Lame Ducks

James Capretta ’ s understated but powerful piece in today ’ s Bulwark should occasion outrage , reflection , and action .
It ’ s clear , as Capretta argues , that congressional legislation is needed to mitigate “ a humanitarian catastrophe ” over the next three months from the terrible third wave of the pandemic .
On the desirability of such legislation economists and public policy experts left and right , Republicans and Democrats , Mitch McConnell and Nancy Pelosi , Donald Trump and Joe Biden , agree .
It ’ s clear there ’ s a compromise to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Democratic House and legislation supported by Republicans in the Senate .
There ’ s no great conceptual disagreement about what ought to be done , and Capretta lays out the contours of such a package .
The disagreement is merely over how large the package of economic support for workers and businesses , of money for testing and health care providers , and of aid for states and localities is to be .
Such disagreements are solvable .
They ’ re solvable by compromise .
And it ’ s clear what the size @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Somewhere between $ 1 trillion and $ 1.5 trillion would allow most of what should be done to be done , at least for now .
It would be a middle ground between the two houses of Congress and the two parties .
It would get enough support from each party to achieve veto-proof majorities—and there ’ s no obvious reason why President Trump wouldn ’ t sign such legislation .
Indeed , Donald Trump can ’ t really be blamed for this particular failure of our political system .
He ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ?
Gridlock .
Short-term politics .
Leaders scared of their base , leaders intimidated by some of their followers , leaders who have paid little price so far for failing to lead .
Okay , it was hard to lead during an election season .
But now we ’ re in a lame duck session .
You know what ’ s good about a lame duck session ?
You can cut a deal now and do what ’ s right , and begin the next session with , so to speak , a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ NAFTA passed in the 1994 lame duck .
It ’ s why George W. Bush went ahead with the auto bailout during the Obama transition in 2008 .
It ’ s why Don ’ t Ask Don ’ t Tell was repealed in the lame duck session in 2010 .
It ’ s why a tax compromise passed in the lame duck in 2012 .
None of these—with the possible exception of the auto bailout—was as much of an emergency as a pandemic relief package is now .
These pieces of legislation were @ @ @ @ @ @ @ done in a lame-duck session .
So here ’ s the situation : Our leaders seem to be unwilling or incapable of producing a necessary and critical piece of legislation during this lame duck session .
If this is the case , they don ’ t deserve to be leaders .
And if our two parties can ’ t produce such legislation , then they don ’ t deserve to be our two parties .
They need to be reformed .
Or we need to be serious about challenging their dominance of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ system as a whole is so broken in the face of a national crisis , then we need to act with urgency on fundamental systemic reforms .
But for now , Leader McConnell and Speaker Pelosi : Do the right thing .
Pass a compromise pandemic relief package .
In this lame duck session .
Or be judged harshly but correctly , by your contemporaries and by history , as lame ducks .

James Capretta’s understated but powerful piece in today’s Bulwark should occasion outrage, reflection, and action.
It’s clear, as Capretta argues, that congressional legislation is needed to mitigate “a humanitarian catastrophe” over the next three months from the terrible third wave of the pandemic. On the desirability of such legislation economists and public policy experts left and right, Republicans and Democrats, Mitch McConnell and Nancy Pelosi, Donald Trump and Joe Biden, agree.
It’s clear there’s a compromise to be had between legislation passed by the Democratic House and legislation supported by Republicans in the Senate. There’s no great conceptual disagreement about what ought to be done, and Capretta lays out the contours of such a package. The disagreement is merely over how large the package of economic support for workers and businesses, of money for testing and health care providers, and of aid for states and localities is to be.
Such disagreements are solvable. They’re solvable by compromise. And it’s clear what the size of a compromise package would look like. Somewhere between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion would allow most of what should be done to be done, at least for now. It would be a middle ground between the two houses of Congress and the two parties. It would get enough support from each party to achieve veto-proof majorities—and there’s no obvious reason why President Trump wouldn’t sign such legislation.
Indeed, Donald Trump can’t really be blamed for this particular failure of our political system. He’s not the problem. What is? Gridlock. Short-term politics. Leaders scared of their base, leaders intimidated by some of their followers, leaders who have paid little price so far for failing to lead.
Okay, it was hard to lead during an election season.
But now we’re in a lame duck session.
You know what’s good about a lame duck session? You can cut a deal now and do what’s right, and begin the next session with, so to speak, a clean slate. That’s why NAFTA passed in the 1994 lame duck. It’s why George W. Bush went ahead with the auto bailout during the Obama transition in 2008. It’s why Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was repealed in the lame duck session in 2010. It’s why a tax compromise passed in the lame duck in 2012.
None of these—with the possible exception of the auto bailout—was as much of an emergency as a pandemic relief package is now. These pieces of legislation were able to pass precisely because they were done in a lame-duck session.
(It’s not good, by the by, that our parties only seem able to compromise effectively during lame duck periods. But that’s a discussion for another occasion.)
So here’s the situation: Our leaders seem to be unwilling or incapable of producing a necessary and critical piece of legislation during this lame duck session. If this is the case, they don’t deserve to be leaders. And if our two parties can’t produce such legislation, then they don’t deserve to be our two parties. They need to be reformed. Or we need to be serious about challenging their dominance of the political system.
And if the political system as a whole is so broken in the face of a national crisis, then we need to act with urgency on fundamental systemic reforms.
But for now, Leader McConnell and Speaker Pelosi: Do the right thing. Pass a compromise pandemic relief package. In this lame duck session. Or be judged harshly but correctly, by your contemporaries and by history, as lame ducks.


thebulwark--2020-11-21--What President Biden Should Do about Hong Kong

On November 11 , four moderate , pro-democracy members of Hong Kong ’ s Legislative Council ( known as the LegCo ) were disqualified under a new law permitting their expulsion for insufficient loyalty to Beijing .
The 15 remaining pro-democracy members resigned in protest , leaving the LegCo—where lawmakers once debated legislation , and could block overreach by the pro-Beijing Hong Kong government—as a mere rubber-stamp for the Chinese Communist Party ( CCP ) .
