I appreciated the debate between Sam Harris and Josh Shapiro. They each arrived (and really began) at bottom lines. For Harris, Trump’s efforts to subvert the electoral Will was disqualifying, and evidence of a fascist mentality and means of governing. Shapiro saw Trump’s record in office as determinative, believing a second term would l…
I appreciated the debate between Sam Harris and Josh Shapiro. They each arrived (and really began) at bottom lines. For Harris, Trump’s efforts to subvert the electoral Will was disqualifying, and evidence of a fascist mentality and means of governing. Shapiro saw Trump’s record in office as determinative, believing a second term would look much like the first and Trump’s wilder impulses would be restrained again by Constitutiional guardrails. In a sense, the argument came down for both to how bad and possibly good is Trump?
I thought Shapiro blew it in answering the character question, saying that the nation’s character is what truly counts in determining the nation’s ultimate fate, since so many of our leaders have been profoundly flawed and yet the nation persists. While there’s a point to that, it skirts the practical issue of how much character or the lack of it influences good governance. Trump’s first term was significantly hampered by his narcissism since every time he advanced a positive policy he vitiated a measure of its positive rffext by engaging in petty squabbles.
Harris missed the greater problem, however, in failing even to consider the profoundly false worldview of the Democratic Party. Wokeness, intersectionality, and identity politics are not “the excesses” of what is otherwise, as Harris viewed it, a normal politics. This is the way in which Democrats now look at the world, a philosophy grounded in class structure—in other words, contemporary adaptations of Marxism. If you base your thinking on such premises, everything you do—everything—will be destructive and demeaning.
Trump’s problems are those of a narcissist (with sociopathic tendencies). Kamala Harris’s problems are principled; she’s committed to what’s false. She has her own problems of character, too, of course—rarely has naked ambition been more exposed. Even if she were personally a saint, however, her philosophy would lead her constantly astray.
I will vote for a bad king every time over a good class warrior.
I appreciated the debate between Sam Harris and Josh Shapiro. They each arrived (and really began) at bottom lines. For Harris, Trump’s efforts to subvert the electoral Will was disqualifying, and evidence of a fascist mentality and means of governing. Shapiro saw Trump’s record in office as determinative, believing a second term would look much like the first and Trump’s wilder impulses would be restrained again by Constitutiional guardrails. In a sense, the argument came down for both to how bad and possibly good is Trump?
I thought Shapiro blew it in answering the character question, saying that the nation’s character is what truly counts in determining the nation’s ultimate fate, since so many of our leaders have been profoundly flawed and yet the nation persists. While there’s a point to that, it skirts the practical issue of how much character or the lack of it influences good governance. Trump’s first term was significantly hampered by his narcissism since every time he advanced a positive policy he vitiated a measure of its positive rffext by engaging in petty squabbles.
Harris missed the greater problem, however, in failing even to consider the profoundly false worldview of the Democratic Party. Wokeness, intersectionality, and identity politics are not “the excesses” of what is otherwise, as Harris viewed it, a normal politics. This is the way in which Democrats now look at the world, a philosophy grounded in class structure—in other words, contemporary adaptations of Marxism. If you base your thinking on such premises, everything you do—everything—will be destructive and demeaning.
Trump’s problems are those of a narcissist (with sociopathic tendencies). Kamala Harris’s problems are principled; she’s committed to what’s false. She has her own problems of character, too, of course—rarely has naked ambition been more exposed. Even if she were personally a saint, however, her philosophy would lead her constantly astray.
I will vote for a bad king every time over a good class warrior.