republicans are back in the wilderness, facing an unpopular Democratic incumbent, I will totally recommend that the GOP run economic libertarians just like Teddy Roosevelt. Maybe I can get a well-paying gig at he New York Times.
