It might be too late when an incumbent if cognitively missing President is still uttering "lock him up" as Joe Biden this week did, less than two weeks before the election.
But Halperin's sage advice to chill is directed at the larger electorate. Voters might keep in mind that when they and a partisan press put so much stock into the outcome of a presidential election, they invite the kind of imperial, overreaching presidency America has witnessed especially in the past quarter century. It was never what our Framers intended.
Trump has said lock them up about every Democratic from Hillary to the present. If “lock ‘em up” is Ok for Hillary, et. al, it’s good enough for Trump. Off to the Bastile for the Orange One.
A national method of quickly counting votes would certainly help. Obama's gentlemanly invite of Trump to the White House the day after the election in 2016 should serve as a template. Whoever wins I sure would like to hear the leaders of both parties to offer to work with that person to pass legislation beneficial to the American people.
The media 'elites' are now the media dinosaurs. I'm still waiting for CBS to release the 60 Minutes transcripts - the only explanation that makes sense to me is that they made a deal with Kamala to withhold them.
The other day a good friend told me that she and her husband wished Trump had been killed in Butler. How do you mend fences with these people?
This is a very sane and mature article and a pleasure to read. Unfortunately, as Mr. Halpin points out, such a perspective is all too rare in the U.S. today. I doubt if our national leaders, official or otherwise, will follow his advice, but we can continue to work towards a restoration of sanity in Western Civ.
We all hope things might return to the "good ol days" of "normalcy" after an election. But It was Bill Clinton with the 365-day election cycle that really began to make this impossible. His "War Room" never shut down: it was a perpetual propaganda machine. As has always happened in American politics, when one side does it, the other copies. Al Gore was the first since 1877 to perpetuate an "election denial," to the point of forcing the Supreme Court to get involved against its wishes. Hillary Clinton ran a long fight against Donald Trump's victory then Democrat legislators promised to block him, then when that failed, they started a three-year war of "Russia Hoax."
So, I'm sorry, but it's a little late now to say "everyone play nice." Once you move from normal acceptance of results to never-ending war (again, remember it was Bill Clinton who refused to accept a GOP budget and forced a government shutdown, which meant we almost never again have real budgets), well, you get what you started.
This is nothing new in American history. The slave South, to protect slavery, passed "gag" rules that prohibited any discussion of slavery; enforced postal censorship that prevented abolitionist mail from being distributed; refused to let free blacks even leave ships in southern harbors. Eventually, of couse, the South (led by Democrats) seceded. After the war, the South refused to enforce the 14th and 15th Amendments, forcing the Union to maintain troops there until the REPUBLICANS stole an election in 1877.
Nevertheless, my point is that periodically in American history we get to the point where the "good ol' days' don't work any more. Once those norms are broken, it takes a lot more than "better people" to fix it. It takes, as we saw in 1865, total victory by one side or the other. Unfortunately, and I know Ruy you do not want to hear this, fixing this is going to take several people responsible for the Russia Hoax, for the J6 Patriot day hoax hearings, and several treasonous generals to go to jail. Nazi German had to be purged and many of its leaders imprisoned or hanged. Instead of "better journalists," I'd say we need to enforce laws against defamation and outright fraud by journalilsts. I know these seem like extreme measures (only when viewed that the Democrats' extreme measures should just be ignored) but when a bone is broken it needs to be reset before it can get better. America needs a legal reset to remind everyone that "going along to get along" is not an option when the other side is at war. And since Bill Clinton, the Democrats have been at war. (Obama: "They bring a knife, you bring a gun")
Now, I have predicted that the crushing defeat of the Democrats in this election, losing the senate by at least 3 net seats, seeing a small gain by Rs in the House, and Trump winning by at least 312 EVs with a popular vote of 1.5 will force a new civil war. This one will be between sensible people like you, Ruy, and the Mark Penns and the Stan Greenbergs, and the Prog Left crazies who want to turn America into Communist China. The current Democrat Party cannot survive. After 2030, the census revisions will lock in ano9ther 10-25 electoral votes for the red states and end most chances of a Democrat getting elected president for a generation. So the sound minds in the Party will have to decide how to separate from, and purge, the lunatic wing that has now cost them the middle class of all colors and left the Democrats a U-shaped party of uber rich and uber poor. As a lifelong Republican, it won't bother me if youi don't succeed, but as an American, it would b healthier to have two good parties. The Rs have already made their MAGA transition to the middle class, working class, Hispanics, a growing portion of blacks, and married couples. Until or unless the Democrats can drop woke, reject "energy transition," repudiate global war, they are in trouble.