This was only the latest salvo in an ongoing assault on the fundamental rights of the people of Hong Kong , a semiautonomous “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the British from 1841 until 1997 .
Hong Kong was supposed to enjoy a high degree of autonomy and freedom until at least 2047 , but the CCP began tightening control much sooner , sparking intermittent protests almost from the moment of handover .
The current protests—Hong Kong ’ s largest to date—began in March 2019 , with one demonstration swelling to nearly two million people .
As heavy-handed crackdowns failed to quell the protests , Beijing went for the nuclear option : a “ National Security Law ” that effectively ends @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dissent by anyone , anywhere in the world .
Since its enactment in June , journalists and opposition figures have been arrested , media offices raided , academics fired , political candidates disqualified , and elections themselves postponed .
A group of young Hong Kongers involved in the protests were intercepted while attempting to flee to Taiwan , and are now held incommunicado on the mainland .
An arrest warrant has even been issued for an American citizen over conversations he had with the U.S. government about U.S. policy toward Hong Kong .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ dimension of a broader component of Xi Jinping ’ s model of authoritarian rule : bringing those within China ’ s borders under tighter control , and attempting to control what others say and do about China across the world .
A strong stance from President-elect Biden on rights and freedoms in Hong Kong and the mainland is essential .
The U.S.-China relationship is one of the most consequential and complex that President-elect Biden will need to navigate .
There are valid criticisms of the Trump administration ’ s China policy— the president @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his policies encouraged too much tit-for-tat .
But the administration was right to focus on human rights abuses in China ( such as it did ) , to take the threat of the CCP ’ s influence in the United States and elsewhere around the world seriously .
There remains strong bipartisan support in Congress for standing with the Hong Kong protesters and condemning human rights violations on China ’ s mainland , as well as for protecting American institutions from malign CCP influence .
While President-elect Biden took a firm stance on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ predict will carry over into his presidency , he is expected to tap many senior officials from the Obama administration who may downplay accountability for human rights abuses in an effort to prioritize bilateral cooperation .
Moreover , comments in China ’ s state media have signaled an expectation that pressure will ease on certain issues , and state media has remarked about the coming “ breathing room ” under a Biden administration .
It is critical , therefore , that President-elect Biden move quickly to affirm that the United States regards human @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kong as important economic and security interests , and will defend the rights of exiled Hong Kongers , members of the Chinese diaspora , and Americans in the United States from harassment , censorship , and repression by the CCP .
To show both the Chinese government and the American people that the incoming US administration takes these issues seriously , President-elect Biden should take the following actions : • Vocally condemn rights violations in Hong Kong and on the mainland , and meet with democracy advocates and victims of persecution .
An @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kong legislators would demonstrate that the future of Hong Kong has captured the attention of the incoming administration .
Publicized meetings with pro-democracy advocates and victims of persecution in China—even before President-elect Biden ’ s term has officially begun—would signal the administration ’ s resolve on these issues .
Continued meetings with activists and victims would provide the administration with a steady stream of information related to human rights concerns in China that could inform U.S. policy .
• Fill key positions with individuals who have historically supported human rights in China and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ operations .
Deliberately selecting individuals known for supporting human rights in China would also signal that President-elect Biden takes Beijing ’ s abuses and undemocratic influence campaigns seriously .
The president-elect should ensure that key officials possess an understanding of the overseas operations of China ’ s United Work Front Department , which coordinates the Chinese government ’ s attempts to influence foreign media , educational institutions , businesses , and state and local governments .
This standard should extend not just to the State and Defense Departments and the intelligence community , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ deal with Chinese officials , including the Commerce , Treasury , and Energy Departments , the U.S. trade representative , and the Environmental Protection Agency .
Other bodies likely to encounter United Front efforts include the Department of Education and Federal Communications Commission , and their staffs should also have expertise on Chinese influence operations .
• Use and update existing law to welcome Hong Kongers and Hong Kong based–businesses seeking to relocate to the United States .
Beijing ’ s decision to unleash a crackdown means that Hong Kong will lose some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ its most innovative businesses .
The United States should welcome them with open arms .
President-elect Biden and the incoming Congress should work together to update laws as necessary to ease their relocation to the United States , and Congress should pass the Hong Kong People ’ s Freedom and Choice Act to provide temporary protected status for Hong Kongers .
• Ensure that every meeting between American and Chinese officials includes discussion of human rights concerns .
Human rights and governance issues are inextricably linked to every nation ’ s economic prosperity @ @ @ @ @ @ @ China of more than one million Uighurs and other ethnic and religious minorities—including Tibetans , Christians , and Falun Gong practitioners , and of human rights defenders—should feature prominently in these discussions , as should the Chinese government ’ s human rights violations in Hong Kong .
Some argue that advocating for rights in Hong Kong and on the mainland is a lost cause .
But that ’ s not for us to decide .
That ’ s up to the people of Hong Kong and China .
Any failure by the United @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Hong Kong would represent a lapse of courage and a miscalculation of strategic interests .
The CCP is only growing more aggressive in its attempt to impose its repression around the world , even in democracies like ours .
If the United States is to remain a world leader , President-elect Biden must make it clear that Beijing ’ s violation of rights at home and abroad is not only fair game for discussion , but will be a critical component of U.S. foreign policy and of bilateral relations between the U.S. @ @ @

On November 11, four moderate, pro-democracy members of Hong Kong’s Legislative Council (known as the LegCo) were disqualified under a new law permitting their expulsion for insufficient loyalty to Beijing. The 15 remaining pro-democracy members resigned in protest, leaving the LegCo—where lawmakers once debated legislation, and could block overreach by the pro-Beijing Hong Kong government—as a mere rubber-stamp for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
This was only the latest salvo in an ongoing assault on the fundamental rights of the people of Hong Kong, a semiautonomous “special administrative region” of China ruled by the British from 1841 until 1997. Hong Kong was supposed to enjoy a high degree of autonomy and freedom until at least 2047, but the CCP began tightening control much sooner, sparking intermittent protests almost from the moment of handover. The current protests—Hong Kong’s largest to date—began in March 2019, with one demonstration swelling to nearly two million people.
