Deafening silence by Congressional Republicans in response to Trump's "go back" comment makes it clear the GOP is intolerant of anything but intolerant white supremacy and white nationalism.
Trump and the Republican party will continue to aggravate racial wedge issues as America nears the 2020 election. They've failed to try unifying America by constantly throwing out proverbial red meat to their base of racists. The Tea Party, a precursor of today's GOP, was overtly racist which Republicans failed to easily condemn so this has been sadly predictable.
Seems , to me , we might be close to “ hitting bottom “ .
1
I wish Americans could appreciate science and knowledge with the same zeal they waste on many wacko religious fantasies.
17
Ah yes. The Conservatives are always right. They are never the malcontents, the complainers, the whiners. But they are and ever have been. This country is a country of malcontents. Everyone who came here and is still coming here were malcontent with where they were. The Conservatives, like the racists already got what they came here for and do not want any else to have it too. Because if too many people have it, then what they have is not exceptional anymore. The racists are particular in this regard because there are so many that have not gotten any more than they had before they arrived except the color of their skin. By golly, no one is going to take that away from them. Never mind that it is the Conservatives that deny them what they came here for. They have the same color skin, so they are better. Everything's better if it's white. You can take that to the bank, or at least to the toilet to read about it. It is they and Trump who should leave if they do not like it here, not the other way around. When is someone going to shout that from the rooftops?
10
Patriotism is a love of country that goes so deep, the country's virtues and faults are felt personally.
Nationalism isn't "irritated" patriotism. It's a state of mind that embraces simplistic, superficial, and reflexive displays of loyalty. It rejects criticism of the nation as anti-patriotic -- as borderline disloyal. When you've raised the stakes that high, you're not thinking clearly enough to be patriotic. You've devolved to tribalism on a grand scale.
The distinction Mr. Douthat sees between nationalism and what Trump is doing is not just unclear, but likely illusory. Trump is nationalism personified and exemplifies why it's a state of mind to be avoided.
9
Gee, I wish it were all so . . . . structured.
Mr. Douthat attributes to Trump an ideological complexity that must have escaped me - a willingness to jettison "American Exceptionalism" in favor of a darker, more nationalistic vision of the world - a necessary corrective, as some have argued, to imperial overreach and to the philosophical predisposition of right-wing intellectuals to . . . blah, blah, blah, blah and blah.
Trump has a governing ideology in the same way that cats have fins, in the same way that badgers are equipped with cell phones and in the same way that cans of soup possess the power of speech.
Titillation, impulse, spite, rage, distractability, prurience and endless infantile need - these make up his "ideology". In combination with a fathomless ability to lie and the low cunning needed to excite the rubes at his continual tent revivals, they are apparently the only attributes America currently requires of its "leader".
9
"Once Republicans were optimists about their country; under Trump they see only “American carnage” and decay. ....under Trump the Republican view of the American position in the world is dark, nasty, zero-sum."
And yet you don't hear anyone telling Republicans "If you hate this country so much, then why don't you leave?"
Trump and the Republicans see criticism of Trump as "hating the United States", even though they spent eight years criticizing Obama without calling it any such thing.
By the way to the main theme of this article I'd say that as long as virtually every Republican in Congress (there were four exceptions today, just four) continues to support the moral and ethical monstrosity that is Donald Trump as President, whether doing so out of sheer cowardice or because they agree with him, they don't deserve any of Douthat's suppositions that they're secretly better than this or without Trump would act more morally.
Their actions are who they are, we can't invent mythical selves based on hopes and wishes about what Republicans should be.
6
Nationalisms here and elsewhere differ, precisely because most of our families got here, to the U.S. of A., fairly recently, from sundry places. So ours has to start with: e pluribus unum.
2
The awful person in the White House did hang on to one element of the rejection of establishment conservatism. It remains his only redeeming feature.
Trump is a racist, a misogynist, a liar, a cheat, a narcissist, an ignoramus and a vulgar loudmouth.
But he is apparently not a war-monger. And that, in Washington, is something.
5
Imagine the tough choice our fearless leader faces in the morning. Is today the day to wear the white sheet and hood; or is it brown shirt day.
4
Hey, y’all...now we’re Socialists!
3
Are you finally waking up, Ross/
3
Ross: the problem is that Trump is a psychopath who would have no idea what you are talking about if he even had the attention span to read your column.
8
I spent the first sixty of my seventy years wondering how Nazism took hold in Germany in the 1930's. I now live in Trump's America. I wonder no more.
12
Where's Anonymous?
1
Since the American "conservative" movement has been proven to be ethically bankrupt, morally bankrupt and only successful at making America bankrupt, I'm amazed that Mr. Douthat continues to write for the Times. His columns seem like a waste of energy to write and a waste of time to read. I'm not criticizing his intellect or skills, it's just the movement he writes about is now obsolete.
6
Dear GOP: Flattery will get you everywhere....
1
“But the nationalist in the Oval Office remains, unfortunately, an exceptional disgrace.”
But one that nearly EVERY Republican, conservative and nationalist supports wholeheartedly.
6
You'll vote for him, Ross. Don't pretend you won't. Like most of the GOP, unless he's caught on film abusing a teenaged boy, you'll vote for him. And if he were a priest, you'd vote for him then, too.
7
Trump is following the authoritarian play book, testing and testing how much he can get away with. The best known parallels are with Germany in the 1930s. Creation of special police forces (e.g., ICE, Border Patrol). Creation of concentration camps. Attacks on the press (Lugenpresse!). I recommend an largely overlooked book for how this works -- Naomi Wolf, "The End of America," published in 2007 and with the last 12 years fulfilling the warnings.
7
I like reading Mr. Douthat's columns, but don't ask me why. And this particular column left me scratching my head, until I read the last sentence, which I understand and agree with.
1
Nationalism and Exceptionalism are incestuous first cousins. Making an argument for a working conservatism using them is not worth the effort, like running a race by hopping on one leg. I'd rather talk about a pragmatic, realistic patriotism that draws on the best of our national traditions. Of course, what those best traditions are is now up for grabs. But at least that would be a fruitful discussion.
1
As usual you parse some mighty fine words and spin out some lovely paragraphs, only to end with ... what? I think your "solution" is to say that true conservatism is a correction to American exceptionalism, but that the current occupant of the Ova Office is a disgrace. How does that advance us from the point at which we find our country?
My question to you Ross, is when are the true patriots going to emerge from the republican party?
Enough with the dithering. Do any republicans still believe in democracy and American Ideals? As this country slips deeper down the rabbit hole every day, when is enough, enough?
What will you tell your friends and family in the future, that you wrote strenuously milquetoast opinion pieces, but you didn't think there was any threat to democracy...
As for the cowards in congress, they had better hope that their well earned plutocrat paychecks will help protect them when everything goes south.
3
Time for Douthat, Brooks and other so-called defenders of the true conservative faith to recognize that Trump is, was, and will be the very embodiment of the GOP. Anyone who expects this to magically change when Trump leaves the scene is paying no attention to history. This is the GOP: a racist, militaristic, science denying, wholly owned subsidiary of billionaires, both foreign and domestic, playing a political game of Russian Roulette with truth itself. A force like this does not evolve. It only ends in disaster for all.
7
Re: RD's 'With a Bigoted Edge'
Edge? What edge? Is only this 'particular' racist rant serious enough to deserve a comment? Edge? Is it only a misstep? A typing error, a misplaced adjective? A stumble? Come on, this was vintage Trump. And five minutes of research would turn up countless examples of the same kind of toxic speech by members of the "good" tribe... the "values" folks, the Republican party Ross embraces and apologizes for.
2
It's too late. America is no longer all white and won't be even if we build the wall and lock the gates. Our citizens are all colors. The future looks like the Squad. And no, we will not be mere guests in our own country, we *are* Americans. We will not go back somewhere because we are already home. We belong. We don't owe anyone anything because we made our own way like every American. We will speak our minds. We will embrace the freedom of this country, our country, to think and believe as we see fit. And if you don't like it, *you* can leave!
4
The notion of "american exceptionalism" always was an ugly one, and embarrassing in its provinciality. Almost everybody growing up in almost every country everywhere thinks his own country is exceptional. And then you travel, and find that people in other countries similarly find their own countires to be special. And then you feel embarrassed about your earlier ignorance as you realize there's a large world out and a lot of different viewpoints out there. Americans tend not to travel abroad much, so don't usually realize any of this. They also are inclined to self-aggrandizement. (The "World" Series? Don't be silly. It's a national event, not a global one.)
The notion of a god favoring one country over another is equally repellant and stupid.
Let's just acknowledge that we all need to work toward making whatever country we happen to live in as wonderful, fair, equal, etc., as possible. It is possible to work toward that happening without our needing to think of ourselves as better--or more exceptional--than others.
8
Nice try, Ross, but no banana. Trump is the embodiment of American conservatism.
You, personally, would love to see my wife die without her ACA generated healthcare. Times' rules prevent me from voicing my opinion of people like you.
3
Mr Douthat's most interesting thought s his conclusion: he wouldn't mind the destruction of American values by the Trumpoisie, he just wishes they would do it more tastefully.
3
The spirit of wanting to be a wisenheimer wiseacre in me feels we should take both ends, join them together at the hip, make them live with each other and fuse their passions so that we may produce something better than the current circus going on. Or not. We won't know if we don't try.
At one end is of course the pseudo-uber nationalist Trump. At the other is "the squad," supposedly "socialist" according to Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming. Combine the two of them to form a multi-ethnic, multi-racial National Socialism. Blow the minds of all the conventional wisdom and diminish the partisan rancor. Form a new movement for the betterment of all Americans. The "politics as usual" between the two entrenched political parties has become exceptional only in digging an ever deeper hole for more and more people, while the people running the economic digging machines take it all to the bank.
Elect one side or the other and nothing really changes, except the speed at which we go downhill. We really need to start thinking outside the box of the duopoly if we're going to make any substantive change.
2
Richard Spencer and The Daily Stormer are all over social media praising Trump's tweet.
Even the biggest racists out there believe that Trump is a racist - and they're cheering him on.
2
The reason why this is happening is because the Reagan economic experiment (i.e. supply side economics) that began in the 1980's has revealed itself to be a huge failure, and the Republicans don't got noth'n else. And everyone is starting to realize this. All that is left is demagoguery. The Republicans are a dirty bunch.
2
Johnny Clegg has died. The artist of the anti Apartheid.
Obviously not in the US press.
Racism is not the USA exeptionalism.
2
This is Joseph McCarthyism all over again. A demagogue spouting attention grabbing untruths and incendiary attacks supported by hypocritical cowards and blatant evil doers while crimes are committed, lives are ruined and civil discourse is destroyed. It's almost ironic that the same sick source is lurking in the wings: J. Edgar Hoover forced conformity while hiding in the closet with his homosexual lovers including who knows what in bed with his acolyte Roy Cohn, the very lawyer that Trump has most admired. Meanwhile the civil rights of suspected leftists were burned at the stake along with their careers. The media rang with the shouts against critics who were told that if they didn't like (i.e. sought to improve) it here they were welcome to "go to Russia". Then the media (e.g. Edward R. Morrow) and federal investigators (e.g. Joseph N. Welch) were finally strong, dignified and principled enough to call Joe's bluff. He ended up dribbling in the dust, dying, allegedly, of alcohol. And where are the strong people and institutions now? Dangerously diffused by screens, social media, etc. There is also a generational gap where the young inhabit a world the septuagenarians cannot get a hold of and luddite resistance rages against inevitable globalization. I suppose we will all be swept away by fire and flood if we don't pull ourselves together...and that's the real danger of this current reenactment of hate and stupidity. Rome burns while Trump twitters.
2
Anyone who can locate "intellectual debate" on Fox News is seriously delusional.
3
Mr. Douthat just wrote 750 words when four would suffice: "Trump is a racist."
Why is it so hard for conservatives, even those who don't like Trump, to say so? It is a shameful, cowardly failure.
3
America is absolutely unexceptional
1
Nationalism, like religion, is a patriarchal conceit.
3
"With a bigoted edge"? C'mon Ross, you are almost there - just make the further leap to the reality that its is RACISM, period.
1
Glad you that conservative religious zeal, Mr. Douthat.
Dear Ross,
I think what you mean when you say "nationalist-in-power often end up scapegoating..." you actualy mean 'fascists-in-power'. Do you not? Also, when you say "the nationalist turn in conservative politics...(is)...justifiable, a response to a series of elite blunders..", rather than "elite", don't you mean 'Republican'?
2
I was a kid when they were saying "love it or leave it" Even then I thought it was patently ridiculous. Now it is just plain stupid.
This was one of your best, thanks!
Re: Trump's boast about "...the highest stock market ever...":
Trump inherited the foundation, framing and roof decking for our current economic position. If Trump has added anything, it is a coat of paint in comparison to the groundwork laid by Bush 43 in his last year in office and during Obama's two terms. Trump's claims are groundless.
2
I may not always agree with Mr. Douthat but I do agree here. I just wish he would say it more concisely (and with a little less elitist undertone - I'm afraid to say). Less is more, as the saying goes.
"The intellectual debate generated by this turn, whether it’s happening in Washington conference rooms or conservative periodicals or at the 8 p.m. hour for Fox News, is often far more to relevant America’s problems that the conservative debate before 2016."
Should read "relevant to".
Signed - a sympathetic party.
Why did Mr. Douthat not cite Nixon on the love it leave it concept? I remember seeing those buttons being sold i Harvard Square, Cambridge, of all places, during the Nixon administration.
3
Actually, in our history many people have chosen to “go back” because they did not want to stay in the US.
Between 1822 and the Civil War about 15,000 African Americans, most of them freed slaves, chose to be repatriated to Liberia, which ultimately became the first independent democratic republic in African history. The travel cost of the repatriation was paid by the US government, religious organizations and private donors.
After the Civil War released slaves were also eligible to receive $100 from the US government if they wished to emigrate to Haiti or Liberia or "...such other country beyond the limits of the United States as the President may determine." Thousands of former slaves took advantage of this offer.
4
I would judge a nationalist movement the way you would judge any man or group of men in an agitated state: Are they acting rationally and thoughtfully to address the reasons for their anger and improve their prospects for the future, or are they acting irrationally and without thought and actually worsening the causes of their anger, working against their own best interests.
Looked at in this light, the Trumpists are obviously doing the latter, presaging more anger to come.
But, as the current President says, "I won't be here" when the bill comes due.
2
If Trump rebuilt the entire $700 billion-a-year defense budget with one ~$70 billion boost, he ought to be able to rebuild the entire interstate system, our railways and fix all of our bridges and airports with another $100 billion. So too, his "better and cheaper" healthcare plan can probably be gotten for peanuts. Only one problem: It's all an illusion of a delusion.
5
"Love it or leave it" isn't a new concept created by Trump. It was repeated ad nauseam by anti-communists during the McCarthy period to people opposed to predatory capitalism and racial discrimination who were then labelled Anti-American, and as a result many of them left. It was the rallying cry of supporters of the Vietnam War to anyone protesting the senseless slaughter not only of our own young men but of Vietnamese men, women and children. Thousands of us finally did leave America and many never returned. However, "Love or leave it" doesn't actually mean what it purports to mean. In fact, the phrase means follow unquestioningly the the status quo even if it is morally wrong. In other words "Love it or leave it" means "My country, right or wrong."