If we could stop the media bias and propaganda, we'd all live peacefully. I believe that. I have a rule to go off X from April to election every election year and I've stuck to that. After the election, win or lose, I always stay off all social media and may have to include Substack this year just because it's over and I want to focus on family for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years.
This advice is nice. It’s likely coming from a very privileged position where, if Trump wins, you and the people you love and know won’t be much affected. But what about the un- and under-privileged who are going to have to brace for the unleashing of mass thuggery? How should they react? How should we privileged react to and with them? I surely hope that our national creed has not and will not morph into “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitulation.”
Who exactly do you men by ":the un- and under-privileged"? The people who currently suffer the most from "mass thuggery" are black people living in big city black neighborhoods. The level of violent crime, especially murder, that goes on weekly in these (mostly Democratically controlled) areas is appalling. The Democrats have worked very hard to deflect attention away from this reality, and have smeared scholars and journalists who have written about it. I expect that Harris would double down on the cover up, and Trump won't be able to help the situation even if he tries.
I have actually looked into the FBI data. Young black men are responsible for half or more of the murders for which the FBI has had data, which has always been incomplete, especially most recently. (They and we do not know if the murders for which we don’t know the race of perp or victims are similar to the ones for which we do have those stats). The percentage of young black men in the general population is tiny, relative to the general population, and the males who commit murders are an even smaller set. In an intervention called the Boston Gun Project, it was found that the majority of murders committed in a couple of large black neighborhoods in Boston were perpetrated by 500 or so young men. The FBI data on ethnicities of victims adds the information that most but not all of the victims of the black men who kill were also black people. Note that most but not all of these crimes were coded as “gang related,” which shifts them into a separate category of murders in some data bases.
How much reporting do you see on a regular basis on the weekly body count in Chicago, Boston, Detroit, L.A., or other cities that include large, lower socioeconomic black neighborhoods? How much reporting covers the identities and circumstances of the victims or the perps in murders carried out by black men? Why are there not hordes of Democrats in the streets carrying signs and chanting “Say Their Names!”? Democrats hate it when anyone brings up the issue of homicide by black males. Why is that?
If Trump wins, he has pledged to pardon all of the thugs who attacked the Capitol on January 6th and unleash them to double down on killing and beating the crap out of cops and anyone else they dislike or gets in the way of Lord Trump’s delusions of dictatorship.
"There’s always another candidate to support and other elections to get involved in down the road."
If only this were true! But if Trump gets back in then White House, American democracy will come to a swift end. Trump will make himself the first American dictator. All USG employees will be required to pledge their loyalty to Trump and the Trump Party. [Think Saddam Hussein and the Baath Party]. Non-loyalist federal judges will be forced to resign. Institutions will all fail or otherwise be crippled. Hungary and Russia will serve as paradigms for the Trump regime.
There will be no more free and fair elections as long as the Trump Party rules. Only a major economic depression, loss of a large war, or totally failed response to an environmental/health emergency will be able to end a Trump dictatorship.
I’m a paid subscriber, and have been a huge fan. But given Harris’s conduct in the closing days of this campaign, I am considering severing all ties with anyone who supports her, and sadly this might involve me continuing to subscribe.
We are heading for a national divorce. The south lost the Civil War but won the culture war and we are living that today. I'm sick of my blue state tax dollars subsidies for the South and their racist authoritarian government. At some point we will be two separate (and very unequal) nations.
It's super racist to say that. The majority of black people live in the south. My state is 60/40. So, when you talk about your tax dollars going to the south, you are just saying you don't want to fund minorities. Almost every southern state has a larger percentage of minority groups.
It might be too late when an incumbent if cognitively missing President is still uttering "lock him up" as Joe Biden this week did, less than two weeks before the election.
But Halperin's sage advice to chill is directed at the larger electorate. Voters might keep in mind that when they and a partisan press put so much stock into the outcome of a presidential election, they invite the kind of imperial, overreaching presidency America has witnessed especially in the past quarter century. It was never what our Framers intended.
Trump has said lock them up about every Democratic from Hillary to the present. If “lock ‘em up” is Ok for Hillary, et. al, it’s good enough for Trump. Off to the Bastile for the Orange One.
John Halpin, not Halperin. How do we correct our Substack text?