As heavy-handed crackdowns failed to quell the protests, Beijing went for the nuclear option: a “National Security Law” that effectively ends Hong Kong’s autonomy and criminalizes dissent by anyone, anywhere in the world. Since its enactment in June, journalists and opposition figures have been arrested, media offices raided, academics fired, political candidates disqualified, and elections themselves postponed. A group of young Hong Kongers involved in the protests were intercepted while attempting to flee to Taiwan, and are now held incommunicado on the mainland. An arrest warrant has even been issued for an American citizen over conversations he had with the U.S. government about U.S. policy toward Hong Kong.
Repression in Hong Kong is only one dimension of a broader component of Xi Jinping’s model of authoritarian rule: bringing those within China’s borders under tighter control, and attempting to control what others say and do about China across the world. A strong stance from President-elect Biden on rights and freedoms in Hong Kong and the mainland is essential.
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The U.S.-China relationship is one of the most consequential and complex that President-elect Biden will need to navigate. There are valid criticisms of the Trump administration’s China policy— the president’s rhetoric was too inflammatory and his policies encouraged too much tit-for-tat. But the administration was right to focus on human rights abuses in China (such as it did), to take the threat of the CCP’s influence in the United States and elsewhere around the world seriously.
There remains strong bipartisan support in Congress for standing with the Hong Kong protesters and condemning human rights violations on China’s mainland, as well as for protecting American institutions from malign CCP influence. While President-elect Biden took a firm stance on China on the campaign trail that many predict will carry over into his presidency, he is expected to tap many senior officials from the Obama administration who may downplay accountability for human rights abuses in an effort to prioritize bilateral cooperation. Moreover, comments in China’s state media have signaled an expectation that pressure will ease on certain issues, and state media has remarked about the coming “breathing room” under a Biden administration. It is critical, therefore, that President-elect Biden move quickly to affirm that the United States regards human rights in China and democracy in Hong Kong as important economic and security interests, and will defend the rights of exiled Hong Kongers, members of the Chinese diaspora, and Americans in the United States from harassment, censorship, and repression by the CCP.
To show both the Chinese government and the American people that the incoming US administration takes these issues seriously, President-elect Biden should take the following actions:
Vocally condemn rights violations in Hong Kong and on the mainland, and meet with democracy advocates and victims of persecution. An immediate statement condemning the disqualification of Hong Kong legislators would demonstrate that the future of Hong Kong has captured the attention of the incoming administration. Publicized meetings with pro-democracy advocates and victims of persecution in China—even before President-elect Biden’s term has officially begun—would signal the administration’s resolve on these issues. Continued meetings with activists and victims would provide the administration with a steady stream of information related to human rights concerns in China that could inform U.S. policy. Fill key positions with individuals who have historically supported human rights in China and who understand Beijing’s global influence operations. Deliberately selecting individuals known for supporting human rights in China would also signal that President-elect Biden takes Beijing’s abuses and undemocratic influence campaigns seriously. The president-elect should ensure that key officials possess an understanding of the overseas operations of China’s United Work Front Department, which coordinates the Chinese government’s attempts to influence foreign media, educational institutions, businesses, and state and local governments. This standard should extend not just to the State and Defense Departments and the intelligence community, but to other departments and agencies that deal with Chinese officials, including the Commerce, Treasury, and Energy Departments, the U.S. trade representative, and the Environmental Protection Agency. Other bodies likely to encounter United Front efforts include the Department of Education and Federal Communications Commission, and their staffs should also have expertise on Chinese influence operations. Use and update existing law to welcome Hong Kongers and Hong Kong based–businesses seeking to relocate to the United States. Beijing’s decision to unleash a crackdown means that Hong Kong will lose some of its best and brightest people and its most innovative businesses. The United States should welcome them with open arms. President-elect Biden and the incoming Congress should work together to update laws as necessary to ease their relocation to the United States, and Congress should pass the Hong Kong People’s Freedom and Choice Act to provide temporary protected status for Hong Kongers. Ensure that every meeting between American and Chinese officials includes discussion of human rights concerns. Human rights and governance issues are inextricably linked to every nation’s economic prosperity and national security. The imprisonment in China of more than one million Uighurs and other ethnic and religious minorities—including Tibetans, Christians, and Falun Gong practitioners, and of human rights defenders—should feature prominently in these discussions, as should the Chinese government’s human rights violations in Hong Kong.
Some argue that advocating for rights in Hong Kong and on the mainland is a lost cause. But that’s not for us to decide. That’s up to the people of Hong Kong and China. Any failure by the United States to confront rights abuses in China and Hong Kong would represent a lapse of courage and a miscalculation of strategic interests. The CCP is only growing more aggressive in its attempt to impose its repression around the world, even in democracies like ours. If the United States is to remain a world leader, President-elect Biden must make it clear that Beijing’s violation of rights at home and abroad is not only fair game for discussion, but will be a critical component of U.S. foreign policy and of bilateral relations between the U.S. and China.


thebulwark--2020-11-23--The Most Predictable Global Financial Crisis

In late 2008 , soon after Lehman Brothers went bankrupt , Queen Elizabeth famously asked why nobody had warned her of the impending global economic and financial crisis .
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic , the world is likely to experience another global financial crisis next year , but this time Queen Elizabeth will have been duly warned .
In unusually forthright language , the World Bank is now alerting anyone who will listen that a wave of emerging market debt defaults could lead to a global financial crisis .
The World Bank ’ s warnings are especially @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Carmen Reinhart , the Bank ’ s chief economist and a renowned international expert on the history of emerging market debt crises .
She is now quite certain that the large amount of debt that emerging market economies are taking on to fight the COVID-19 pandemic will give way to an unprecedented wave of debt crises and restructurings .
She further cautions that a global financial crisis could follow , especially given the size of the emerging market economies and their interconnectedness in the global economy .
There is good reason to think @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the pandemic , the emerging market countries had record high debt levels and , in all too many cases , shaky public finances .
Thanks to the pandemic , many are now experiencing their worst recessions in 90 years , and their budget deficits have ballooned to levels that have no precedent in living memory .