3
Conservatism in the U.S. is and always has been exclusionary. Exclude the poor, ethnic groups, women, etc. I'm old enough to remember Nixon/Agnew and their appeal to the love it or leave "silent majority." Trump is in that mold with a megaphone. At least 40 % of the country feels he can do no wrong. We are on the verge of losing our democracy.
4
Mr. Douthat, Yours is not the definition of nationalism I learned from my history teachers in high school in the 1970s. But if you give it another name, I would subscribe to the theory you and Thiel lay out. Here's a question though: Is it necessary to peg what you observe in the past half century or so of American political history to a theory? Didn't we learn not to trust theory as predictor of the future from Fukuyama's "The End of History and the Last Man?" For another perspective on nationalism read, or reread, Figes's "A People's Tragedy." I mean, I don't think you and National Review alone get to determine the accepted meaning of "nationalism."
2
The right has no serious ideas. It is focused on one simple goal: holding power. And so it resorts to any tactic, no matter how offensive to decency or moral rectitude, to achieve it. Trump will continue to spout hate and outlandish lies because he knows these, no matter what else they might do, destabilize and disrupt any serious conversation or line of thinking. Chaos benefits whoever holds power as long as they hold power. Whatever else Americans might do, the idea that masses will take the streets in a massive act of civil disobedience is obviously not going to happen - not when Prime Day is on, at least (and every day is prime day, let's be honest). So we resign ourselves to non-debates about the odious president, hardly ever getting beyond his despicable odiousness. Meanwhile, real people with real problems start to give up on any political discourse to resolve their problems. And voila, we end up with a complete disaster of a government: doing nothing for the people except those who can pay for it.
4
More like love me, or get out.
5
The header for this NYT article should have been:
" Trump’s Message: Love 'What I Do' or Leave 'The Country', a Bigoted Edge 'Takeover of America' ".
2
The irritated nationalism now sitting in the oval office is what republicans have been working for since Saint Ronnie gave tax breaks for corporations in the 1980's to take manufacturing overseas and break the unions, while allowing the rich to evade all forms of taxation.
The new American exceptionalism is the insatiable greed of the uber wealthy together with their need to financially and socially destroy anyone who does not share that peculiar form of psychopathy, and feckless tossing aside of any laws that hinder the unfettered accumulation of wealth.
Today's 'conservatism' is fascism, marching with a flag and a bible, to the goal of a blood bath in the streets.
4
"A populist-nationalist corrective to American exceptionalism would be welcome" as then described in the article by Mr Douthat is a contradiction in terms.
Populist-nationalists are, by definition blind to anything outside their nation. The only use comparisons would have for them would be get our lemurs to shout or scream at the lemurs on the other side of the imaginary boundary, simply to reinforce the supposed family/tribal bond, under the control of the charismatic Leader.
Trump is the apotheosis of conservatism. I suppose it must be sad to see the work of decades being trashed, but comservatives have no-one to blame but themselves. They have fed the populist-nationalist Frankenstein's monster of hate and fear for years and years. What a pretty thing they have created.
3
Oh for God's sake. I have a definition of nationalism too: selfishness at the level of an epidemic. How on earth is a turn towards nationalism justified when the problems we face are global? It is fine to be proud of your nation, some decades are easier to feel this than others, but when the oceans are being strangled by plastic and the ice caps are melting nationalism is downright dangerous. I wonder now if it is nationalism that has allowed the American people to turn a blind eye to the policies of separating families and putting them in cages.
All this contorting over ideology, as if any single political philosophy can solve all problems is just ... wankery. Use your ideology as a guide, fine. But not as a goal unto itself. This is the failure of all philosophy; one size does not fit all.
8
Trump doesn't love America. He doesn't even know what America is. All he knows is Trump, and he sullies our country's ideals every day.
6
It would seem that any suggestion for improvement of the country that does not come from the mouth or mind of Donald Trump must be treason if one can go by his reaction to anything that issues from the other side of the aisle. That would seem to indicate that something on the order of 60% of Americans (and growing) are traitors according to The Donald. Great job of leadership big guy.
3
The primary domestic policy of this administration is to loot the Treasury and steal public lands. The move to gut the BLM has purpose. Namely to weaken legal protections of public lands so as to facilitate selling leases to use public land for pennies on the dollar and to sell off public lands to cronies at cut rate prices. Environment be damned.
2
Last year, on the 14th of July, president Macron gave an important speech at the Arc de Triomphe. Trump was present and experts suggested that it was directed at him. Macron carefully explained the difference between patriotism and nationalism. He concluded nationalism had to be combatted.
Europeans understand the danger of nationalism better than us.
100
@Skiplusse well at least better than Trump.
6
@Skiplusse
Trump's take away was "look at all those neat military vehicles on parade!"
15
Don't try this at home. We in Germany toyed around with exceptionalism and nationalism extensiveley in the 1930s and 40s. Did not turn out so well for us (and the rest of the world).
286
@Mark B
Exactly!!! Hear! Hear! I agree with you entirely. It’s as if 45% of Americans have decided that that Conservative element in U.S. politics that agreed with in the 1930s with Germany’s National Socialists is the right way to proceed after all. Hungary, Poland, England, the U.S... history is turned upside down as if the terror that was the 1930s and 1940s had never happened.
29
@Mark B We are trying this at home right now and the only question is how far it goes.
12
@Mark B. I have thought the Nazi references were a bridge too far. No longer. I feel we are living in a recreation of the last days of the Weimar Republic and the Brown shirts will soon be marching.
19
As always, good analysis. Just looked up the conference Douthat mentioned. Wasn't surprised to find out that the large number of speakers were almost all middle-aged or older white guys. https://nationalconservatism.org/ You've got a diversity problem, dudes.
4
Re: “... eminently justifiably response ... “ My parents response to such would have been: “Don’t be such a baby, look in the mirror, stop feeling sorry for yourself, and take responsibility for your own actions.” This “exceptionalism” belief is like all belief structures that demand religious adherence, they start with the major premise and suborn all facts and experience to that premise. No enlightenment or progress can come of this intellectual equivalent of the Middle Ages.
3
When you write your list of things that are so wrong with this country, Mr. Douthat, take a little more time to write another list of all the things that are right about this country, the things that make it strong.
You are in danger of becoming one of the people the President is talking about. You sound like you hate your country.
1
America is becoming the reflection of Trump's vile nature in service of his malignant narcissism which will leave our country and the world scarred.
2
Trump is only giving a voice to what many Americans are thinking. They are not 'racists'; they are just sick and tired of a small minority of people with iliberal philosophies hiding under the cloak of a 'progressive' label and denigrating the United States and what it stands for.
4
@TWW
People with their hands out, thinking the government is responsible for their lives.
Hear the real American Dream (which is still out there):
In America, you live free (protected by the constitution) and if you work hard, you get rewarded.
The original American dream has nothing to do with being rich.
2
@TWW
And tell me what does it stand for? Please list exactly what you're talking about. Can you do that? Try hard, it does take some critical thinking skills.
2
@Raz
The slaves worked harder than any other people America has ever seen. Look at how they were rewarded.
Their descendants were denied every opportunity they pursued. Denied education, denied even basic employment, denied decent housing, denied the right to life through indiscriminate lynching and out-and-out murder.
The Dred Scott decision decided that slaves were property, had no right to citizenship and had no right to freedom in Free States. Black people were denied the right to vote or own property.
For some, (usually white males) the American Dream came true. For others, it was a nightmare.
4
A simplification in blunt terms for Republican promises:
We provided a tax cut for the middle class that primarily helped the rich -- if you don't like it, leave.
We claimed to provide health care that was bigger, better, cheaper, and covered more people especially for preexisting conditions. And instead we are doing out best to make the ACA unconstitutional and with proven incapability to replace it with anything at all. If you don't like it, then leave.
We promised to provide well paying jobs. Instead all our policies are intended to help our rich political contributors. The numbers of permanently unemployed is unchanged or increasing. The government's fake unemployment statistic is down, but wage increases are less than inflation so the job growth is in low wage jobs. If you don't like it either work three jobs or leave.
If you are poor or a person of color then leave. We didn't make any promises for you.
How this all gets twisted into American exceptionalism is a mystery to me. This is a rich, white plutocracy, and it is not exceptional at all.
"Keep America Great" -- the vision of rich white folks.
3
In this column, Ross Douthat is just putting lipstick on a pig when he speaks of "nationalists." Please read history, for they are just good old fascists and they never believed in our constitution.
Now I grew up sincerely believing in American exceptionalism. America never had a Mussolini, Hitler or Stalin in power and Joe McCarthy was just a senator. In our history, there had been the two original sins of genocide against Native Americans and slavery, but these we more than a hundred and fifty years ago. As a modern American, seeing the progress of civil rights movement, LGBTQ+ rights movement, the environmental movement, the pro choice movement, and the election of Barak Obama, were all reasons to believe that we were advancing as a society towards our ideals. American exceptionalism was NOT a myth. We were special as a country and the American experiment was in fact grand.
However, George Bush the younger, and the oil wars in the middle east were harbingers of what to come. In 2016, when the physical embodiment of the seven deadly sins, became president, and the GOP kept him in power, they forever destroyed the concept of American exceptionalism. Today the Grand Wizard rules and the GOP's white sheets have come off. So like many other nations, American history now has its tyrant. Even when he is gone, we will never be the same.
4
I don't think any of it matters anymore. The vast majority of conservative voters are complete fools and they love Trump because they are complete fools. No matter how much intellectual conservatives deliberate about nationalism vs. patriotism, it matters little because Trump is in charge and Trump only cares about Trump. The GOP is in charge because it handed the keys to Trump and Trump is driving. When Trump is no longer driving, the Democrats will have power once again. No conservative voters want what the GOP is selling. They just want Trump. When Trump is no longer available, they'll go back to either being apolitical or they may even vote Democrat. They love Trump because he starred on a reality TV show for a decade and "tells it like it is" about Blacks, Muslims, & Illegals. Mike Pence or Ted Cruz could do the same thing, only they weren't reality TV stars, they are just boring conservatives. No conservatives actually care about any issues, they just like to be entertained, to be kept in a state of constant outrage, that is like a drug for them. I like Ross' columns, but why debate and pretend that any conservative ideas have any future? Conservatives don't believe in conservatism anymore. They just believe in Trump. And when Trump is over, it's over.
2
Currently, I am reading "Bloodlands
Europe Between Hitler and Stalin" by Timothy Snyder which speaks of the policies of both of humanities worst criminals in their policy toward Ukraine, Poland, Belarus, and the Baltic states from 1933 through the end of WWII. What strikes me in particular, in relation to the current nationalist debate, of how these two dictators also could not be wrong and how they use their infallibility their policies.
Nationalists take heed - beware of where your arguments can lead.
2
Hah. America has problems. However, if Peter Thiel and Donald Trump don't think America is already exceptionally great (and always has been), then they can go back to Outer Space. Meanwhile it is the Democrats who have been trying hardest to fix real problems and to Make America Even Greater. (The slogan "Make American Great Again" is actually unpatriotic).
4
Calling our president "an exceptional disgrace" leaves out the entire steaming pile of GOP supplicants, from congressional hacks, to state-level gerrymandering scaredy-cats, to the duped voters who put them there in the first place. No, there is plety of blame to go around.
1
Trump talking about gratitude makes me laugh. He is a bottomless well of need and insecurity. He criticizes things about the U.S., that's OK. Someone else, coming from a completely different place than him, elected to represent a district he has probably never set foot in and that he knows nothing about, criticizes things about the U.S., and he turns that into a personal challenge and makes it racial. What an ass.
3
This is an odd column. I'm struggling to see a point in it.
The only possible point seems to be this (please try to follow the tortured logic):
- Trump campaigned on "American carnage"
- Now that he is president, Trump says that America is now great, carnage solved
- Anyone who challenges this assertion, and says that there are still any problems, is a traitor and they should leave
- So (I guess?) Trump's invitation to four women of color to "go back where you came from" is not racist, it's just Trumpy, "with a bigoted edge"
Wait, what?
1
Wow, it's so easy to get wrapped up in a "great debate" over the meaning of nationalism, exceptionalism, our place in the great tide political philosophy at this moment in our history.
At the very least, it can make writers of such topics feel they are deep. deep thinkers who can perhaps be rewarded with a warm ego-enhancing flush of affirmation from their fellow traveller navel gazers when they meet at a cocktail party. And, even maybe, at on a practical level they can perhaps come up with propaganda, um, I mean, a serious economic or political theory, that will justify further tax cuts for the wealthy, and land a cushy job at some right wing think tank! Cha ching!
Or, one can simply acknowledge that Trump is just a dummy who really neither cares nor knows anything about policy or history, who is smart enough to feed the low information, status insecure voters, enough lies, half truths, innuendo, so he could get power and keep it.
It's really not more complicated than that, is it?
3
I asked a local Republican leader why the right wing hates America so much and he replied" We don't hate America, we hate what America has become since the 1960's social revolution".
Isn't that why Trump's MAGA hat's work for some people.
3
What Trump really reflects is racist jingoism, with a large dose of flim-flam man. To the extent that is the product of post-1980 Republican politics, Douthat needs to own the idea.
2
.
The "Me Too" movement coupled with the "New Progressives" has an indiscriminate agenda that attacks the guilty (Cosby, Weinstein, Epstein), the innocent (Franken, Kavanaugh, Dershowitz) and the dead (Columbus, Jefferson, Washington, etc.). Amid this irrational and pervasive fanaticism, it is right and good to have clear and direct communication from an outspoken commander-in-chief.
#longlivethepatriarchy
2
Ross. As a Brit I listen to your podcasts and read your articles. Whilst I respect your self-professed position as a US conservative, viewed from across the pond you seem like a cautious liberal. In these dangerous times for American democracy, there's little that hair-splitting ideology can achieve when the forces of reaction and demagoguery are so virulent. True advocates of American values and the Constitution have no choice but to oppose Trump and his supporters.
5
@Neil Drewitt - If Dwight David Eisenhower were alive today, Trump’s ‘conservative’ Republican Party would call him a left-wing extremist; a socialist. Top income tax rates at the time were around 90%; higher education was heavily subsidized and close to free at many colleges and universities; we invested heavily in our own infrastructure and in reviving European nations and their economies after World War II.
Eisenhower also advocated for civil rights after Brown v. Board of Ed.— albeit somewhat timidly given virulent opposition in his own party and from the Southern Dixiecrats who are now the core of the 21st century right-wing GOP. He proposed a national healthcare program — ditto.
And Eisenhower — a true military hero, not a tinkertoy soldier and member of a long line of draft dodging cowards — warned against the untrammeled power of the ‘military-industrial complex.’
Yup, Ike was a socialist weirdo. He ‘hated our country’ — at least the country as Trump and his ilk envision it — and shoulda ‘gone back to where he came from.’
Which happened to be a small town in Kansas, not a ludicrous, ostentatious tower in Manhattan with a pink marble lobby and his name emblazoned on everything that is and is not nailed down, bankrolled with the proceeds of his racist slumlord father’s shady business; with seed money from his German immigrant, draft dodger, gambling parlor, brothel and saloon owner grandfather.