Thanks, and don’t worry about it!
A national method of quickly counting votes would certainly help. Obama's gentlemanly invite of Trump to the White House the day after the election in 2016 should serve as a template. Whoever wins I sure would like to hear the leaders of both parties to offer to work with that person to pass legislation beneficial to the American people.
The media 'elites' are now the media dinosaurs. I'm still waiting for CBS to release the 60 Minutes transcripts - the only explanation that makes sense to me is that they made a deal with Kamala to withhold them.
The other day a good friend told me that she and her husband wished Trump had been killed in Butler. How do you mend fences with these people?
This is a very sane and mature article and a pleasure to read. Unfortunately, as Mr. Halpin points out, such a perspective is all too rare in the U.S. today. I doubt if our national leaders, official or otherwise, will follow his advice, but we can continue to work towards a restoration of sanity in Western Civ.
We all hope things might return to the "good ol days" of "normalcy" after an election. But It was Bill Clinton with the 365-day election cycle that really began to make this impossible. His "War Room" never shut down: it was a perpetual propaganda machine. As has always happened in American politics, when one side does it, the other copies. Al Gore was the first since 1877 to perpetuate an "election denial," to the point of forcing the Supreme Court to get involved against its wishes. Hillary Clinton ran a long fight against Donald Trump's victory then Democrat legislators promised to block him, then when that failed, they started a three-year war of "Russia Hoax."
So, I'm sorry, but it's a little late now to say "everyone play nice." Once you move from normal acceptance of results to never-ending war (again, remember it was Bill Clinton who refused to accept a GOP budget and forced a government shutdown, which meant we almost never again have real budgets), well, you get what you started.
This is nothing new in American history. The slave South, to protect slavery, passed "gag" rules that prohibited any discussion of slavery; enforced postal censorship that prevented abolitionist mail from being distributed; refused to let free blacks even leave ships in southern harbors. Eventually, of couse, the South (led by Democrats) seceded. After the war, the South refused to enforce the 14th and 15th Amendments, forcing the Union to maintain troops there until the REPUBLICANS stole an election in 1877.
Nevertheless, my point is that periodically in American history we get to the point where the "good ol' days' don't work any more. Once those norms are broken, it takes a lot more than "better people" to fix it. It takes, as we saw in 1865, total victory by one side or the other. Unfortunately, and I know Ruy you do not want to hear this, fixing this is going to take several people responsible for the Russia Hoax, for the J6 Patriot day hoax hearings, and several treasonous generals to go to jail. Nazi German had to be purged and many of its leaders imprisoned or hanged. Instead of "better journalists," I'd say we need to enforce laws against defamation and outright fraud by journalilsts. I know these seem like extreme measures (only when viewed that the Democrats' extreme measures should just be ignored) but when a bone is broken it needs to be reset before it can get better. America needs a legal reset to remind everyone that "going along to get along" is not an option when the other side is at war. And since Bill Clinton, the Democrats have been at war. (Obama: "They bring a knife, you bring a gun")
Now, I have predicted that the crushing defeat of the Democrats in this election, losing the senate by at least 3 net seats, seeing a small gain by Rs in the House, and Trump winning by at least 312 EVs with a popular vote of 1.5 will force a new civil war. This one will be between sensible people like you, Ruy, and the Mark Penns and the Stan Greenbergs, and the Prog Left crazies who want to turn America into Communist China. The current Democrat Party cannot survive. After 2030, the census revisions will lock in ano9ther 10-25 electoral votes for the red states and end most chances of a Democrat getting elected president for a generation. So the sound minds in the Party will have to decide how to separate from, and purge, the lunatic wing that has now cost them the middle class of all colors and left the Democrats a U-shaped party of uber rich and uber poor. As a lifelong Republican, it won't bother me if youi don't succeed, but as an American, it would b healthier to have two good parties. The Rs have already made their MAGA transition to the middle class, working class, Hispanics, a growing portion of blacks, and married couples. Until or unless the Democrats can drop woke, reject "energy transition," repudiate global war, they are in trouble.
Ruy didn't write this post but I will let him know your views.
John, do you/Ruy/Mark Halperin have a podcast? (Please don't refer me to Pod Save America with Obama retread hosts.)
Ruy has one that TLP publishes every other week. Mark Halperin has his own Substack but I have no relationship to it.
I was looking for a podcast. I heard Mark Haperin on Megyn Kelly the other day and would love to hear more from him.