Another way of stating the World Bank ’ s prediction is as a question : If we have had emerging market debt crises in the past with less severe recessions , a lower debt level , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , why would we not have a more serious crisis this time , when economic conditions are so much worse than they were before ?
And the follow-up question : If debt crises in individual emerging market economies shook the global financial system on many previous occasions , why , when the emerging market economies have greater weight in the global economy than they have ever had before and are all simultaneously being gut-punched by the pandemic , would we not experience am even larger crisis now ?
A closer look at Brazil @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Latin America and Africa respectively , gives further reason for pessimism about the emerging market debt outlook .
Even before the pandemic , both countries had debt levels that were disturbingly high for an emerging market economy .
Since the pandemic , both countries ’ budget deficits have ballooned to around 15 percent of GDP while their public-debt-to-GDP ratios have skyrocketed to around 100 percent in Brazil and around 80 percent in South Africa .
These countries ’ policymakers now find themselves in an untenable situation .
If in an effort to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ real economic weakness , they were to try to reduce their countries ’ budget deficits by spending cuts or tax increases , they risk digging themselves ever deeper into a recession and damaging their tax bases .
Yet , on the other hand , if they do not engage in real budget-belt tightening , they risk having their countries ’ debt levels continue to rise at an exponential rate , which will make their budget deficits all the more difficult to finance .
To be sure , in a world of ample global @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , even insolvent countries find that they are able to finance their deficits by piling up even more debt .
But as Herb Stein was fond of observing , something that can not go on forever will eventually stop .
In surveying today ’ s global financial landscape , the Queen of England , together with the world ’ s economic policymakers , would do well to remember Stein ’ s aphorism .
Maybe then , once global liquidity dries up and the emerging market debt crisis begins , they will not be @ @ @

In late 2008, soon after Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, Queen Elizabeth famously asked why nobody had warned her of the impending global economic and financial crisis.
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the world is likely to experience another global financial crisis next year, but this time Queen Elizabeth will have been duly warned. In unusually forthright language, the World Bank is now alerting anyone who will listen that a wave of emerging market debt defaults could lead to a global financial crisis.
The World Bank’s warnings are especially dire considering that they are coming from Carmen Reinhart, the Bank’s chief economist and a renowned international expert on the history of emerging market debt crises. She is now quite certain that the large amount of debt that emerging market economies are taking on to fight the COVID-19 pandemic will give way to an unprecedented wave of debt crises and restructurings. She further cautions that a global financial crisis could follow, especially given the size of the emerging market economies and their interconnectedness in the global economy.
There is good reason to think that Reinhart is right. Even before the pandemic, the emerging market countries had record high debt levels and, in all too many cases, shaky public finances. Thanks to the pandemic, many are now experiencing their worst recessions in 90 years, and their budget deficits have ballooned to levels that have no precedent in living memory.
Another way of stating the World Bank’s prediction is as a question: If we have had emerging market debt crises in the past with less severe recessions, a lower debt level, and healthier public finances than we have today, why would we not have a more serious crisis this time, when economic conditions are so much worse than they were before?
And the follow-up question: If debt crises in individual emerging market economies shook the global financial system on many previous occasions, why, when the emerging market economies have greater weight in the global economy than they have ever had before and are all simultaneously being gut-punched by the pandemic, would we not experience am even larger crisis now?
The questions answer themselves.
A closer look at Brazil and South Africa, the largest economies in Latin America and Africa respectively, gives further reason for pessimism about the emerging market debt outlook. Even before the pandemic, both countries had debt levels that were disturbingly high for an emerging market economy. Since the pandemic, both countries’ budget deficits have ballooned to around 15 percent of GDP while their public-debt-to-GDP ratios have skyrocketed to around 100 percent in Brazil and around 80 percent in South Africa.
These countries’ policymakers now find themselves in an untenable situation. If in an effort to stabilize debt levels at a time of real economic weakness, they were to try to reduce their countries’ budget deficits by spending cuts or tax increases, they risk digging themselves ever deeper into a recession and damaging their tax bases. Yet, on the other hand, if they do not engage in real budget-belt tightening, they risk having their countries’ debt levels continue to rise at an exponential rate, which will make their budget deficits all the more difficult to finance.
To be sure, in a world of ample global liquidity where investors are desperate for yield, even insolvent countries find that they are able to finance their deficits by piling up even more debt. But as Herb Stein was fond of observing,something that cannot go on forever will eventually stop.
In surveying today’s global financial landscape, the Queen of England, together with the world’s economic policymakers, would do well to remember Stein’s aphorism. Maybe then, once global liquidity dries up and the emerging market debt crisis begins, they will not be so surprised.


thebulwark--2020-11-23--The Centrist Rush to Blame the Left for the Closer-Than-Expected Election

Emotions ran high during election week .
Anyone who had been paying attention knew that the results were likely to be ungainly and uncertain , but the waiting was still hard .
Come election night , only one thing was clear : President Trump did not lose in an instant landslide .
Though he did eventually lose badly and definitively , the margins were closer than expected , and , predictably , everyone has been in a scramble to figure out why .
What did the polls get wrong this time ?
Where did Democrats go wrong ?
What did @ @ @ @ @ @ @ came fast .
Of course , there is nothing unusual about commentators drawing sweeping and wrong conclusions before all the facts are in ; that is a hazard of professional punditry .
What was noteworthy in this case , though , was the tendency of some centrists to reflexively offer the same insta-explanation of the election ’ s apparent outcome : the vote was a backlash , they said , against the left and wokism .
For example , in response to a tweet purporting to show—based on the raw , uncalibrated exit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than 2016 among every race and gender except white men , Shadi Hamid claimed on election night that “ a whole paradigm of understanding America is being challenged.
” The next day , Wednesday , November 4 , Damon Linker kept alive the anti-woke argument , arguing in a column that “ the Democratic Party whiffed and whiffed badly , ” thanks mainly to their “ toxic progressive-fantasy wishlist.
” On November 6 , Andrew Sullivan claimed that the election outcome was “ clearly and unequivocally a rejection of the woke left.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the left ’ s electoral strategy had also been rejected : mobilization had been tried , and it had failed .