2
We can admit not everyone is a "liberal" in the current Democratic framing of the word. However, it's hard to debate nationalism meaningfully within a conservative context when a strong majority of Americans are neither conservative nor nationalist. It's sort of like debating which pipe wrench to use when re-wiring a server. Yes, a problem exists but you're discussing the wrong tools to even begin approaching the subject.
The fact is American conservatism currently represents a failed project in republicanism increasingly propped-up by anti-democratic and authoritarian tendencies. The last thing I want to hear our of the conservative think tank is theoretical legitimacy for conservative nationalism. Are you out of your mind? Nationalism of every stripe relies heavily on oppositional identity. Me, not you.
Republicans under Trump are working very hard to ensure the American public are all part of the "you."
3
And already we see how Trump's view of America is permeating into our legislative branch. It wasn't enough for Senator Lindsey Graham to declare those four pesky Democratic representatives as un-American. He took it one step further and branded them as communists.
Since he is now in charge of the Senate Judiciary Committee, how long before he creates a Senate Committee on UnAmerican Activities?
McCarthyism lives! Well, perhaps it never died. It just hibernated for a few decades.
5
A lot of word salad here to try and explain Trump's remarks in the context of Republican party positioning. The actual explanation can be summed up in the one word that was left out: racism.
5
Kevin: agreed that Ross Douthat should have broadened his analysis here to speak to Republican ‘strategy’ since 1968 to propagate white fear and demonize people of color. Don’t agree though that this is a ‘word salad’ - it’s a serious attempt at deconstruction.
Centuries of brutality, oppression, and “the bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil” (2nd Inaugural, March 1865) are a American and exceptional disgrace. Which, no surprise, neo-nationalists will not acknowledge, will not see as having a legacy that’s very much alive today. As you suggest, racism has been codified in our laws, policies, and institutions.
So, how to address? Saying to Joe Biden, “I don’t believe you are a racist...” then citing his questionable statements/votes and adding “You’ve hurt me” in effect concludes, ‘...but you really are.’ Does that advance the conversation, as is said? Once it’s suggested that a white person might be or is racist, does that invalidation mean, in some perverse irony, ‘You no longer count’ in the national dialogue?
One step I can suggest is that many white Americans (I am one) read Robin DeAngelo’s “White Fragility” for its dispiriting and complex account of the many ways having white skin confers advantages we do not deserve. White Americans have the hard work to do, and maybe we’ll never be done. Yet there are new kinds, hopeful bonds, to forge - and so in that effort find the true meaning of all those platitudes we finally need to live up to.
1
I never thought I’d see the day when I felt sorry for Douthat. I’m not there yet, but it’s definitely getting closer. Defending
“ conservatives “ in this Trumpian age is a fools errand. Nice
“ Job “, if you can keep it.
4
Maybe next time, Ross, save yourself some time and just type “elite blunders” as many times as it takes to fill your word count, because really that’s your only message.
5
“Fascism a form of radical right-wing, authoritarian ultranationalism[1][2] characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition and strong regimentation of society and of the economy.” We are on our Republican way.
Yesterday Trump colored himself a racist in four different ways! Not that he needed to after his years of leading racist “birtherism”, “socialist”taunts,and “evil corrupt” non white nation memes. But his “base” demanded more so he gave them the squad, who can’t be Americans because they are not white and so must “go back”. Yet Douthat and other “conservative” pundits twiddle their thumbs. “Conservatives” overlooked Trump’s racism, calling it racial “insensitivity”. Many Liberals have pointed out that the “Southern strategy” is clearly a racist exploitation and that Republicans just have to include racists and racism along with misogyny that forces women to have “medically unnecessary” assaults, I mean exams, if they want an abortion (that their god, who is a male, calls murder). Liberals have also been saying that Republicans who tolerate racists (Trump), are racists themselves. Maybe everyone should take a breath? Telling 4 elected
Congresswomen to leave America defines Trump’s understanding of Law, the Constitution, and Justice. Douthat did not cover that story, but made up another one in which Republicans are not racists and are really normal.
2
Seems this is how conservatives who enabled the degradation of their party's moral core that led to Trump try to convince themselves that they're not part of the problem. It's a living, I guess.
5
This is the second set of abstract political comments I have read in the Times today. David Brooks went on about what has happened to liberalism, Ross Douthat, conservatism. Pardon me for repeating, but the ideological labels add nothing to the discussion. What has happened to the Republican Party is that their decades long project of recruiting the bigots and information challenged voters of America to their base succeeded. This worked well for a long time: the base supplied the votes so the real Republicans--people Mr. Douthat would probably call conservatives--could represent the interests of the rich. (Since 1980, three high end tax cuts and a $23 trillion debt. Can you think of anything else Republicans have accomplished?) When Trump came along, unfortunately, the base finally had a Republican leader who acted on their bigotry, and the system collapsed. What the real Republicans neglected to consider was that when most of your voters are your base of bigots and dim bulbs, they run the Party. Nationalism, conservatism. whatever, are not the problem; it's the voters who make up the Republican base.
13
Peter Thiel asks “how does my country compare to other countries?”
Well, income inequality is the absolute worst of any developed nation. Dead last. In fact, it is worse than a lot of developing nations. Glad you ask, Pete.
Infant mortality is awful. Medical costs and health insurance premiums are obscene. Life expectancy is declining. We are beyond fat. There is an opioid epidemic.
Government is bordering on authoritarianism if not outright dictatorship. And we can always afford more tax cuts for the already filthy rich.
I would say things are going quite swimmingly---for Thiel and his ilk.
9
A theme from the first day of the Trump presidency is monumental laziness. Turns out there is plenty of time for golf and no wonder.
Immigration is a complex problem. Solution? Build a big wall. Tough to get funding? Solution: Have Mexico pay. Global warming too difficult to grasp? Solution: Claim that in your expert opinion, it's a hoax. Jobs not coming back? Solution: Photo op. Tell people don't sell your house. North Korea not behaving? Solution: Talk tough and have lots of photo ops. Same for everything from Russia to gun control. Talk tough, do nothing. If this stuff was easy, any of our smart presidents would have done it long ago.
One reason healthcare is a potent issue for Democrats is that saying we're gonna have it and it will be fantastic and dirt cheap isn't enough to make it happen.
And when the facts don't support you, lying and name calling is soooooo much easier than doing some actual work. Add to this the cavalcade of incompetent talk radio personalities in the cabinet and, well, there's always time for golf.
13
Why was "love it or leave it" not asked of Trump's voters? They didn't think America is great. They hated its prevailing values and rules. There are other countries today (and some ideological homelands of the past) that more suit their authoritarian, protectionist, and xenophobic tastes.
But "go back" doesn't apply to white people - white people always deserve to be where they are.
9
There are two Americas and never the twain shall meet.
I am not an American even if most of my family are American citizens.
My America names Washington's airports after our real heroes Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner and James Chaney.
My father's Reagan and my Reagan is the antiSemitism and paranoia of the McCarthy witch hunts and the betrayal of all that creative talent. It is the Reagan of the destruction of the Republican Party in 1964 at the Cow Palace and the pledge to destroy the Civil Rights Act. It is the 1980 visit of Reagan to Philadelphia Mississippi to celebrate the American values of the the lynch mob and the power of hate and intolerance.
My father had a Jesuit education who thought himself a Pole first and a Jew second until my grandfather ordered all his children out of Europe in the early 1920s.
My father limited his cursing vocabulary to words fit for polite company but the sight of Reagan on television set off a tirade of polite but impassioned cursing.
I am a fan of Hannah Arendt's observation of the banality of evil but for me it matters not whether Reagan was evil or only banal. His legacy will always be the end of America trying to be the best and most just America it could be.
4
Examine the second sentence of this essay: "Once Republicans were optimists about their country; under Trump they see only “American carnage” and decay."
Mr. Douthat should take a look at Tim Alberta's book "American Carnage". Alberta is highly optimistic about the US, he is pessimistic only about the Republican Party.
Mr. Douthat cares so little for facts that his second sentence is completely false. Because MAD magazine is no longer able to say it, I'll say it for them: "Scheesh."
1
Orwell’s take was more revenant and interesting than either Thiel or Dougherty’s. Nationalism is “inseparable from the desire for power. The abiding purpose of every nationalist is to secure more power and more prestige, not for himself but for the nation or other unit in which he has chosen to sink his own identity.”
1
"Exceptional in bad ways" was always true about America if you lived in other parts of the world. One only has to consider opposition to the Vietnam War which dogged LBJ when he visited Australia where I was a student in the late sixties. Women with hour glass figures were replaced by British Twiggies, Motown by the British Invasion, a gun culture versus peaceful streets. Australian actors still stride in Hollywood. Multiculturalism thrives in Toronto. Most Europeans speak English among their many languages. Holland coaches the USA on flood control. Vance Packard took note of "The Ugly American" long before Donald Trump leant his support to Brexit.
@Boomer: the book "The Ugly American" means nothing remotely like what you allege here.
2
Read the Wikipedia page on "Demagogue". While it never mentions Trump and uses only examples from distant history, it is amazing how it serves as a kind of playbook for Trump. I think it might be the only thing he ever seriously read all the way through.
2
If Trump is re-elected, we (born and raised in the US, white, sixty-something) will be leaving the country. From mass murders to hate crimes to fraudulent elections to corporate corruption to a crime mob running much of government, this is not the country we’ve known and loved.
It’s a shame. Our Founding Fathers put strong safeguards in place, but human greed for wealth and power is apparently stronger.
2
Come now, Ross, the disgrace is not exceptional at all. It's widely shared. In fact, practically the entire Republican Party enables it and so shares in it.
2
Political labels and philosophies of any stripe have taken a back seat to the power of the new moneyed class as exemplified by Jeffery Epstein who managed to evade justice, notwithstanding his voracious atrociously heinous crimes.
As we know, Trump has no ideology as such. He’s a fraudster who’ll pull a fast one over anyone to enhance himself. He’s also the result of the power of unrestricted money in politics. With control of the press, eg Fox News, the money class (Murdoch) can gloss over reality with pithy labels: “socialist”, “exceptionalism”, “anti American”, and so on... in the mean time, as you well point out, the country is being destroyed and ceding global leadership to China. As long as the money launderers and crooks make a buck, nothing else matters.
3
In this context, the "city upon a hill" metaphor makes me think of mountaintop removal coal mining, as it's done in Appalachia. Rip the top off the mountain, strip out what's valuable, and leave behind a pit and poisoned water. It's a pretty good metaphor for the Trump administration.
I've always thought of conservatives as people who found reasons to do nothing about much of anything. The free market was the panacea. Trump is different. He not only doesn't strive to make things better, he finds creative ways to ruin anything that's good – national parks for example; also, the air we breathe and the water we drink.
Trump's Law: if it can be made worse, I will make it worse. And I will hire the best bad people to do it.
5
Another conservative columnist who refuses to label Trump as a racist and a corrupt fraud. All the political philosophy and discussion of nationalism cannot disguise that.
As for the political philosophy, let's unpack Douthat's assertion that "The modern conservative movement — at its most idealistic, at least — was organized to defend genuinely distinctive features of American life: our unique mix of commercial dynamism, religious zeal, communitarian affections and decentralist suspicion of the state."
Commercial dynamism equals crony capitalism and corporate welfare.
Religious zeal equals religious and social intolerance.
Communitarian affections equals segregation and white supremacy.
Decentralist suspicion of the state equals send more Federal money to states than they pays in taxes but don't tell the states what to do with the money.
Conservatism has always been a hypocritical cover story for maintaining the status quo for the white, male plutocracy. The arc of Republican conservatism from Nixon to Trump has just gotten meaner and more effective at shifting money and power from poor, working, and middle class people of all ethnicities upwards to the top 0.1%, the true elite of elites.
4
"And in the shadow of that Trumpian un-exceptionalism a far more interesting debate about what ails America has opened up on the right, one that acknowledges more of the failures that exceptionalism encouraged (misguided military adventures, above all), and the problems of stratification, stagnation and social breakdown that it often overlooked."
I must have missed that debate!
In what cobwebbed corner of the GOP debating society did it takes place?
Alll I see is a bunch of conserevative sheep being herded by a dangerous imbecile into ruin and their ultimate oblivion.
All i hear is the united evangelical singing of the praises of a president not worthy of even life itself!
2
Trump and Republicans are about WHITE NATIONALISM/SUPREMACY. It is both interesting and dismaying watching conservative intellectuals and commentators trying to somehow create some sort of ideological framework for what the modern Republican party is: a racist, reactionary party, which it has been for a long time. Trump finally removed the mask.
2
Love it or leave it?
I think rather that the message is:
Love HIM or leave it.
2
Trumpy speaks what most Republicans think. Therein lies his appeal.
2
Historically this will be recorded as the "Venomous Presidency" which was devoid of honesty, principle, honor, compassion,class, etc. ...... which were all replaced by a snake oil salesperson whose only purpose was near-psychotic self-aggrandizement at the expense of the nation whom he was supposed to serve. One can only hope that along the perilous way our citizenry/elected officials came to their senses and held him to account on election day and in criminal proceedings thereafter. God Bless America.
3
"You were a socialist if you doubted the perfection of our health care system, part of the mooching “47 percent” if you didn’t think a capital-gains tax cut would solve the working-class’s social crisis, an appeaser if you doubted the wisdom of a maximally hawkish foreign policy."
Very well put, Mr. Douthat.
Now do you still think that the Republican party will someday try to actually solve some of our problems? May be time to knock off the Charlie Brown schtick.
2
It is obvious to any person actually paying attention, that it is Trump and his Republican enablers who need to "go back" into private life where they do not have the same ability to spread the viruses of anti-Semitism, racism, and hatred. As voters, it is up to us to send them back and re-affirm what is good about America.
1
Trump is not a nationalist. He is an extreme narcissist who commands national attention because he is the president. This enables him to satisfy his unhealthy egoistic tendencies on the largest scale possible. Every failure is either declared a victory or ignored by creating yet one more crisis.
MAGA is a clever misnomer. America never needed to be great or made great again. It is what it is (frequently a study in confusion). It is Trump who needs to be "great." We know this every time he declares himself the most successful and best president ever.
His stunts will continue to be praiseworthy to those who foolishly fall for them. Each stunt, however, brings diminishing returns and costs him votes. Surely his latest dust up is appalling to many of those who voted for him in 2016. As Lincoln said you can't fool all the people all the time.
1
I was glad to see the following comments in this comment, and hope more conservatives will acknowledge it:
“Obama-era conservatism that decided that anyone unhappy with Republican governance was just an ingrate who didn’t deserve the American experiment:
“You were a socialist if you doubted the perfection of our health care system, part of the mooching ‘47 percent’ if you didn’t think a capital-gains tax cut would solve the working-class’s social crisis, an appeaser if you doubted the wisdom of a maximally hawkish foreign policy.”
1
Our exceptionalism used to be our republican, democratic, and non-monarchial form of government, back when our country was founded and we were pretty unique. By the last century we were no longer so unique or exceptional. We were exceptionally large and rich. We had a unique empire that rested on economics rather than ideology or citizenship or direct rule, but it was an empire that was inconsistent with our proclaimed ideals.