If we could stop the media bias and propaganda, we'd all live peacefully. I believe that. I have a rule to go off X from April to election every election year and I've stuck to that. After the election, win or lose, I always stay off all social media and may have to include Substack this year just because it's over and I want to focus on family for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years.
This advice is nice. It’s likely coming from a very privileged position where, if Trump wins, you and the people you love and know won’t be much affected. But what about the un- and under-privileged who are going to have to brace for the unleashing of mass thuggery? How should they react? How should we privileged react to and with them? I surely hope that our national creed has not and will not morph into “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitulation.”
Who exactly do you men by ":the un- and under-privileged"? The people who currently suffer the most from "mass thuggery" are black people living in big city black neighborhoods. The level of violent crime, especially murder, that goes on weekly in these (mostly Democratically controlled) areas is appalling. The Democrats have worked very hard to deflect attention away from this reality, and have smeared scholars and journalists who have written about it. I expect that Harris would double down on the cover up, and Trump won't be able to help the situation even if he tries.
The rates of violence and murder are highest in rural counties — in Red states. You can look it up on the FBI’s website.
The FBI website that released inaccurate crime statistics? That website?
Bingo
I have actually looked into the FBI data. Young black men are responsible for half or more of the murders for which the FBI has had data, which has always been incomplete, especially most recently. (They and we do not know if the murders for which we don’t know the race of perp or victims are similar to the ones for which we do have those stats). The percentage of young black men in the general population is tiny, relative to the general population, and the males who commit murders are an even smaller set. In an intervention called the Boston Gun Project, it was found that the majority of murders committed in a couple of large black neighborhoods in Boston were perpetrated by 500 or so young men. The FBI data on ethnicities of victims adds the information that most but not all of the victims of the black men who kill were also black people. Note that most but not all of these crimes were coded as “gang related,” which shifts them into a separate category of murders in some data bases.
How much reporting do you see on a regular basis on the weekly body count in Chicago, Boston, Detroit, L.A., or other cities that include large, lower socioeconomic black neighborhoods? How much reporting covers the identities and circumstances of the victims or the perps in murders carried out by black men? Why are there not hordes of Democrats in the streets carrying signs and chanting “Say Their Names!”? Democrats hate it when anyone brings up the issue of homicide by black males. Why is that?
Are you saying if Trump wins the left will unleash mass thuggery?
Haha. Very funny.
Serious question. Why would the winning party riot?
That is not a serious question.
If Trump wins, he has pledged to pardon all of the thugs who attacked the Capitol on January 6th and unleash them to double down on killing and beating the crap out of cops and anyone else they dislike or gets in the way of Lord Trump’s delusions of dictatorship.
🙄 Oh brother. I hope you can hide the bed until all the thuggery is over.
"There’s always another candidate to support and other elections to get involved in down the road."
If only this were true! But if Trump gets back in then White House, American democracy will come to a swift end. Trump will make himself the first American dictator. All USG employees will be required to pledge their loyalty to Trump and the Trump Party. [Think Saddam Hussein and the Baath Party]. Non-loyalist federal judges will be forced to resign. Institutions will all fail or otherwise be crippled. Hungary and Russia will serve as paradigms for the Trump regime.
There will be no more free and fair elections as long as the Trump Party rules. Only a major economic depression, loss of a large war, or totally failed response to an environmental/health emergency will be able to end a Trump dictatorship.
If I hadn't seen your previous posts I would think this is a parody account. No one outside your very tiny small silo believes any of this.
There seem to be no actual liberals in "Liberal Patriot", but there is no shortage of rude, impolite trolls
I'm being rude because I disagree with your hyperbole?
I’m a paid subscriber, and have been a huge fan. But given Harris’s conduct in the closing days of this campaign, I am considering severing all ties with anyone who supports her, and sadly this might involve me continuing to subscribe.
We are heading for a national divorce. The south lost the Civil War but won the culture war and we are living that today. I'm sick of my blue state tax dollars subsidies for the South and their racist authoritarian government. At some point we will be two separate (and very unequal) nations.
It's super racist to say that. The majority of black people live in the south. My state is 60/40. So, when you talk about your tax dollars going to the south, you are just saying you don't want to fund minorities. Almost every southern state has a larger percentage of minority groups.
The state government is racist. But you know that is what I said.
You said the South AND their racist authoritarian government.
Bigots are on the left and the right, aren't they Shaun.
You can always dream…