These prominent public intellectuals rushed to judgment based on exit polls that everyone knew ( or should have known ) were uncertain .
They deployed this evidence to confirm what they already believed—and in so doing , neglected plausible alternative accounts .
Worse , their knee-jerk arguments often replicated ( and so legitimated ) bad-faith right-wing assertions .
It all started with the exit polls .
We have known for four @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was off , and one of the big questions facing commentators this year was whether political polling could recover and prove more robust .
Trumpism and the pandemic made 2020 such an unusual election year that caution should have been the order of the day .
Instead , pundits saw what they wanted to see and ran with it .
Take the example of Andrew Sullivan .
In his November 6 post , Sullivan—who this summer left his position at New York magazine over differences with his Vox Media colleagues about issues of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and used it to spin out an elaborate theory about the unreliability of pre-election polling and the dangers of wokism .
According to Sullivan , the polling in the run-up to the election got “ the less inhibited white non-college-educated Trump voters right , but the graduates very wrong.
” He goes on to explain how the exit polls prove that those pre-election polls were off by “ a whopping 26-31 points among white [ college ] graduates , ” and from this boldly infers that Let ’ s take a close look @ @ @ @ @ @ @ First off , the exit poll data from the National Election Pool ( NEP ) that Sullivan relied on in his analysis was way off .
Polling experts are able , imprecisely , to assess polls post-hoc by comparing actual election results to county-level census data .
For now , it looks like the NEP ’ s exit-poll estimates of who actually voted was wrong , and this distorted demographic-based vote margins .
G. Elliott Morris , a polling expert and critic of Sullivan ’ s take , shows that “ counties with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ v 2016.
” In other words , it looks like Sullivan ’ s claim about a big pro-Trump shift among white college graduates was plain wrong .
But even more problematic than the data sources or what Morris calls Sullivan ’ s “ data illiteracy ” are the flawed logical premises of his argument .
Sullivan leans hard on uncertain and problematic exit polls both to make an argument about how wrong the earlier polling had been ( as one Twitter wag put it , “ We can ’ t trust the polls @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) polls to prove it !
” ) and to enter a serious charge against the “ woke media ” : “ they mislead Democrats who then misread the country.
” He goes so far as to declare that the “ cold hard data ” reveals a “ mass secret vote ” that in turn reveals that the “ New York Times ’ woke narrative ” is simply a “ niche elite belief , invented in a bubble academy , ” et very much cetera .
Sullivan openly declares his satisfaction at an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Who here is misleading whom ?
Sullivan was hardly alone in spinning such a narrative .
He is part of a much broader chorus eager to blame the left for the tight electoral margins to the neglect of counter-evidence and alternative explanations .
Writing for Persuasion—the centrist web magazine launched by Yascha Mounk earlier this year with the aim of defending liberal argument and persuasion—on Wednesday , November 11 , Zaid Jilani took aim at the left ’ s theory of voter mobilization .
According to Jilani , the theory went something @ @ @ @ @ @ @ aside whether this is a fair summation of the theory .
Given that the Democratic nominee was Joe Biden , it ’ s pretty clear that the theory never got fully “ activated.
” Nevertheless , Jilani echoes suggestions that “ the left-wing of the party actually alienated some traditional Democratic voters , ” and concludes that the election was a repudiation of the leftist dream of mobilization .
In the early aftermath of an incredibly fraught and uncertain election , and writing for an outlet called Persuasion , Jilani is confident that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ day .
Jilani seems untroubled by the fact that Sanders ’ s mobilization experiment did not actually take place , that the 2020 election saw record-breaking voter-turnout , and that the final outcome hinged—somewhat dramatically , as you might recall—on unprecedented mobilization of ( majority black ) urban voters in Michigan , Pennsylvania , and Georgia .
Where would Democrats have been without “ woke ” left mobilization ?
That was just one of the many questions that didn ’ t get asked in the hurry to blame progressives for Biden ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ plenty of alternative explanations to explore .
First up is the one that has garnered the most media attention : the question of Democratic campaign strategy .
In response to anti-left criticism , Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez published a Twitter thread on the subject worth attention from anyone who is serious about building up the Democratic party ( her post-election interview with the New York Times and the response from her moderate Democratic colleague Rep. Conor Lamb are also worth reading ) .
If AOC is right about the failures of the 2020 Democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that means there is real hope for Democrats in the two Georgia Senate runoffs in January and in the 2022 midterms .
And then there ’ s the matter of incumbency .
In 2016 Trump was an outsider and a wild card , whom very few people expected to succeed .
In 2020 , he had actually been president for several years , and had had time in office to solidify his base .
He scrambled after ways to look presidential after months of appearing like a bumbler during the pandemic—and was immensely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decision to accept the SCOTUS nomination at a crucial moment in the campaign .
Seeing a dignified Judge Barrett standing next to Trump at the Rose Garden in September surely made some crucial Trump-skeptical GOP voters more comfortable casting their vote for him in November .
Finally , there is the power of cruelty and hate .
Joe Biden ran a moderate campaign , pledging to “ heal the soul of the nation ” and “ build back better ” —elevated and admirably unifying , albeit vague , rhetoric .
Donald Trump , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to speak of .
He ran as a brow-beating cult leader peddling a message of resentment and hatred .
There are good reasons why ugly , dehumanizing rhetoric is said to undermine democracy , and one of those reasons is that it can be very powerful .
This year , we saw red-scare talk of socialism , red-meat assertions of manliness , and overt appeals to white supremacy coming from the right .
Sadly , it may be the case that Trumpist hate , not left activism , played the most significant role @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which is to claim that the left had no effect on the outcome of the election .
There is anecdotal evidence that there were voters who were turned off by Black Lives Matter , by the protests and riots—and certainly by the caricature promulgated by Fox News and talk radio of socialists lurking behind every Biden yard sign .
But given how polarized the electorate already is , and how little solid data is available even now , claims that the left was the decisive factor in the election outcome are unwarranted .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ anti-woke narrative is how tidily it replicates specifics from bad-faith right-wing discourse .
Sullivan speaks of everyone on the left in glib , mocking tones : “ The GOP got the highest proportion of the minority vote since 1960 !