Our unique mix of commercial dynamism, religious zeal, communitarian affections (from which blacks and others were excluded by law and custom), and decentralist suspicion of the state generally did not include a decentralist suspicion of large businesses. This left large businesses free to sabotage or stifle dynamisms that threatened them, gain controlling influence on many parts of the state, destroy the communitarian affections expressed by labor unions, and abandon whole parts of the country in their pursuit of profit. Finance was free to crash the economy without punishment and get made whole.
The modern, reality-based conservative movement lives on in the moderate wing of the Democratic party. Our official conservative movements, both trumpsters and never-trumps, have lost contact with reality, believing instead in voodoo economics, the end of racism among white people, and the ability of everybody to be better than average by really trying (which amounts to believing that anyone who is not better than average is not really trying).
5
Mr. Trump and other of the MAGA crowd have reduced it all down to a glib statement. For me, when confronted with MAGA statements, I hit back with WMAG questions. What Makes America Great? Benchmarking, which is what Peter Thiel is doing, is an effective tool to address concrete issues and helps to identify deficiencies in process and outcome. It is a standard management tool used to prevent companies from becoming so insular and sclerotic that they cannot respond to or even generate market movements.
But for cultural and political purists in the Republican (and Democratic) party such kinds of introspection would effectively lead to a problem solving exercise that would require stepping out of the echo chamber to an evidence based world. Both have become the party of do nothings and know nothings since their ideology are completely tied up in maintaining what they perceive to be an exceptional status quo. In reality it is quite unexceptional.
Both legacy parties are too tied into their narrow, ultra-individualistic view of life to have any kind of communitarian let alone a national outlook. A more prudent third party made up of what I call centrist progressives (Elizabeth Warren best example) make attempts at identifying recalcitrant national problems and providing a solution. Disagree with the details of the proposed solutions but there is no doubt that they have recognized the essential problems.
I agree. Mr. Trump appears to thrive cultivating hostility, mistrust and disrespect. It is the job of EVERY Congressional Representative and US Senator to diligently and passionately represent the interests of their constituents. It is their job to question and ponder over the effectiveness of our current laws. Perhaps some Congressional Representatives could have used more constructive language when asking these hard questions. For example, the questions and challenges ALL of our government needs to tackle the existing problems with the ACA are complex. TWITTER is not the forum to address these issues. WE THE PEOPLE along with our government representatives can improve accessibility to effective, accessible and affordable health care for all US Citizens. Our existing system is by no means perfect at this point in time but frankly, thousands of citizens dealing with preexisting medical conditions are thankful for the strides that were made during the Obama years. RE: Immigration. Again, the challenges are complex. EVERY CITIZEN of this country who does not claim North American Native American Heritage needs to realize that historically their background involves immigration. Democracy is messy. WE ALL must embrace this and realize that alienating citizens with inflammatory accusations and simplified Twitter retorts does NOT foster positive solutions. WE THE PEOPLE must embrace this reality. More importantly, Donald Trump needs to embrace this reality.
2
“American exceptionalism”? Surely you jest. We have the world’s largest economy, a mere 330 million residents or so, and a purportedly ‘representative’ government. Yet we also have:
A President elected by a minority of those who voted, who in turn comprise a minority of the eligible voters; a man whose conduct and ‘policies’ are loathed by a strong majority of us and who humiliates us on the world stage.
The world’s most bloated military budget, as large as the next ten nations in line combined.
The most expensive health care among all ‘advanced nations,’ with the most inequitable availability of care, along with declining life expectancy, rising infant mortality and other adverse outcomes.
Millions of young people mired in debt for higher education that is provided to academically qualified students virtually free in other ‘advanced nations.’
Rotting infrastructure.
A government mired in debt as a result of tax cuts enacted for the benefit of a small number of the nation’s wealthiest individuals and corporations; and as a result of the decision to squander trillions on ill-advised, ill-fated wars.
Toxic income inequality as a direct result of government tax and fiscal policy since adoption of the repeatedly disproven ‘supply side’ myth.
Over 30,000 deaths from gunfire, and tens of thousands more maimed per year - with a rational solution barred by big-money lobbying and a tormented interpretation of the 2nd Amendment to a Constitution drafted nearly 250 years ago.
9
@chambolle
Sadly, due to the imposed restriction on space, your list is woefully restricted in naming in their entirety our nation's shortcomings.
3
Sounds like Germany of the 1930's to me. Too many are just waiting for the "knock on their door."
4
Douthat-- the Times's most consistently acute observer-- is absolutely right that the ideology of "exceptionalism" has caused great harm to America and the world on which we have attempted to impose our values. And that goes for the Clintons as much as for the Bushes.
If "nationalism" means a frank assessment of the state of the nation and a primary concern with it rather than the world as a whole, fine. But for that we don't really need nationalists: we need people who will make it a more just and self-aware nation, people like Sanders and Warren, for example.
3
Could it be that we are not a great as we are told? Great leaders,people who do heroic acts don’t strut around bragging what a wonderful job they did. They are often quite humble about their accomplishments. Yes this nation is the economic engine that leads the world but as a world leader in many ways we have failed. Vietnam,the ill fated middle eastern policies, the interference in local governments and election in numerous countries particularly South America are not great acts of leadership but more often acts of a self centered foreign policy that is not in the interests of a better world.
4
I would like to raise two points: First Mr. Douthat completely and I believe purposely avoided White Nationalism to which most right wing conservatives aspire to it and are delighted to have Trump leading the charge. The second point is Mr. Douthat did not present any empirical data to support that any form of nationalism leads to strengthening of democracy, rule of law and in the long run improvement of middle class and poor people economic status and quality of life. I am pleased that Mr. Douthat is unhappy with Mr. Trump version of nationalism but should have had the courage to call and label Trump as racist who using White Nationalism to stay in the office.
2
Douthat walks right up to the line of his Republican Party’s essential dishonesty in its thirst for unbridled power and wealth, then slips backward into the easy, sleazy storylines of so-called conservatism in America. Take his statement “even as they chest-thumped about their own patriotism and the perfidy of liberalism, conservative politicians didn’t seem to be actually cultivating or sustaining the things their ideology claimed to be defending”, replace “didn’t seem to be” with “were never”, and you have the truth of Republicans.
Party-approved false narratives abound in Douthat’s fable. Commercial dynamism? A euphemism for a robber barron class’s privilege to ignore their workers health and safety and the environmental damage they do. Religious zeal? The false thin tissue of Christianity covering the cudgel used against “the other”. Communitarian affections? Just more identitarian politics. Decentralist suspicion of the state? Republicans love using the state to redistribute wealth upwards through tax policy, and never hesitate to place its jackbooted heel on the throat of any Americans whose looks or actions deviate from the Republican norms. And the only Republican debate taking place is what new false narrative will best con the credulous into voting for them.
Maybe some day in the future, perhaps as a deathbed conversion, Douthat will develop a conscience, walk up to the line, step over it, and write an honest column about the Republican Party.
4
I am in Quebec where the economy has never been better and our center right government is still popular after a year in office and nationalism is an important part of all Quebec governments.
We are however a liberal democracy and racism is strictly a no no and nationalism has moved from DNA and a long history to inculturation and citizenship.
At 71 I remember who Reagan was and the hatred of the early 50s the 1964 takeover of the GOP by Goldwater, Nixon, Reagan and the purveyors of hate and racial entitlement and advocates intimidation. I remember Philadelphia Mississippi and still say if America was still the beacon on the hill Washington's airports would be named after James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and James Schwerner.
Quebec works even with the nationalism which keeps us from being the best we can be, we insist that religion has no business in the public spaces of our overwhelmingly secular humanist society.
I still remember the all powerful churches that provided health education and welfare in my youth in an ultraconservative society. I still believe Reagan was evil and as much as I believe in the banality of evil Reagan was truly evil.
1
Very nice article Mr. Douthat. This brings a bit of clarity to all the giant trucks I've been seeing lately with huge American flags flying from their beds. Good to know that without Trump and Fox "News," most of these folks would go about their days focusing on family and friends, as opposed to constantly masking their racism with nationalist "patriotism." This irritated state of patriotism has a single, easy cause, and that's Trump's instillation of pride and perceived superiority in white, racial identity. That's all this whole nationalism-populism business is about.
6
American exceptionalism is based on the aspirational assertion that "all men are created equal", which attracts the best and brightest from around the world, to help take America into the future.
Trump's brand of nationalism is awarding white Christian men higher status, just as they do in Europe. It is debasing American exceptionalism.
Trump's cult of personality threatens to make American power appear unprincipled, which weakens us and makes the world less safe.
2
The question "How Does My Country Compare to Other Countries" can be answered in innumerable ways that are both positively constructed and driven to improve the current state. Such an assessment is not only required but in fact a healthy antidote to narrow minded nationalism and jingoism.
However, when the question instead turns to "Why Does My Country Look Like This", as in now being constructed within the Republican party and its various think tanks (and might I add including you Mr. Douthat), then it opens up the opportunity for negative and bigoted commentary especially with those seeking to lay blame for our social gaps.
Moreover, the notion of America as a country that effectively separated religion from the state has always been false. Not only is professing trust and faith in Christianity and its various edicts an expected part of our national psyche but so is acknowledging the professed superiority of the Caucasian heritage of our nation.
Such notions are under increasing pressure to succumb to the expanding diversity of our country be it ethnic, religious, sexual orientation or some other label that we wear.
As with all groups that fight and protest the oncoming downfall of their dominance, the Caucasian group is doing its bit. And it looks and feels bigoted, unjust, filthy and pathologically ill constructed.
The Nationalist corrective that you mention should be viewed within that lens. Not some other euphemistic notion that you choose to direct us to.
3
Ironic then, that Trump is demonizing “the squad” for pointing out just where our country is failing many of its citizens, even as they attempt to fix some of these problems.
2
Well done again Mr. Douthat. Excellent analysis - and spot on that the nationalist in the Oval Office remains an exceptional disgrace.
I'm no historian but it seems to me that every "empire" had it's period of exceptionalism before it disintegrated due to often avoidable human mistakes guided by greed, fear, or hatred of "the other." Looks like America's turn at leading the world in some of the best ways is coming to a crashing halt rather than the slow crumble that was previously evident. Extremism isn't good for anyone....
2
Ross, surely you see and understand that Trump's campaign was not based on any empirical belief, outside the sphere of partisan politics, that the United States has lost its exceptional place in the world. It was based solely on the idea that LIBERALS were giving away that exceptional place, and that the ONLY thing conservative voters had to do to fix that was to elect Trump. That paradigm allowed him to get elected and proceed to completely ignore anything he'd said on the campaign trail that wasn't convenient for his 1% donors. Trump's base, meanwhile, firmly believes that they made America great again simply by casting one ballot.
3
@gmg22 Or by wearing a red hat.
1
Peter Thiel is leveling accusations of treason against Google.
I'm not sure if they'll find that, but I fully expect that some of what he says will be found to be true. I believe there's a unique confluence of naiveté and greed in many Silicon Valley companies that makes them very vulnerable to spying by foreign nations.
We know it even happens in government. There's nothing racially-motivated about this concern!
What I would really like to hear from Mr. Douthat and his enlightened nationalists is not dissertations about the loss of exceptionalism, but specifically what do they think are the problems that ail America and keeps it from being exceptional again?
The loss of religious fervor?
The breakdown of traditional marriage?
The acceptance of the LGBT movement?
Too many women in the workforce and too few in the kitchen?
Or maybe, the loss of the Sony Walkman?
2
I don't see how elitism is synonymous with exceptionalism. It isn't as though pre-Trump conservatives were carrying out the exceptionalist ideology to its maximal extent and that's now why we're in the situation that we are. Rather, they were hypocrites.
I also don't see how obsessively comparing ourselves to the rest of the world based on a variety of multivariate and subjective international rankings is the way to approach the country's problems.
There are problems America has that will not be fixed by superimposing the top-down policies of other countries onto it whether it be gun violence, health care, wealth taxes, or porn addiction.
The way we divide power and commit to the skepticism of concentrated power is the single characteristic that makes America exceptional. It's disappointing that Ross and others appear to be abandoning that under a false premise of what ails the country.
As a federation, we as Americans have greater power to influence our surroundings on a state and local level than many developed and developing countries do. If our media would acknowledge that and relent from nationalizing every conversation and artificially raising the stakes of our politics, we'd have a more conducive social and political environment wherein progress can be achieved.
2
And so, the next piece for Douthat to explore: Among the right wing we have a debate about the problems in our national society and the ways we might address them. In other words, some segment of the right wing of American politics begins to echo -- perhaps consciously but hardly with attribution -- arguments and ideas offered by progressives for decades.
1
If you’re arguing in favor of a ‘nationalist’ perspective, then I would argue that you may have missed the point of learning about Napoleon Bonaparte.
Admittedly, language changes over time, but every nationalist movement since the nineteenth century has been one of needless death and destruction.
Nationalism justifies the individual belief that a person’s life can be of higher value than another person’s, simply because of the flag that they were born under. There are few political ideologies which are so perverse in their nature as this.
2
The fable of the bee. Mandeville :" Private vices make public virtues . "
Today philosophers know that it is a terrible conception.
1
One thing that genuinely confuses me in this piece is the supposed opposition of 'nationalism' to 'exceptionalism', in particular the idea that 'nationalism' entails a healthy pragmatic criticism of the nation.
Any definition I have ever studied of "nationalism" usually involves a belief in the superiority of one's own country (our country is better than other countries) - and certainly not a dominant sentiment of 'our country is flawed but fixable'.
And while I get that Douthat is writing about conservatism, what he describes as a 'healthy debate on the right' is honestly probably better exemplified by (Douthat will hate my for this) the Warren-AOC-Kaepernick school of thought that goes " I criticise this country because I love it and want it to be better".
3
Mr. Douthat is uncharacteristically cogent in this piece, and what he says of American populism could be extended to populists of different stripes in power in other counties.
They all base their appeal in rabid nationalism (expressed here as exceptionalism) plus scapegoating some maligned minority they present as the source of all the nation's evils.
Unfortunately, things are not so easy to solve as "kick out the troublemakers", and that's why populism, after the application of their initial recipe (mild discrimination), without any real gain for their followers, have to either a) double down (and go into much more sinister territories, turning discrimination into outright repression) or b) get kicked out of office.
Unless they've rigged the system to perpetuate their rule, and then the lack of option b) ends up forcing them unto a)
May find a more detailed analysis here: http://purebarbell.blogspot.com/2018/09/the-allure-of-populism-and-demise-of.html
One of the first scholars of nationalism was the Catholic Carlton J.H. Hayes. His last book, a little summary of his life's work entitled "Nationalism: A Religion" made a useful distinction between "patriotism," a quiet, dignified love of country and "nationalism" which he defined as "patriotic snobbery." It was a good distinction. Patriotism can be recognized in the words of the song "It's a Grand Old Flag": "...Every heart beats true/'Neath the red, white and blue/Where's there's never a boast nor brag." Nationalism can be recognized in the phrase, "My country: right or wrong," which Gilbert Keith Chesterton said was like saying "My mother, drunk or sober." Trump and his supporters are a bunch of drunk mothers.
4
ross: why can't you simply say "the racist in the Oval Office"? your column parses words when it should be direct and honest.
2
A long and tedious way to go to get to the last line: "But the nationalist in the oval office remains, unfortunately, an exceptional disgrace." Took a while but you finally got there Ross. Next time start with that idea and tell us how you propose to remove him, before its too late.
7
Funny how Ross and other republicans can suddenly parse the meaning of 'nationalism'. They aren't NEARLY so interested in the actual definitions of any other ideology, have you noticed? Funny how Democratic Socialism is 100% destructive, Communism is 100% dangerous, Global trade concepts are 100% stupid, Democrats are 100% wrong. Anything not-trump is 100% traitor.
White nationalism? Well, now! THAT'S full of virtues and vices, huh? See, according to republicans, there's a whole lot of good in fascism or totalitarianism, that's overlooked, and strength blah blah Look! A Clinton!
"Go back where you came from, darkie" and "no dark immigrants messing up our white homeland". Suddenly we need to parse whether trump is 100% a racist, or maybe it's ok cuz only 79%? If you hate Muslims too, maybe it's 100% good! Shame.
Shame. Shame. Shame. We need to trade our beloved Statue of Liberty in, I guess. We do not stand united with all our brothers and sisters. The government truly IS coming for one group, and if you think they'll stop at one, you deserve what's coming. Suddenly, the local big-belly-boy armed local militia might think YOU aren't sufficiently loyal to DearLeader. Maybe you mentioned in public that Putin is a jerk. Maybe your wife's job as a teacher makes her vulnerable to 'traitorspeak'.
Ross, parse it as you want. This is exactly how Democracy slides. Remember, before Hitler convinced the Germans that they were victims of Jewish meanness, Germany was a democracy too.
3
"Once Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush believed in America as the leader of the free world, the shining city on a hill"
Hoo-boy, Ross, you began sucking down that KoolAid much earlier than I expected. Explains a lot.
Its clear, for example, you never understood what modern American Conservatism is about, or the vile strategies it employs to get what it wants.
It appears you believe Trump and the wasteland that is your party are an aberration, a blip from which your side will recover once the fever passes.
Uh-uh, big boy.
This is your future home; it s going to get much worse as the intellectual pillars of your formerly acceptable party melt into the mainstream.
Already one sees the moral collapse of Susan Collins, Patrick Toomey and their sorry ilk. Souls brave and slippery enough to claim they're only going along because somebody fooled them or lied to them. Going, going...
Their ruse just a tad too obvious, they inadvertently make themselves suspect among true believers, and therefor suspected, just as the Lemming Standard takes effect.
The politics of mockery, spitefulness edging toward institutionalized violence ("Edging", did I say?), the demand for some fake national unity on every score, that's your future. That's what you gave us.
You have one choice: join that vile parade, or put an end to it and start over, with eyes more able to see where rampant "Conservatism" and contempt for the real founding values of your country takes you.
8
Enough of the pseudo-intellectual musings about nationalism and conservatism, both terms undefined and undefinable. Who cares? The author is just arranging deck chairs on the Titanic.
How about a column calling Trump out for the fascist that he is? An heir to no one's view of America except his own, and the sick, depraved individuals who spew hate from Breitbart, such as Steve Bannon.
When Trump and his loathsome "family" are gone, we can talk about the kind of America we want to be. Right now, we are unrecognizable to either friend or foe, at home and abroad.
Pen a column on the clear and present danger to our democracy, please. And the need to show Trump the door at the earliest possible moment.
8
@alexander hamilton
Hear! Hear! You're not designated a NYT Picks because you employed the dread accusation, "Fascist." But that's what he is, a Fascist. Trump learned long ago that he can be whoever and whatever he wants to be, openly, and not be accused of it by entities aiming to set a higher standard. Unfortunately for the NYT their competitors on The Right have no such qualms. And Trump? He just denies he is who he is and goes about being a Fascist because hey, that's what a sociopath does. He hasn't literally shot anyone and gotten away with it, but he does it figuratively every day. Anyone who can read this list and deny Trump's racism and Fascism can also believe the moon will fall out of the sky:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/15/opinion/leonhardt-trump-racist.html
1
Draft a primary challenger. Either everyone ashamed of his demagoguery supports a primary challenge, or we can assume Donald Trump speaks for the Republican Party.
141
@Dan M
William Weld, former Governor of Massachusetts, has already mounted a primary challenge for the Republican nomination.
It's a shame we haven't heard more about his run (he should be remembered for more than his stint as Gary Johnson's 2016 Libertarian running mate). He's smart, speaks in full sentences and has no heart-full-of-hatred issues -- an improvement over what the party nominated last time out.
It might be prudent for some Democrats and Trump-averse Independents to send him some campaign contributions!
16
@Dan M I think it is well documented that he owns the GOP. Its members simply choose to overlook Trump's outrageous behavior in order to help their rich donors.
16
@Dan M That ship--actually a galley--sailed a long time ago. A glowering, whip-wielding Trump struts back and forth between the benches while McConnell, Graham, Barr and the others keep pulling their oars.
15
Trump has shown the world the true meaning of American exceptionalism. We are exceptionally stupid for allowing this ignorant, unfit buffoon into the White House.
9
The only thing that can hold together a nation of more than 300 million is a commitment to the common well being and some level of allegiance to a "more perfect union."
Ronald Reagan cited government as the problem. Grover Norquist (how did that fawning, mediocre mind get all this attention?) famously suggested we drown government in the bathtub.
Since then, increasingly, we have "conservative" society, with a president and Republicans in Congress who see the government as a problem, so don't do a damn thing but keep shoving its head under the bath water.
Nationalism and exceptionalism have little to do with it, Ross.
2
in America nationalism, unlike patriotism, expresses itself as racism. People like Ross are blind to that fact which in many ways stems from our failed denazification program, aka reconstruction. There is nothing else to say when the governor of Tennessee today issues a proclamation in praise of the traitorous racist murderer Bedford Forrest, butcher of fort pillow and KKK founder. the Germans would be ashamed to honor Eichmann or Goebbels. And let's not forget the part played by the times,
with its hypocritical (at best) demand for an honorable platform for the racism of the odious Charles Murray. the reenforcement of these two sickening phenomena, one for the other, demonstrates the intertwined nature of white supremacy. Trump instinctively knows this, and plays on it. The only recourse of the true Patriot is to reject dred scott nationalism in favor of the real American exceptionalism based on crispus attucks, Frederick Douglass, web dubois, sojourner truth, Martin Luther King, thurgood Marshall and Barrack Obama (among others). Scant chance of that however at the times, where Brooks celebrates the racist wf buckley, and Wapner celebrates the racist Charles Murray, and Stephens and kristof join hands to push for our best colleges to privilege antiblack racist speech. in the context of this reality, the kapernaeck rejection becomes largely understandable. I believe it's the wrong approach for the reasons given. I say with Norman Thomas: don't burn the flag, wash it.
1
The missing magic word here, Ross, is "white." It's White Nationalism that is being courted and is on display. It's White Nationalism that sees hope for its sad, angry, fearful, murderous anti-black/brown, anti-Jewish credo in Trump's hateful agenda.
4
This attempt to put an intellectual veneer on nationalism is absurd. What agenda does this attempt serve? In Trumpworld, nationalism equals racism. It's just that simple.
2
While this is an interesting intra-ideological debate, it has little to do with the reality of Donald J. Trump. Trump does appear now to be a full-on racist. He is also a full-on narcissist who will attack anyone or any institution he believes is his persecutor. While the white nationalists are fully taking advantage of this moment in time; please do not confuse Trump for a nationalist. He is an emotionally unstable man who uses anyone; including the world's worst actors, to achieve his own self-gratification.
It really is that simple.
227
@Bryan "please do not confuse Trump for a nationalist."
That's really the salient point.
Oh, sure, Trump is a nativist who despises immigrants unless they're from Norway. But as racist as he is, as anti-immigrant as he is, that's not really a motivator for anything he does.
Trump is above all a Trumpist. His primary motivation is always what's in it for him. Will it make him richer, or will it stroke his ego. The latter is if anything the stronger motivation, since he's so visibly insecure that he needs constant reassurance that he's the best at everything.
His nationalism is largely a side effect, because giving vent to his inner racist makes his base cheer. He loves that cheering, and he can't get enough. No other President has gone to election rallies only months after taking office, and he did it because he was suffering cheering withdrawal.
30
@Bryan I think you're underestimating him. He knows that stoking white racial anxiety is his ticket to re-election. I don't think it's gonna work but it is an actual strategy, however clumsily deployed.
11
@Gus
I have to agree with much of your comment. I find it rather pathetic that the man we are supposed to look up to needs to be constantly told he the greatest the best of the U.S.
That truly is a point of major concern for me. And yes my past involves me being bullied until my senior year of high school then I grew bigger and stronger many of the bullies did not recognize me.
The things I responded to bullying all of a sudden were acknowledged and some backed me up.
After high school I couldn't deal with college I did go for about 2 years but there was always the fear that the bullies would come after me.
Then I married a person I considered the best of humans. By the best I mean beautiful beyond belief someone I never thought would be interested in me from that I learned while I am not the handsomest of men I was desired by another.
Mr Trump uses bullying to shutdown any criticism to his world view as well as how he sees himself.
That's classic traits of bullies I feel sorry for him and in terror of what he building.
Just a thought.
4
The most hilarious thing Americans say is that it is the greatest country in the history of the planet. Really? It’s just a young nation which is running itself into the ground in a mere 248(?) years. A bunch of unhappy and unhealthy people led by a carnival barker.
12
My, how Ross Douthat smudged the word “nationalism” to make it sound intellectual, to have it be about an “irritated state” with some “internal failing.”
George Orwell in “Politics and the American Language:” “The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink.”
Douthat’s op-ed is logically rendered and it is insincere.
“Nationalism” is a cover-up word. It is an “exhausted” idiom. It hides this ugly truth about America: we not only think America better than all other countries on earth, we believe we are, as individuals, better than all others.
Read Douthat’s essay again; replace “nationalism” with “racism.” His insincerity disappears.
To break the spell of inky exhausted insincere political writing, I read Toni Morrison and James Baldwin.
These lines are from Baldwin’s long poem, "Staggerlee Wonders.”
“The sons of greed, the heirs of plunder,
are approaching the end of their journey:
it is amazing that they approach without wonder,
as though they have, themselves, become
that scorched and blasphemed earth,
the stricken buffalo, the slaughtered tribes,
the endless, virgin, bloodsoaked plain,
the famine, the silence, the children's eyes,
murder masquerading as salvation, seducing
every democratic eye,
the mouths of truth and anguish choked with cotton,…”
Baldwin or Douthat?
3
The Republican party imploded. It was weighed down with great internal contradictions and Trump pricked the balloon.
A not so subtle pledge to the great unwashed to put Blacks, women and 'foreigners' in their place and at the same time trying to broaden their appeal beyond a diminishing older, white, non metro, religious and less educated population that was their base of support.
When the only arguments against their opponents that the Republican president and his BFF Republican Senator Graham can muster are that the Squad are communists, terrorists and anti American you can see the intellectual desert the Republicans live in.
8
It is a poor intellectual exercise to talk about the virtues of present day US conservatism without mentioning how it got conquered and now is managed by white supremacists and racists.
You have to acknowledge that conservatives have a problem and solve it before you start talking about any of its supposed virtues.
3
Nationalism - read white nationalism - is patriotism overrun by ignorance and hatred of 'other'. There is nothing exceptional about it.
5
Let's start being hones: This isn't "populism" or "nationalism." It's all-out fascism. Madeleine Albright, who was forced to flee the invasion of the German military into her native Czechoslovakia at the start of WW II, wrote a book titled "Fascism: A Warning." And the warning was for America because of the rise of Trump.
She pointed out that the harkening back to some mythical period of American greatness was exactly what Hitler did with his myth of Arian greatness, and what Mussolini did in harkening back to the greatness of Rome, which he promised to restore.
And just as the German and Italian fascists needed a weak minority to blame for the problems people were suffering, in their case Jews, Donald Trump is doing the same thing by blaming Hispanics, immigrants and, yes, Jews.
Ross Douthat and the rest of American media are covering up the frightening truth: this isn't nationalism or populism, but the advent of American fascism.
And we should be very afraid.
7
The ideal patriot is an angry white man. White men are able to speak out about problems without becoming the problem. The rest of us would-be patriots who speak up will be assailed as ungrateful or un-American.
6
The fairy tales of children are comforting to minds too frightened to think; there must be a pony below that stinking pile. But there is no such pony underneath and there is no upside to Trump. It will be difficult for folks such as RD to get clear about this, given his belief that holding power means defining what is sin and in whom. Jesus supposedly told us what marriage is and is not, as one example of his delusional thinking. Take for example RD's view that Feminism is a rejection of a Christian way of thinking. No. Model prisoners of this 'nail the sinner,' syndrome are just following Rd' and companies lead, only now they are nailing the white man, (he is all bad racist, a money and toy driven fool) who thought they, [Trump as the Great White hope] were the sole definers of sin. Fear not RD; we are all buying this hopeless sin loving narratives, and this is the tenor and substance of our political dysfunction. But again, these are positions of folks too tired to think clearly. Unless and until RD and really all of us, begin to see this, there is no hope, (It may be that Progressives are the most dense in this regard; but no, there really are no degrees of insanity, either you are sane or you are not). How about 'love your neighbor as yourself', not you and I are both hopeless sinners.
1
Discussing "nationalism", without once mentioning the insidious racism and xenophobia that has always accompanies it, severely compromises the credibility of Ross Douthat's column
3
"...a series of elite blunders."
are you referring to the Koch Brothers, Sheldon Adelson, who?
i love this "elite" trope. can you be more specific Ross, and you better hurry because the Brown Shirts will soon be marching in the streets.
2
Douthat is missing the one thing here you'd expect him to be expert in: utter shameless depravity.
What else does he see in the likes of Trump, McConnell and Graham?
And what do you say of those who, like Peter Thiel, finance it all?
1
America is becoming Germany, circa 1930-something, with malignant white nationalism metastasizing throughout the party in control of the government as the rest country and world look on in shock, and the 'good Americans' standing by, silent or whimpering quietly about the demise of 'American values'. If our political system does not soon vomit up the putrid trump administration and its minions in Congress, it will be fatally poisoned.
2
Trump IS a Racial Arsonist. Burn it ALL down, as long as he benefits. And he will. Who will stop him ???
Thanks, GOP.
3
Well said.
Three years ago when Douthat tweeted "Trump/Moldbug 2016" very few people took Trump or Moldbug at all seriously. When Douthat later linked, on multiple occasions, to the neo-fascist writer Nick Land, that was the first many of his readers had heard of this figure as well. For those who don't know, Moldbug nee Yarvin has consistently maintained that people of African descent are genetically suited to chattel slavery. At the end of his essay "The Dark Enlightenment" Nick Land explicitly equates the end of slavery in America with the end of freedom. No one has done more to normalize and promote the views the president now espouses on a regular basis than Ross Douthat. Even this column makes no effort to separate itself from Peter Thiel, who continues to gleefully and gladly support Trump. After a certain point it might be worth asking just how stupid Douthat thinks we are.
1
Ross, this is an excerpt from one of my essays, Size Matters, from 2010.