No wonder Charles Blow ’ s head exploded.
” Democrats , Sullivan concludes , need to jettison “ woke madness.
” And once again , it ’ s not just Sullivan .
Here ’ s a passage from Damon Linker ’ s November 4 column for The Week : I believe that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whose work I respect and have learned from—is more likely to be overcompensating for his own biases than writing in bad faith , but this paragraph might as well have been composed by Tucker Carlson .
And it ’ s false : Nothing on this list—not a single thing—was part of the official Democratic platform .
Nor was any endorsed by the Biden campaign .
Linker misleadingly takes a list of good-faith but highly controversial proposals—proposals that were each met with serious discussion and debate in civil society , exactly as a good @ @ @ @ @ @ @ consensus view of the Democratic party .
A party that , unlike the GOP , actually ran a centrist campaign .
Linker explicitly denies that this is what he or the GOP is up to ( “ this wasn ’ t just a function of the fallacy of composition , where one loony activist says something off the wall and the GOP amplifies it far beyond reason in order to tar the opposition unfairly ” ) .
But that just belittles the Democrats ’ ideas further ( as the sorts of things “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and lets the right off the hook for what is actually bad-faith nonsense .
Take Linker ’ s claim that Democrats seek “ equity ” of outcomes .
This is based on a clumsy video put out by Kamala Harris that seeks to explain the difference between equity and equality , and that spread like wildfire on the online right in the days leading up to the election .
I say the video is clumsy because it concludes with a picture of two people standing on a mountain together , and proclaims that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up at the same place.
” The massive Twitter uproar that ensued proclaimed that Harris had .
.
.
declared herself a Communist .
This despite the fact that , in the next-to-last sentence of the video , Harris says that the aim of equitable policy is to make sure that “ everyone can be on equal footing and then compete on equal footing ” —which sounds a lot like equality of opportunity and ( regulated ) capitalism .
The idea that Senator Harris is some kind of card-carrying Communist is absurd on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the left will be happy to tell you .
But it has been peddled by the right since she was named to the ticket .
It ’ s perfectly fine—of course—to disagree with the left and to fight hard for alternative solutions to problems .
It ’ s another thing to misrepresent the Democratic party ’ s fairly mainstream positions as being far-out , while refusing even a minimal acknowledgement that the floated proposals are responding to anything serious .
Is giving formal representation to Washington , D.C. residents or Puerto Ricans @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fantasy ” in the context of a constitutional democracy ?
Is it really a bad thing that some Democrats hope to enact “ a long list of new policies ” or to “ transform the country , ” given years of anti-government Republican obstruction and the disturbing rise of Trump ?
The debate about court-packing and reform hardly emerged in a vacuum and it involves , among other things , basic voting rights .
You may disagree with these ideas ; they may be inadvisable as matters of politics or unwise as matters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fair to characterize them , as Linker does , as a “ toxic progressive-fantasy wishlist.
” As he worked to highlight the supposed damage done by leftist sloganeering , Linker twisted up the Democratic position beyond recognition and gave air to distortions of the right .
As we close out 2020 , it ’ s not hard to understand why leftists are so distrustful of the center .
Again , I do not mean to suggest that the left is politically blameless , either in its outlook or its messaging .
Some people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ even without a right-wing propaganda machine .
I am personally glad that Democrats went for the centrist “ persuasion ” experiment rather than testing the left flank ’ s mobilization theory with Senator Sanders as the presidential nominee .
Conversely , many left-wing critiques of Never Trump conservatives and of endeavors like the Lincoln Project strike me as wrongheaded and untrue .
I have focused here on the centrists ’ attacks because centrists tend to present themselves as objective and balanced arbiters of the country ’ s best interests .
Instead what we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ still , even after four long years of norm-busting Trumpism , deeply beholden to ingrained political both-sidesism , and obtuse about the role that they play in recycling damaging right-wing tropes .
And even the most thoughtful and intellectually admirable among them , like Linker , sometimes succumb to the temptation to exaggerate threats coming from the left and minimize palpable anti-democratic illiberalism on the right .
In electing Joe Biden as the 46th president , America has stepped back from a frightening precipice .
But Trumpism will still be with us , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the center—will continue to matter .
I hope that , in the coming months and years , instead of reflexively attacking the base of the party whose voters successfully ousted Donald Trump , centrists will be more careful with evidence and arguments that flatter their own prejudices .
I hope that , in continuing to object to what they call identitarianism , they will not forget the racism , misogyny , and illiberalism of Trump ’ s GOP .
Above all , I hope that they will make it easier , rather @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Congress to get on board with much-needed Democratic legislation .
They can do this by respecting , rather than mocking and antagonizing , their compatriots to the left .
Even when they disagree .
Perhaps even especially when the stakes are big and emotions are running high .

Emotions ran high during election week. Anyone who had been paying attention knew that the results were likely to be ungainly and uncertain, but the waiting was still hard. Come election night, only one thing was clear: President Trump did not lose in an instant landslide. Though he did eventually lose badly and definitively, the margins were closer than expected, and, predictably, everyone has been in a scramble to figure out why. What did the polls get wrong this time? Where did Democrats go wrong? What did Trump do right?
The bad takes came fast. Of course, there is nothing unusual about commentators drawing sweeping and wrong conclusions before all the facts are in; that is a hazard of professional punditry. What was noteworthy in this case, though, was the tendency of some centrists to reflexively offer the same insta-explanation of the election’s apparent outcome: the vote was a backlash, they said, against the left and wokism.
For example, in response to a tweet purporting to show—based on the raw, uncalibrated exit poll data—that Trump did better in 2020 than 2016 among every race and gender except white men, Shadi Hamid claimed on election night that “a whole paradigm of understanding America is being challenged.”
The next day, Wednesday, November 4, Damon Linker kept alive the anti-woke argument, arguing in a column that “the Democratic Party whiffed and whiffed badly,” thanks mainly to their “toxic progressive-fantasy wishlist.”
On November 6, Andrew Sullivan claimed that the election outcome was “clearly and unequivocally a rejection of the woke left.”
On November 11, Zaid Jilani argued that the left’s electoral strategy had also been rejected: mobilization had been tried, and it had failed.
These prominent public intellectuals rushed to judgment based on exit polls that everyone knew (or should have known) were uncertain. They deployed this evidence to confirm what they already believed—and in so doing, neglected plausible alternative accounts. Worse, their knee-jerk arguments often replicated (and so legitimated) bad-faith right-wing assertions.
Bad Data, Bad Arguments
It all started with the exit polls. We have known for four years now that the polling in 2016 was off, and one of the big questions facing commentators this year was whether political polling could recover and prove more robust. Trumpism and the pandemic made 2020 such an unusual election year that caution should have been the order of the day. Instead, pundits saw what they wanted to see and ran with it.
Take the example of Andrew Sullivan. In his November 6 post, Sullivan—who this summer left his position at New York magazine over differences with his Vox Media colleagues about issues of race and identity—took early exit poll data and used it to spin out an elaborate theory about the unreliability of pre-election polling and the dangers of wokism. According to Sullivan, the polling in the run-up to the election got “the less inhibited white non-college-educated Trump voters right, but the graduates very wrong.” He goes on to explain how the exit polls prove that those pre-election polls were off by “a whopping 26-31 points among white [college] graduates,” and from this boldly infers that
the threat of wokeness both alienated educated white voters—and caused more of them to vote Trump than anyone expected. The problem with woke media is that they mislead Democrats who then misread the country.
Let’s take a close look at that argument and its flaws. First off, the exit poll data from the National Election Pool (NEP) that Sullivan relied on in his analysis was way off. Polling experts are able, imprecisely, to assess polls post-hoc by comparing actual election results to county-level census data. For now, it looks like the NEP’s exit-poll estimates of who actually voted was wrong, and this distorted demographic-based vote margins. G. Elliott Morris, a polling expert and critic of Sullivan’s take, shows that “counties with more college-educated whites swung hardest toward Democrats v 2016.” In other words, it looks like Sullivan’s claim about a big pro-Trump shift among white college graduates was plain wrong.
But even more problematic than the data sources or what Morris calls Sullivan’s “data illiteracy” are the flawed logical premises of his argument. Sullivan leans hard on uncertain and problematic exit polls both to make an argument about how wrong the earlier polling had been (as one Twitter wag put it, “We can’t trust the polls, and I have the (exit) polls to prove it!”) and to enter a serious charge against the “woke media”: “they mislead Democrats who then misread the country.” He goes so far as to declare that the “cold hard data” reveals a “mass secret vote” that in turn reveals that the “New York Times’ woke narrative” is simply a “niche elite belief, invented in a bubble academy,” et very much cetera. Sullivan openly declares his satisfaction at an anti-woke election outcome that he himself concocted. Who here is misleading whom?
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Sullivan was hardly alone in spinning such a narrative. He is part of a much broader chorus eager to blame the left for the tight electoral margins to the neglect of counter-evidence and alternative explanations.
Writing for Persuasion—the centrist web magazine launched by Yascha Mounk earlier this year with the aim of defending liberal argument and persuasion—on Wednesday, November 11, Zaid Jilani took aim at the left’s theory of voter mobilization. According to Jilani, the theory went something like this:
The left-wing of the Democratic Party had the answer. To clobber Republicans at election after election, all they had to do was get out the vote. According to this theory, legions of would-be progressives weren’t casting ballots. But once activated, they would sweep the likes of Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez into higher office, transforming America.
Let’s set aside whether this is a fair summation of the theory. Given that the Democratic nominee was Joe Biden, it’s pretty clear that the theory never got fully “activated.” Nevertheless, Jilani echoes suggestions that “the left-wing of the party actually alienated some traditional Democratic voters,” and concludes that the election was a repudiation of the leftist dream of mobilization. In the early aftermath of an incredibly fraught and uncertain election, and writing for an outlet called Persuasion, Jilani is confident that persuasion, not mobilization, won the day.
Jilani seems untroubled by the fact that Sanders’s mobilization experiment did not actually take place, that the 2020 election saw record-breaking voter-turnout, and that the final outcome hinged—somewhat dramatically, as you might recall—on unprecedented mobilization of (majority black) urban voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia.
Missing Alternatives
Where would Democrats have been without “woke” left mobilization? That was just one of the many questions that didn’t get asked in the hurry to blame progressives for Biden’s supposedly disappointing electoral margins. There are plenty of alternative explanations to explore.
First up is the one that has garnered the most media attention: the question of Democratic campaign strategy. In response to anti-left criticism, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez published a Twitter thread on the subject worth attention from anyone who is serious about building up the Democratic party (her post-election interview with the New York Times and the response from her moderate Democratic colleague Rep. Conor Lamb are also worth reading). If AOC is right about the failures of the 2020 Democratic campaign—no door-knocking, not enough digital engagement—then that means there is real hope for Democrats in the two Georgia Senate runoffs in January and in the 2022 midterms.
And then there’s the matter of incumbency. In 2016 Trump was an outsider and a wild card, whom very few people expected to succeed. In 2020, he had actually been president for several years, and had had time in office to solidify his base. He scrambled after ways to look presidential after months of appearing like a bumbler during the pandemic—and was immensely aided by Amy Coney Barrett’s decision to accept the SCOTUS nomination at a crucial moment in the campaign. Seeing a dignified Judge Barrett standing next to Trump at the Rose Garden in September surely made some crucial Trump-skeptical GOP voters more comfortable casting their vote for him in November.
Finally, there is the power of cruelty and hate. Joe Biden ran a moderate campaign, pledging to “heal the soul of the nation” and “build back better”—elevated and admirably unifying, albeit vague, rhetoric. Donald Trump, by contrast, had no electoral platform to speak of. He ran as a brow-beating cult leader peddling a message of resentment and hatred. There are good reasons why ugly, dehumanizing rhetoric is said to undermine democracy, and one of those reasons is that it can be very powerful. This year, we saw red-scare talk of socialism, red-meat assertions of manliness, and overt appeals to white supremacy coming from the right. Sadly, it may be the case that Trumpist hate, not left activism, played the most significant role in the election outcome.