"Common sense tells me that patriotism in our time must be redefined so that it includes a sense of loyalty to the people with whom you share a country - not because they're better than anyone else, or because God allegedly loves them more, but simply because this is the extended family that we were all born into, and are best able to contribute to. Ancestor worship may float your boat but ancestor worship will not put bread on anyone's table, nor better equip America to meet the challenges of a global marketplace and workforce. Either we put our heads together, and begin thinking nationally - as every other advanced industrial society already does - or we consider our options in the aftermath of what is likely to be a painful, traumatic divorce."
I am a liberal nationalist. In the era of globalism run amok, I simply do not see an alternative to being one.
Trump is not a nationalist, he's a narcissist. Furthermore, a party that prizes markets and profits over the well-being of its citizens cannot be a nationalist party.
The dark side of American nationalism was this idiotic belief in exceptionalism. The Founding Generation was indeed exceptional, especially for their time. We're not exceptional, not in any positive way with either a Dubya / Cheney or Trump at our head, especially for our time.
If the truth be told, with leadership like this, we're a colossal embarrassment.
The Founders weep.
1
Caught up in all of the debate about nationalism is the issue of gaslighting. Donald Trump is callously manipulating his supporters with the convenient use of bromides that seem to signal his belief in America, while all the while turning his back on the very fundamentals that made this nation great.
That he does so with apparent glee while denigrating his opponents stems from his alt-reality view of the world, and his blatantly malicious willingness to masterfully deceive the gullible among us. Appropriating words like exceptionalism panders to his symbol-receptive base, while he simultaneously seeks to eviscerate the very structures that actually made America great.
It has long been said that the devil is in the details. It has recently been said, also, that the devil may just be in the White House.
1
A critique of exceptionalism is not in itself a definition of nationalism. You might as well define the critique of exceptionalism as “puppies” or “petunias”... or go ahead and make up a word.
Nationalism is to weighted with a negative history to be given a facelift.
2
Where did this evil come from in man and why don’t you see it or read about it in our history books when it comes to women. Man has been promoted and protected by the church as far back as burning witches at the stake for being healers. The church has nurtured this belief in man as an image of god, a protector, a warrior, a slayer, a conqueror. Our history books are filled with the atrocities of man vs man, now is the time for the better angel. A women
1
This is simply not the time for an impassioned defense of nationalism. It acts really very much like the distractive
techniques of our President, and it ends up with good readers
wasting their time and energy on comments
Perhaps the only way to respond such a consistent pattern of distraction on the part of this columnist is through shunning.
Goodbye, dear Mr. Douhat, and all good fortune to you.
"You would judge a nationalist movement the way you would judge any man or group of men in an agitated state."
nope.
You would judge a nationalist movement the way you would judge any man or group of men who inculcate an agitated state.
4
By writing, "our unjustified narcissism," Douthat seems to be saying that there are times when narcissism is justified, but not now.
1
Nationalism is a mental illness shared by millions who need to blame others for their lives of quiet and not so quiet desperation. The impulse to believe in American exceptionalism is just another ism that one day will be a wasm. In the mouths of authoritarians like Trump or Nixon, nationalism stinks like a ruptured tumor and always leads to violence. Jefferson understood the roles each of tyrants and patriots and the irony shouldn’t be lost that our so-called exceptionalism has been predicated on fighting deadly undemocratic regimes such as the one Trump dreams of day and night. Given more years of his demonstrable incompetence this nation will be finished as a model of anything; instead he will have cursed us with the unforgiving memory of racism that crosses the history of the country since before it was a country. Nationalism always ends badly and often in streets running with blood. I smell cordite in the air, brethren, and it burns my nostrils.
4
I fail to see any redeeming qualities of nationalism whatsoever.
In whatever country it rears its ugly head, it has always been a negative, inward-looking, xenophobic force, eventually pressed into service by fascist-sympathizers as a tool of repression, and preservation of privilege and status quo.
2
Methinks thou dost mispercieve what Trump and his base base believe. Far from thinking the U.S. is dark and nasty, they believe they are the U.S. and they are walking in the light; that it is the Democrats, i.e., anyone who is not mesmerized by The Con Man, who make up the dark and nasty.
2
We got spirit,
Yes we do,
We got spirit,
How ‘bout you?
I waited throughout this babble to see if Douthat would use one simple word, 'racism'. I guess that he doesn't see white nationalism as racism. I guess my subscription goes to further the ends of the clerico-fascism that Ross demands where being European and Christian are part of what it means to be an American. Ross is oh so polite with his hateful message, but polite people can bring down a democracy as easily as those who are crude. How long and how far is this going to go....by Ross and his party? When Trump is screaming racist epithets at his rallies will we hear Ross just repeat these style points? Enough!
1
Nationalism has no virtues.
Like racism or religious fundamentalism, it is a manifestation of tribalism, and its objective is to diminish the others and benefit its own. And like the other two it needs ignorance, lies and hate to flourish.
160
@Javier Borrajo Indeed. Nationalism never is about the needs of the nation and fundamentalism never focuses on the true fundamentals.
14
@Javier Borrajo
Agreed!
5
@Javier Borrajo
People are the same everywhere, right? ;)
1
Growing up, I thought America was the one place where the world's oppressed and persecuted people could go for refuge. I thought we were one of the few places with free and open elections, a free press, and freedom to openly disagree with the government.
This has all evaporated into the ether.
Trump has removed our exceptionalism, in all the places where it was righteous and true.
204
@Geno But this was never true. Voter suppression, McCarthyism and "walking-around money" kept lots of people from exercising the franchise and speaking their minds. Let's not get so misty-eyed about the 1950s and '60s.
2
@Geno - well let's be clear about this: America is far from being the only place where oppressed and persecuted people could go for refuge. In my country we just doubled our refugee quota this year and we are going to double it again.
There are 88 countries currently rated as "free" by FreedomHouse.org with regards to free press, free elections etc. That's 45% out of 195 countries.
So take heart! Plenty of counties are more liberal and progressive than the United States, to put it mildly.
11
@Geno
We STILL have free and open elections, a free press (look at the Times!), and free speech certainly still exists.
As far as the world's oppressed and persecuted, most of the people crossing our borders, even legally, don't fall in these categories. They are economic refugees.
Over half the people in the world live in “poverty” (over 5 billion, 15 times our entire U.S. population, exist on $10 or less per day), and we can’t solve that problem by allowing them to immigrate here.
3
"In other words, the problems that brought me to power can’t be problems any more now that I’m in charge — which requires, in turn, that anyone who insists that there actually are still problems must be the problem themselves."
Ross, you hint at but never fully come out with it: Donald Trump, on daily basis, creates his own reality.
It must be hard to write a serious column about nationalism and conservatism, when the president doesn't fit either rubric.
He reminds me more of "l'etat, c'est moi" of ancient regimes, that in his own mind, nothing matters but what he's done in his own mind.
Never mind that the ICE raids never happened--if he said they did, and were ongoing, it must be true.
So, yes the problems bedeviling America are still there, but Trump has created new ones, which to him are totally caused by the "others" he loves to demonize.
At some point, conservatives and nationalist Republicans will realize what the demonized Democrats already have: our government, including genuine leadershisp, is evaporating in the egomanical personality of Donald Trump.
265
@ChristineMcM "He reminds me more of "l'etat, c'est moi" of ancient regimes"
Trump's surprisingly literal in his belief that he is the state. Normally that's rhetoric in this day and age, but he's frequently talked about any criticism of him as being "treason." He has, in the past, attempted to pressure the justice department into prosecuting political enemies for the crime of being his political enemies.
Further, whenever he says "treason," which he does frequently enough, it's never, ever about about an action that hurts the country. It's only about something that impacted him in some way.
There's no question that in his mind, the two are inseparable now. He is the state, and the state is Trump.
27
@ChristineMcM
You are so correct Trump “creates his own reality”. So obvious but what is confounding is how his supporters, White House staff and elected officials seem to be buying into his reality despite what is before their eyes. He is a master manipulator, narcissist and conman extraordinaire. Truly a remarkable feat.
Watching this unfold is like watching a train wreck in slow motion. Will America wake up? Or will 40+% of America’s population continue to follow like sheep and not question the emperor? Where has people’s critical thinking gone? Was it ever there?
18
@Liz McDougall I'm afraid it's to late. The country will never return to it's potential greatness. A permanent stain (Trump and his supporters) on our country. MAGA-how obsence.
5
What, exactly, are the conservative policy proposals that address any of our current problems? Health care? Crickets (other than ending the ACA). Immigration? A wall. The deficit? Cut social programs. Opioid addiction? Crickets. The environment? Drill. Education? Infrastructure? Is there anything besides the perennial demand for privatization? These are the policies that are going to save a country? I am still waiting for Reagan's supply-side economics to trickle down to the parched but ever-patient working class.
509
The way privatization works now is to dismantle civilization. Public-private partnerships have done good things sometimes, and have been disappointing most of the time. Privatizing prisons and the army (Blackwater) is a form of returning to slavery and mercenaries. Anti-gun control is about dismantling civilization once again: instead of giving up small (and illusory) private freedom in exchange for much greater public freedom, private guns means might makes right. Charter schools are disappointing and can’t be scaled up to produce better results, but they can be used to remove union protections for teachers, another example of loss of civilization. And so on.
59
@maggie The issue is the Republican voters and the disaffected other voters. The first vote to hurt someone -- minorities, women who want to control their bodies and have a discussion with their God about it, poor people who didn't get the breaks that others did, because all who are successful got a break PLUS worked hard -- and the other group just feels hopeless. That's why Obama's campaign resonated, it was hopeful, albeit not fully sketched out. Trump is all about circling the wagons and laying blame. The Republican voter loves that.
25
@maggie Actually, in our history many people have chosen to “go back” because they did not want to stay in the US.
Between 1822 and the Civil War about 15,000 African Americans, most of them freed slaves, chose to be repatriated to Liberia, which ultimately became the first independent democratic republic in African history. The travel cost of the repatriation was paid by the US government, religious organizations and private donors.
After the Civil War released slaves were also eligible to receive $100 from the US government if they wished to emigrate to Haiti or Liberia or "...such other country beyond the limits of the United States as the President may determine." Thousands of former slaves took advantage of this offer.
6
We have formed a toxic political culture in which think tanks like the Project for a New American Century can thrive while there's a total absence of think tanks trying to guide our more productive endeavors like AI, biological research, drug research, etc... We've left all but National Offense up to profit-driven entities.
We've labelled every endevor that isn't profit driven as socialist, anti-American and dangrous. It's a paradox really, because in a well-oiled, efficient, fair, capitalist economy, profits should be pretty low!
The quest for unatainable profit levels and personal wealth is destroying everything. The illusion could be sustained as long as the US was the main exploiter. Now that China is challenging, we're destroying ourselves with our ignorance and inability to adapt.
The Democrat's economic solution was to compete with China for exploitation rights. We need a new generation of thinkers paving our way.
Ross and David Brooks keep spinning, spinning and spinning. Their heads filled with distinctions and definitions and all types of ways to distance themselves from the consequences of all they have worked for. They clearly are upset how ugly it has turned out. But they can't take any responsibility for the role they have played in it turning out this way. And if things turned out the way they wished, it would still be a very desolate, soul deadening, life destroying place to be.
6
How benign you make conservatism appear!
What you call commercial dynamism amounts to the conscious structuring of the legal and financial systems to benefit and protect corporate interests over any stakeholder.
Your religious zeal, marginalized in a modernizing world of educated men and women, contorted itself into a fundamentalist crusade to control the bodies of women in order to thwart modernity.
Your communitarian affections do not thrive in your commercial/corporate world with its implacable demands on families to get ahead or sink. But where there is little commercial dynamism -- outside cities -- stagnation and narrow choices look to conservatives like the good ole days.
Suspicion of the state has been steadily nurtured by conservatives into hatred of the more universalist policies of equality, environmental protection, educational standards, and taxation of the wealthy to pay for democracy.
Your argument with exceptionalism is a contrived distraction from the desperate reality of a vicious nationalism with its fascist grin and the utter indifference of "conservatives" to the destruction of democracy.
3
Sorry, but I've had it with Trump. I don't want to hear any nuance or any subtle arguments for his bigotry and incompetence. He is not fit for the job and the sooner he's taken on by a righteous House, the better.
4
"Once Republicans were optimists about their country; under Trump they see only “American carnage” and decay."
And yet they sit entirely complicit which makes them all morally and ethically bankrupt including everyone who continues to support them.
2
It's kind of fascinating to watch two elite conservatives twist around the wreckage that is the Republican party. Today, for instance, we have Mr. Douthat's tepid response to Trump's incendiary tweets with a lengthy and academic dissection of nationalism and exceptionalism. And, David Brooks' assertion that Trump's racism is actually just an ugly exercise in controlling the leadership debate on the left. Wow! How's this for a rejoinder: Donald Trump is not merely a racist and a demagogue, he's an authoritarian bent on self-aggrandizement and self-dealing. Patriotism is his great con and he has cowed a legion of congresspeople with its blunt force. He is beneath the dignity of the office. He is beneath the dignity of the nation. Indeed, he is beneath the dignity of the species.
6
Let's not pretend that Trump's campaign and presidency had anything to do with a 'populist corrective' to failed politics/policy of potentially both parties. Trump ran because he thought he could become 'the first person to make money running for President' and because he is a carnival barker narcissist of the first order who needs his ego stroked non-stop. If he thought it would have gotten him elected and offered a path to self-gratification, money and acclaim, he would have run as a communist.
As for the American people who were 'reacting' to past bouncers of the left/right... they were scammed. Some have recognized this (I know a few people who were Democrats/Obama voters who voted for Trump) and now feel they got a bad bargain. The rest are far more motivated by racism, misogyny and jingoism than any understanding of- or desire to- actually address America's problems. And despite Trump's protestations that he's performed a miracle, only a few percent of Americans are better off- on the backs of everyone else.
4
There are no virtues of Nationalism. Nationalism is a corrupt vice, the same as Jingoism. And, it is NOT associated with Patriotism, ever.
3
"It’s in this spirit that nationalists-in-power often end up scapegoating some group of malcontents or critics within the nation, implying that they are saboteurs and wreckers, that their complaints are treasonous, that they should be expelled."
Often? I'd be genuinely curious to hear from Douthat or others an example of nationalism that hasn't taken this turn.
2
Mr. Douthat describes a healthy debate within today's GOP about the best ways to improve our nation's health, welfare, security, and future. As I watch the commentary by every single GOP leader over the past two years, that debate is completely invisible. The only debate in today's GOP is how to increase and retain absolute power for the oligarchs, corporatists, and war profiteers, regardless of how this affects the rest of the population.
2
Its funny, millennial Peter Theil and millennial AOC are saying pretty much the same thing in regards to American exceptionalism but conservatives only take it seriously when it comes out of a billionaires mouth. That millennial generation is going to confound both the left and the right. They are the ones to watch.
5
I love it when conservative writers like Douthat start playing word games to cope with even their embarrassment about what "their" conservative movement has become.
Nationalism = Exceptionalism
Conservatives are NOT Populists (concerned about "ordinary people"); Conservatives want to "conserve" the power of the "property owners". This goes back all the way to the Framers, many of whom where afraid of democracy (power to the people) because they feared that "ordinary people" did not respect "property rights".
One thing is true; Trump ascended to power through populism, although his is not a true concern for "ordinary people" - being a sociopath, his only concern is for himself - but he did/does have an almost subliminal understanding of what many "ordinary people" are upset about, and an understanding of how to make people believe he understand them and "cares - honed by his "used car salesman" like real estate experience.