Replicating Right-Wing Lies
None of which is to claim that the left had no effect on the outcome of the election. There is anecdotal evidence that there were voters who were turned off by Black Lives Matter, by the protests and riots—and certainly by the caricature promulgated by Fox News and talk radio of socialists lurking behind every Biden yard sign. But given how polarized the electorate already is, and how little solid data is available even now, claims that the left was the decisive factor in the election outcome are unwarranted.
What is most disheartening about the centrists’ anti-woke narrative is how tidily it replicates specifics from bad-faith right-wing discourse. Sullivan speaks of everyone on the left in glib, mocking tones: “The GOP got the highest proportion of the minority vote since 1960! No wonder Charles Blow’s head exploded.” Democrats, Sullivan concludes, need to jettison “woke madness.”
And once again, it’s not just Sullivan. Here’s a passage from Damon Linker’s November 4 column for The Week:
So much for the Democratic fantasy—the one that seemingly never dies—of unobstructed rule. Democrats didn’t just want to win and govern in the name of a deeply divided nation’s fractured sense of the common good. No, they wanted to lead a moral revolution, to transform the country—not only enacting a long list of new policies, but making a series of institutional changes that would entrench their power far into the future. Pack the Supreme Court. Add left-leaning states. Break up others to give the left huge margins in the Senate. Get rid of the Electoral College. Abolish the police. Rewrite the nation’s history, with white supremacy and racism placed “at the very center.” Ensure “equity” not just in opportunity but in outcomes. Hell, maybe they’d even establish a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to teach everyone who voted for or supported the 45th president just how evil they really are.
I believe that Linker—whom I know a little, and whose work I respect and have learned from—is more likely to be overcompensating for his own biases than writing in bad faith, but this paragraph might as well have been composed by Tucker Carlson. And it’s false: Nothing on this list—not a single thing—was part of the official Democratic platform. Nor was any endorsed by the Biden campaign. Linker misleadingly takes a list of good-faith but highly controversial proposals—proposals that were each met with serious discussion and debate in civil society, exactly as a good liberal might hope—and presents it as the consensus view of the Democratic party. A party that, unlike the GOP, actually ran a centrist campaign.
Linker explicitly denies that this is what he or the GOP is up to (“this wasn’t just a function of the fallacy of composition, where one loony activist says something off the wall and the GOP amplifies it far beyond reason in order to tar the opposition unfairly”). But that just belittles the Democrats’ ideas further (as the sorts of things “loony activists” would propose), and lets the right off the hook for what is actually bad-faith nonsense.
Take Linker’s claim that Democrats seek “equity” of outcomes. This is based on a clumsy video put out by Kamala Harris that seeks to explain the difference between equity and equality, and that spread like wildfire on the online right in the days leading up to the election. I say the video is clumsy because it concludes with a picture of two people standing on a mountain together, and proclaims that “equitable treatment means we all end up at the same place.” The massive Twitter uproar that ensued proclaimed that Harris had . . . declared herself a Communist. This despite the fact that, in the next-to-last sentence of the video, Harris says that the aim of equitable policy is to make sure that “everyone can be on equal footing and then compete on equal footing”—which sounds a lot like equality of opportunity and (regulated) capitalism. The idea that Senator Harris is some kind of card-carrying Communist is absurd on its face, as she and anyone on the left will be happy to tell you. But it has been peddled by the right since she was named to the ticket.
It’s perfectly fine—of course—to disagree with the left and to fight hard for alternative solutions to problems. It’s another thing to misrepresent the Democratic party’s fairly mainstream positions as being far-out, while refusing even a minimal acknowledgement that the floated proposals are responding to anything serious. Is giving formal representation to Washington, D.C. residents or Puerto Ricans really such a “toxic” “fantasy” in the context of a constitutional democracy? Is it really a bad thing that some Democrats hope to enact “a long list of new policies” or to “transform the country,” given years of anti-government Republican obstruction and the disturbing rise of Trump? The debate about court-packing and reform hardly emerged in a vacuum and it involves, among other things, basic voting rights.
You may disagree with these ideas; they may be inadvisable as matters of politics or unwise as matters of policy; but it hardly seems fair to characterize them, as Linker does, as a “toxic progressive-fantasy wishlist.” As he worked to highlight the supposed damage done by leftist sloganeering, Linker twisted up the Democratic position beyond recognition and gave air to distortions of the right.
Our Asymmetrical Reality
As we close out 2020, it’s not hard to understand why leftists are so distrustful of the center. Again, I do not mean to suggest that the left is politically blameless, either in its outlook or its messaging. Some people surely are alienated by progressivism—and would be even without a right-wing propaganda machine. I am personally glad that Democrats went for the centrist “persuasion” experiment rather than testing the left flank’s mobilization theory with Senator Sanders as the presidential nominee. Conversely, many left-wing critiques of Never Trump conservatives and of endeavors like the Lincoln Project strike me as wrongheaded and untrue.
I have focused here on the centrists’ attacks because centrists tend to present themselves as objective and balanced arbiters of the country’s best interests. Instead what we too often get are commentators who are still, even after four long years of norm-busting Trumpism, deeply beholden to ingrained political both-sidesism, and obtuse about the role that they play in recycling damaging right-wing tropes. And even the most thoughtful and intellectually admirable among them, like Linker, sometimes succumb to the temptation to exaggerate threats coming from the left and minimize palpable anti-democratic illiberalism on the right.
In electing Joe Biden as the 46th president, America has stepped back from a frightening precipice. But Trumpism will still be with us, and how people talk about it—especially people in the center—will continue to matter.
I hope that, in the coming months and years, instead of reflexively attacking the base of the party whose voters successfully ousted Donald Trump, centrists will be more careful with evidence and arguments that flatter their own prejudices.
I hope that, in continuing to object to what they call identitarianism, they will not forget the racism, misogyny, and illiberalism of Trump’s GOP.
Above all, I hope that they will make it easier, rather than harder, for moderate members of Congress to get on board with much-needed Democratic legislation. They can do this by respecting, rather than mocking and antagonizing, their compatriots to the left. Even when they disagree. Perhaps even especially when the stakes are big and emotions are running high.