14
The original "Conservative", Sir Robert Peel, said something like "While we are not opposed to all change, we wish to conserve what is good in our nation." In itself hardly a terrible aim. But the present Republican controlling elements (above all Trump's inner circle) are trying to change things back to a past ideal which probably never existed. Unless you think that white supremacy and the natural claim to power of the rich are those ideals - for those were more or less accepted for much of the USA's history (and for Great Britain's for that matter).
The President is not a patriot - he is a Trumpist. "If you love America, you must love me," is his message. Anyone who manifestly does not love him is un-American. He desperately wants to be part of the millionaire elite, so the publication of his tax returns, which would among other things show that his finances were and are a disaster, must be prevented at all costs. He wants to be part of the world political elite, so he has sought to show himself as rubbing shoulders with world leaders, even Korean dictators or the Queen, who is in fact not a leader but a relic of history.
But America does not need a power elite - it has great intellectuals who could be described as an elite, and artists who need not fear comparison with others in the world. The very existence of a President Trump is the greatest possible disservice to what is still a great country.
9
I have been staring at this sentence for a while now, hoping it will suddenly make sense: `The intellectual debate generated by this turn, whether it’s happening in Washington conference rooms or conservative periodicals or at the 8 p.m. hour for Fox News, is often far more to relevant America’s problems that the conservative debate before 2016.' It still doesn't make sense.
11
@Larry King If the author or proof readers had made two corrections to obvious mistakes, the sentence would be more readable but it might not make more sense. I wish that authors who use fancy words that have several meanings would define in what sense they are using these words before they get too deep into their deep thoughts. My excuse is that I am old.
Liberal and conservative nationalism are okay. Lincoln was a liberal nationalist. He wanted to preserve the union. Teddy Roosevelt was a conservative nationalist. He was an imperialist but a democrat also.
Populist conservative nationalism is not okay. It is the source of fascism in Europe and demogoguery in the United States, ranging from Father Coughlin, Joe McCarthy, Ross Perot, and Donald Trump.
The main task of any society is to ensure political order. This is especially challenging in mass societies. They require a political hierarchy, in which an autonomous political elite guides the masses. Equality can be a danger. It can lead to dictators, as it did in Elia Kazan's movie, A Voice in the Crowd.
1
"The modern conservative movement — at its most idealistic, at least — was organized to defend genuinely distinctive features of American life: our unique mix of commercial dynamism, religious zeal, communitarian affections and decentralist suspicion of the state."
Whatever.
Neither commercialism nor capitalism are explicitly extolled in the Declaration of Independence or Constitution.
Separation of church and state and a strong wariness of religious "zeal" were strong concerns at the founding of our secular democracy.
The Federalist Papers may not fit into your American "patriotic" decentralist suspicion of the state.
"communitarian affections" I have absolutely no clue what you're talking about but I'll give you a point for distracting jibber jabber.
9
Nationalism is often paired with bigotry, but neither is a necessary condition of the other.
Without some form of collective, none of us would be able to rise above the level that social scientists used to call savagery. But by cooperating, dividing labor, and benefiting from each others' discoveries we get ahead, and that's true at the level of the village, the tribe, or the nation.
Maybe someday we'll be able to function in supranational groupings, the EU is a hopeful sign of exactly that right now, but so far Canada obviously has it going better than Somalia does, and it would be hard to deny the Canadians (and Danes and Kiwis and a few others) have it going better than Guatemala, Mexico, or the United States do.
Borders are still necessary, and defending them is still more than a matter of racial animosity.
2
It seems to me, being a citizen of Canada (although I did once work and live in NYC from 1995 to 2007) and therefore a citizen of one of the many other democratic countries Ross barely mentions in his editorial that your country is "exceptional" only in its belief that it is exceptional. It may come as a shock to your citizens that many other countries including my own are engaged in providing succour to the downtrodden and persecuted. Indeed, Canada's most populous city, i.e. Toronto, has become the most cosmopolitan city in the world and it is situated in a country where its citizens are encouraged to sustain their native languages and adhere to their own particular traditions and customs at the same time being Canadians.
I think "narcissism" is a much better word to describe the jingoistic myth like beliefs of your citizenry. And, in that regard, you have the perfect President.
77
A true nationalist believes his country is best. The natural assumption is people in other countries feel the same way. If someone from Canada did not think Canada was best, I would he had something seriously wrong with him. I had a good laugh when NYT commenters expressed outrage a few years ago that Pope Francis felt being Roman Catholic was the best way to reach heaven. If you do something for decades by worship or living in and serving a nation, and you do not think it is the best way to get what you want from life or after life, then you are the one with the problem.
2
@J. David Burch Yes! Unexamined exceptionalism really does boil down to narcissistic nationalism.
7
@J. David Burch You are right about our racist-in-chief-President, however you do not provide for your Native American Indians in Canada just as we don't here in the US.
6
Splitting hairs on definitions and distinctions that are clever but obscure do little to clarify crucial issues. The good things about conservatism include a skepticism about universality and perfection in human institutions, a clear-eyed view of history (never a strong suit in the US), the need for elites to do their part for the whole society, an appreciation for education, prudence when it comes to change, and the inevitability of unanticipated consequences. Something like 90 percent of Americans who call themselves conservatives do not have a clue and are content to support patriarchy, dumbing down, and fear of the other. This syndrome my be regressive and reactionary but it sure ain't conservatism. Why does Mr Douthat not just say this?
19
Trump doesn't know the difference between patriotism and nationalism. The "squad" in Congress that Trump has told to "go back" (to the Bronx presumably for AOC) are in fact extreme patriots. Like our own founders, who rebelled against their country, England, to form a new government and a new country, the squad have an idea of a better nation. There were plenty of royalists that wanted to stay with King George and felt those who wanted to form a new government were wrongheaded traitors to the King. The Squad is following in the footsteps of the patriots who saw the need for radical change and formed a new nation to achieve it. I hope we don't have to have a revolution to achieve change like the founders did. But, any truly radical change often comes at a price.
9
Nationalism has a specific meaning.
What you are describing is a next phase of conservatism beyond what William F. Buckley wrought.
It can’t be nationalism without the noxious and dangerous exclusionism of nationalism. Because that is what nationalism is - defining the those who belong in the nation by those who do not.
Read more and do better in your analysis.
10
@JR Exclusion is necessary in all groups; small tribes or entire nations.
This is not an opinion but rather a well established organizational psychological fact. We are defined as much but what we are as what we are not.
Progressivism rings hollow because if we are for everyone, then we are for nothing. There is no narrative, no common thread tying people together except fighting an amorphous "hate".
Problem is, when progressives start defining what this evil "hate" is, it turns out to be anything that attempts to create a normal template for America.
Revolutions are always strongest as insurgencies: united against a common enemy, ideological differences can be put aside...temporarily.
But the progressive movement is going to have serious trouble trying to hold together 1) suburban parents 2) fire brand white activists 3) young professionals 4)inner-city blacks 5) subruban Latinos and 6) a still nascent trans movement
There's no way to tie these quite different groups together if the entire idea of a common nation that *necessarily* excludes people is verboten
1
@JR
"A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling stop."
— William F. Buckley, arch-conservative
1
@Arturo
I'l pay you a thousand dollars to debate me in public.
That's a remarkably revisionist version of the un-exceptionalism of the Trump campaign. Does Mr. Douthout forget that the centerpieces of the campaign were the immigration of Mexican rapists and big city minority crime? Nationalism is about our collective failings as a nation, not about how some scapegoats are ruining our greatness. And it's about how we have to come together as a nation to change, not "I alone can fix it".
6
Nationalism in the modern era is devoid of rational evidence. How can we be nationalist in a country made of immigrants, where almost everyone is married across cultural, national, racial and ethnic lines? Yet, the idea of nationalism lingers on. In the same way, the idea that the US is exceptional is silly given that the US makes mistakes as does every other country. Now, were there aspects of US history that were exceptional? Sure, but to say that the US is exceptional outright is simply an effort to brainwash children into waving flags and joining the military. Both brands of modern conservativism are based on false historical narratives. The entire modern conservative movement is a farce, yet it is still governing the US somehow.
9
What is the United States?
Is it a sovereign nation? Or a global Pax Americana empire?
Which should it be?
This is the greatest geopolitical issue of our time.
“The Virtue of Nationalism” by Yoram Hazony provides an excellent, somewhat academic, framework to address these questions.
1
Jingoism is not Patriotism, just manipulation. You can’t project values you don’t have.
15
It's been clear since day one that Trump's "irritated nationalism" appeals to a bigoted white base with racial, LGBTQ, and women's rights issues.
That's not a corrective. That's going backwards to a place that demonized people.
Most nationalist movements always end up there. And folks get hurt.
8
For a more in-depth analysis of nationalism, I offer the following recommendation: Read Harvard historian Jill Lepore's Foreign Affairs essay ("A New Americanism: Why a Nation Needs a National Story") about the nature of American nationalism and how it has changed since the country's founding.
1
What I heard President Trump tell "The Squad" was that their constant criticism of everything patriotic and of all American history and of all historic American values is unpatriotic. And if it's so bad here why did they come? Because imperfect America is so much better than where they came from.
I believe a Persian-American citizen or an Arab-American citizen or an Asian-American citizen, immigrant or born here, is just as much a citizen as anybody else. So does Trump.
But the Democrats' radicals wants to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
This isn't dog whistling. It is a statement of the views of a significant portion of Americans. Speaker Pelosi recognizes this and is trying to shut the squad up before the 2020 election. I hope she fails in this task.
4
@AmarilloMike
What is it that "Organ" trump supporters have that can selectively hear things. How come this Organ is incapable of sensing that 75% of the Squad is native born and cannot go anywhere!!
1
@R
That's true.
But on her election night Congresswoman Tlaib wore the Palestinian flag as a kind of cape and that threw me off. Her parents came here because imperfect America was better than Palestine. I stand corrected.
1
@Amirillo:
First, according to Trump 2016 everything was bad in America then. Clearly this was the case in his message and his slogan Make America Great Again, which makes no sense if America in your eyes was indeed Great then.
Then, apparently facts don’t reach Texas since three of the four he demonized were born in the US, one in the same city!
As for any hyphenated American being as much of a citizen as anyone else, if you really believe that he feels Hispanics are as good as anyone else, you are lying to yourself (or to us!) . If you believe he thinks Muslims are as good as anyone else see sentence above!
Speaker Pelosi is trying to shut the squad up because, putting it simply, she wants Democrats all putting forward a winning platform and these Freshman (Freshwoman, Freshperson?) Representatives are muddying the waters, attacking her authority and generally not acting like first-termers “should “.
As for this Trump’s tweeting representing a substantial portion of the nation, that is sadly true. There is indeed a substantial portion of the nation that is bigoted! Sad but true! And Trump is their spokesmen and their leader. And you sir sound like a faithful acolyte!
1
Nationalism will sink the world and our planet. International cooperation will see us through to a secure future. Worrying about "who's on first" is absurd and precisely what will end up in self-destructive warfare. If "American exceptionalism" meant a willingness to lead internationally, that is what we should strive for. Unfortunately, the "exceptionalism" concept has been hijacked by the "USA-USA" chorus and narrow-minded "we're better than them" notions. Childish thinking, a la Trump, and we had better get back on the cooperation track.
4
Exceptionalism, conservatism and nationalism as practiced by Republicans always comes down to not paying taxes. It means regulations are inherently bad. It means social welfare is always a moral failure of the recipient. It means Laffer gets a medal.
Our form of nationalism, like most, blames the other for problems. It is inherently bigoted. And if not, it certainly has bigots as a constituency. And the Republicans have been cultivating this since 1968. This is how it looks 50 years on.
28
I always cringe at the word nationalism. I can't get past it. Yes, I get the idea of it being a laudable unifying concept, wherein people come together in a show of communal pride of place, both physical and spiritual, in pursuit of some higher purpose, but too often nationalism becomes perverted. Nationalism for me will always be associated with its dark side, and without an unequivocal rejection of that aspect of it by our President it's a word that should stay in the closet, lest it become a source of comfort or even inspiration to those carrying the flags of the new fascism. You may be absolutely right Ross, but the choice of this word "nationalism", a word your fellow OpEd conservative correspondent David Brooks has also written in praise of, gives a subtle but green light to those worst segments of the party to which you belong, whether you like it or know it, or not. Please find a new narrative.
3
A third party I have recommended could include a moderate nationalist patriotism along with respect for traditional values and a desire to make the American dream real for all. American exceptionalism is really the non-racist, non-blood/and/soil basis of America. We should prize this, not attack it or ignore it.
The U.S. compares poorly to every industrialised country in terms of education, healthcare, wealth disparity, social inequality and judicial injustice.
This is why Trump won, because he was the only one clever enough to blame others for the nation's ills.
14
@Hamid Varzi
The bosses have always known that if they can get the white working stiff to hate and fear the black and brown working stiffs they will have an easier time stealing from all.
1
if the current usa is as good as it gets I am disappointed.
7
“The modern conservative movement — at its most idealistic, at least — was organized to defend genuinely distinctive features of American life: our unique mix of commercial dynamism, religious zeal, communitarian affections and decentralist suspicion of the state.”
That’s the thing, plenty of other countries have these to varying degrees. None of these traits are unique to our country. Yet to proclaim yourself the anointed keeper of America’s past revisionist history belays your true concerns. All I see in this comment is the same quasi-revanchism that Trump’s “irritable nationalism” espouses on a daily basis in the form of (previously) dog whistles and (now) truly overt attacks on minorities.
Except this time, you’re trying to convince us that you have the moral high ground. Disgraceful.
6
If you don’t like that dad is beating mom and the kids, you can move out. Just don’t talk about it. It will make the family look bad.
4
Well, a long apologia for American exceptionalism, which should really be called Triumphalism!
Lines like ‘elite mistakes’ makes me cringe. The elite make mistakes? You mean Iraq 1 and 2? 2008 financial crisis that the elite walked away from?
At least after 4 years of Trump, Douthat finally admits Trump is a disgrace but don’t blame the conservatives who apparently were somewhere this last 10 years not obstructing and killing with policy.
American Nationalism does not let the light in!
3
"...genuinely distinctive features of American life: our unique mix of commercial dynamism, religious zeal,..."
All right, Mr. Douthat; Capitalists for Christ. No wonder the country is dysfunctional.
12
“And it’s this spirit that infuses the strange-but-predictable spectacle of Trump, just over two years removed from a campaign that constantly emphasized his country’s failings, railing against a squad of left-wing congresswomen for their own criticisms of America and demanding that they go back to the foreign countries whence three of them did not in fact arrive.”
Let’s all just agree about what citizenship means: no matter who you are, where you’re from, or what you believe in, once you have earned citizenship to the United States, you are as much a citizen as anyone else in this country with all the rights and privileges (save running for President) that native born citizens have. All of these representatives could’ve been born out of country and this attack by Trump would still be just as disgusting as he is perverting what it means to be a citizen.
3
Douthat has sanitized what for which Trump actually represents.
Yesterday, the President of the United States was asked explicitly whether he was concerned that White Nationalists are praising the odious comments that he made about Representatives Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY., Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., and Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass.
And his answer was a very succinct No.
Donald Trump is not calling conservatives to the spirit of nationalism. He is beckoning the call for White Nationalism.
He is stating explicitly that nationalistic fervor is strictly reserved for Whites. And that Non-white Citizens who object to his policies should be exported from this country. In response, numerous conservative politicians echoed these sentiments and some even offered to buy plane tickets.
When placed in that context, your portrayal of Trump as being the imperfect representative of Old Fashioned Nationalism with a "bigoted edge" is off-base and your rebuke comes across as a mild wrist slap.
If we want to have a truly honest debate, we need to call out Trump for what he is: The White Nationalist President. And we need to be honest that the embrace and the lack of criticism from so-called staunched conservatives reveal that the conservative movement is quite comfortable with this philosophy.
This is not about nationalism...this is about the repudiation of our Constitution and its amendments by Trump and the GOP.
4
You really can't compare Reagan and George W. Bush. Reagan had the good judgment to quietly cut our losses in Lebanon and get out. Bush got us into Iraq and Afghanistan where we still remain 18 years later with no end in sight.
1
I would add one other way in which the current breed of nationalists see the country going wrong, in not being white enough. The hostility that erupted when a Black man rose to the Presidency was a reversion to the worst of American history.
That was followed by the election of the Anti-Black man who promised a return to white rule.
What has modern conservative nationalism wrought?
Take a look.
3
During a war, patriotism morphs into ugly nationalism, and our youth are sent forth to kill and die. Nationalism cannot survive without enemies, and enemies must be punished. Without war, nationalism needs a different propaganda, restrictions on freedom, blind jingoism and the vilification of minorities and "communists" to slake its thirst. It is upon us. It's fascism wearing a mask.
1
I see American exceptionalism as made up of these components:
1/America's vast natural resources rarely matched by any other nation.
2/ America's location, isolated from the problems inherent of Europe and the Middle East.
3/ America's climate, mostly moderate allowing for farming productivity.
4/ America's form of government which protects the rights of people including the freedom to live without the constraints of government or religion.
5/ And lastly, but most importantly, America's makeup of many different races and cultures that add to its diversified talents and creativity.
But none of these things makes Americans better than the peoples of other nations. They are just as worthy of living the good life that Americans have come to expect. American exceptionalism does not give America the right to plunder other nations or force our will upon them to control them or make them more like us. And it does not give America the moral right to just turn our backs on the rest of the world and just let it suffer when we can help.
20
@USS Johnston Exactly. What Americans often overlook is the geographic lottery that this country won. Once we were freed from the British, we had an entire continent (more or less) to control, and its abundant natural resources. that we took advantage of those resources first with slave labor, then with cheap immigrant labor is also lost on people who think it was the declaration of independence and our constitution that made America the power that it is. Those are critical, but the geographic lottery paved the way.
11
I see a lot of overlap between nationalism and exceptionalism actually. Exceptionalism in practice has meant America should be excepted from the rules that bind other countries. Nationalists argue much the same thing.
3
In an important sense, every country qualifies as exceptional, because its distinctive mix of political, economic and social institutions distinguishes it from all its neighbors. But when American apologists employ the term to describe the US, they imply that our uniqueness makes us superior.
The national debate over this matter stems from the fact that no empirical test can prove or refute that contention. Religion plays a larger role in America than in most free countries, yet the state intervenes in it less. Americans historically have displayed greater skepticism than their European counterparts toward government efforts to solve social and economic problems, leaving businesses and individuals freer to make their own decisions. Our Bill of Rights also limits the state's power to restrain freedom of speech, press and gun ownership more than is the case in many other democracies. We have absorbed more immigrants than most other countries, making them citizens equal to the native-born, but we also suffer from outbreaks of ethnic and cultural prejudice.
These verifiable difference help shape the American character, but liberals and conservatives disagree over their impact on our quality of life. Freedom exacts a cost, but so does government intervention. Rather than obsessively comparing ourselves to others, however, we might do better to focus our debate on how to improve our society. Then, at least, we would argue about something that mattered.
3
There is no upside to nationalism whatsoever. Unfortunately very few people can delineate nationalism, racism and bigotry in multi-cultural societies such as America. On the other hand, patriotism is a completely different ballgame; it emphasizes on the country rather than the nation. And yes, America has been exceptional throughout her history; capable of attracting and integrating people from around the world, a "shining city upon a hill whose beacon light guides freedom-loving people everywhere" as Regan described her. The adventurous wars of the last decades were the result of a traumatic event in our history and unfortunately the man in command and his entourage were ill prepared to respond. I think any other President would have had a different response and saved us at least from the debacle in Iraq.
American exceptionalism begins and ends with the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
For large portions of our history we have strayed far from its ideals. Slavery, Native American genocide, interment of Japanese Americans, segregation leap to mind.
Most break out moments of true exceptionalism were led by exceptional men-Lincoln's emancipation proclamation, T. Roosevelt's trust busting, FDR's leadership and polices through the Great Depression and WWII, Truman's Marshall Plan and rebuilding of Europe and Japan.
The ideals of our founding fathers took root in the morass of 1946 in Europe and Japan. From Vietnam to Syria we have tried to spread those ideals from gun barrels and bombs with no success.
Yes, it is time to come home to create our own Marshall plan for rural America and our city ghettos, to restore our own distressed lands, our own distressed people. We cannot do it with a demagog in the White House, who can never see beyond his own need for personal affirmation and applause.
If the election of 2016 can show us anything, it is how very deep and how disbursed the wounds of our society truly extend. Democrats need to acknowledge the real concerns of average Republican voters. Republicans have to acknowledge that the United States is and will remain a diverse country where everyone is totally equal.
Or we can let the seeds of evil that were planted in our founding documents destroy the magnificent harvest it could produce.
6
The problem isn't "American Exceptionalism" or "American Nationalism" per se, the problem is what they've become.
American Exceptionalism used to be aspirational. My blue-collar father raised me on the notion that it meant the world's most ambitious, talented people came here to work, and that if I wanted to work a decent job and succeed, I would have to out-work all the folks that were already here and the more that were coming.
In the 30 years since, our nation's elite have manipulated the system as to entitle themselves to this concept of "American Exceptionalism" to the exclusion of the bottom 75% and our immigrants so the sake of entrenching themselves.
The meritocracy that market-capitalism implicitly demands has been destroyed to such extent that a fake businessman whose only success was watching land value in Manhattan climb over a 50 year period is POTUS.
American capitalism, American exceptionalism, the American dream, and inclusionary American nationalism have all been continuously attacked by the Republican Party since at least Reagan.
2
We're starting to get more than a little worried about what we have long tolerated, aren't we? We should be.
14
However interesting these issues may be to conservatives with a true philosophical bent, you are reading much too much into Trump's comments.
His "carnage in America" statement is nothing more than him saying whatever is needed to win votes. He correctly intuited that the only likely base of support he could get was rural, blue collalr and white. He also correctly perceived a general discontent in that group that he could exploit.
If he had believed that Democrats had the rural white vote sewed up, he would have campaigned for the country club Republican vote. If the Democrats were still the party of the deep South, he would have campaigned as a New York liberal.
He didn't care what he said. His knowledge of the issues reflects someone who hasn't read a book in decades, if ever, and barely was cognizant of anything other than headlines. He knows no history. That's why his campaign slogans were virtual time-warps "I am the law and order candidate!" and "America First", all offered without irony or real understanding of the context of the original words.
14
Well stated!
A real national movement would get corporate money out of politics and return elections to the people. Trump represents a dictator-like level leadership of the corporate deep state. With deregulating everything in their path. Largest tax breaks in history. Silence on addressing Citizens United. (corporate personhood and money as free speech).
A nationalist movement would care for our land and creation. It would provide health care to citizens. It would address income inequality instead of merely expanding the working poor. We have no nationalist movement under Trump. We have multinational corporate power extorting our economic ad natural resources, but most of all the people, who will pick up the tab and the mess.
4
"By asking 'how does my country compare to other countries?' the nationalist can recognize problems that the exceptionalists ignore and propose solutions they pre-emptively reject.
Great question to ask, nationalists. How about starting by asking how our so-called leader compares to the leaders of other countries?
7
@Jay Orchard
Trump’s ethnicity- fascists think Trump is the greatest leader in the world and that America is “#1” !
They can’t tell the fascist from the trees.
3
"In other words, the problems that brought me to power can’t be problems any more now that I’m in charge — which requires, in turn, that anyone who insists that there actually are still problems must be the problem themselves."
Which is only the mindset and mantra of every dictator ever.
Ross may have some points to make about not rejecting out of hand a true conservative critique of national policies, but I think he errs in assuming that many of those critics are actually critiquing in the service of making the country work better. Far too many--and all of the ones with real power--are just looking to aggrandize their oligarchic selves, enhancing their bottom lines in whatever way possible, and trying to come up with philosophical reasonings to justify their selfish greed.
These people are social Darwinist and Calvinist at core, believing that for those who don't have the resources to live the good life, it's their own fault, the result of poor behavior and poor choices, and there can't possibly be any unfair systemic mechanisms at work; the system works well for the affluent, so there's no possible reason it couldn't work well for anyone, unless one's own poor choices ruin one's success.
i don't doubt there are a few conservative thinkers who legitimately want to critique systems to improve them. But most have no such motivation; their only motivation is keeping and growing their own wealth, and protecting it from the hoi polloi.
23
Sadly, and without any intent of viciousness or insult, I think it is fair to say that Ross immediately lost the vast majority of Trump supporters (along with Trump himself) with the very title of his piece: “A populist-nationalist corrective to American exceptionalism would be welcome.”
Thus the folly of trying to discuss or argue politics with any sense of historical context with the majority of this minority. So we have to bank on the reasonable and educated outnumbering the Trump crowd on Election Day 2020.
7
When I point out ways the US falls short of its promise, I have been told to "love it or leave it." Ironically, such statements consistently come from people who don't know that the American Revolution was a 7-year slog between the Declaration of Independence and The Treaty of Paris. Heck, those who tell me that I hate my country don't even know what the Treaty of Paris is. Neither can they tell me when we adopted the Constitution or even what it says. In fact, my favorite way to end these "arguments" is to recite the Preamble and challenge my accusers to a battle of Constitutional knowledge.
I love the Enlightenment ideals embedded in our country's founding. However, I also recognize that our founders made compromises to set it all in motion and make this nation a reality--compromises acknowledged by many of the founders in the hope that future generations would find ways to work toward resolving issues that were less than ideal.
Thank you, Mr. Douthat for telling the world that I am not the enemy of the US. I may see problems that our country needs to resolve. I may disagree with conservatives about how to resolve them, but that certainly does not mean I hate the United States.
43
@elsiejay
It is amazing these people who say "love it or leave it" are the same ones hoarding firearms against their government. While waving around the flag of a treasonous rebellion against the Nation. A treasonous rebellion, it must be noted, that lost.
Good people on both sides? Ha!
2
@elsiejay It would take less time to read the Constitution then it does to watch an episode of "Game of Thrones and yet few Americans have ever chosen to read it. Regarding those who supported Trump from the beginning the majority think that one must be of European heritage and a Christian to be an American. They fundamentally misunderstand what it even means to be an American. But I have to hand it to Ross, after telling me that as a non theist I live an empty life, he gives us a roadmap to alt-right nationalism that would be oh so much more polite than Trumps. He is sort of a blackshirt who goes to see Verdi at La Strada.
The only exceptional thing about Trump-GOP Republicanism is its stunning resemblance to Kremlin oligarchic corruption and its complete dedication to Robber Baronism, a state run disinformation system, Caucasianism, and a total disregard for the country’s infrastructure, future and reputation.
Russian-Republicanism is nothing to write home about, unless you think Moscow on the Potomac is what George Washington had in mind.
The Republican Party needs to formally raise the Russian flag and declare its true political allegiance and philosophy.
219
@Socrates You must have missed the Mueller report, which found a lack of evidence of any Russian-Trump collusion. There's a word for falsely claiming that your political opponents have ties exist to foreign governments: McCarthyism.
3
@R.P. What was it, 140 or 160 different contacts between Trump's family/campaign and Russian operatives? The Mueller report did, in fact, detail multiple efforts at collusion. Not enough to constitute an organized conspiracy---not for lack of trying, however---but enough to shame all those involved. As for Trump himself, Mueller specifically stated he could not disprove collusion, only that the "rules" did not permit indicting a sitting president.
33
@R.P.
You must have missed the fact that "collusion" has no legal meaning. What Mueller's report did not prove was conspiracy between Drumpf's campaign and the Russkies. Conspiracy is a criminal act and requires a high level of proof. What Mueller did find was that the Drumpf campaign was more than happy to play footsies with the Russian intelligence agencies that were on a mission to get Cheeto Benito elected.
26
The bigger question is WHY would anyone, conservative, Republican or Martian, support Donald Trump? What reason is there for this blind support and adulation?
Setting aside his behavior and his many gaffes ( can't pronounce the word origins and his father was born in a quaint German village), he has made a mess of our foreign policy. and our budget is bloated and underfunded. He obsesses about building a wall on the border to make our country secure, yet drugs are smuggled into our ports in container ships and we are vulnerable to attack via drone, hacking or a growing number of countries with nuclear capability.
Looking into nationalism and conservatism does not explain support for a man who is ignoring serious problems but instead is either flying to a rally or riding a golf cart?
47
Trump, and our toxic politics, are the result of billionaires and narrow interests poisoning political discourse; the major culprit being Murdoch's Fox News. Liberal politicians, government, and solutions were tarred with hyperbolic language. The harbinger of all of this was the campaign to discredit climate science--pervasive on conservative media from the Wall Street Journal onwards. The success of this campaign should have been recognized as an ominous sign. Disinformation works, and it has ruined our politics.
75
Exceptionalism. Nationalism.
Equating them with patriotism is not virtuous.
21
When Conservatives speak of American exceptionalism, they are just patting themselves on the back. Progressives understand that making our country the good example for others to follow is a job that is never finished. We must take on new challenges as they arise to show the world that we are truly exceptional. Creating an exceptional nation is a job for Progressives, a job that is too tough for Conservatives.
32
@OldBoatMan
It's the willingness of a country to look hard at itself in the mirror, admit shortcomings, and then try to improve that makes it "exceptional".
1
Before 'Greatness' is restored to America, this project requires work and a leader in possession of a full deck of cards. We are a young nation, watching a president missing a few buttons grow more juvenile by the day.
41
We must learn from history. History repeats itself. The maxims are true and contradictory. If we learned from history it wouldn't repeat itself. I once taught a unit on how patriotism leads to nationalism, which leads to imperialism and ultimate war. The problem is at the outset, that is, defining patriotism. It cannot be blind support of policy or leadership. Not all administrations are good and not all policies appropriate. The "love it or leave it" mentality is nothing more than an effort to suppress change and protest. America was founded on protest. Great moments in our history often started with protest (abolition of slavery, ending the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, the very founding of the nation). America may not be the greatest nation in the world. Recognizing that, attempting to change and improve life in America, does not mean you are not a Patriot. Protesting conditions in America does not mean you are not a Patriot. Rapinoe can be a Patriot just as a young woman who loses her life serving in the military can be a Patriot. The problem with Trump and his core is the inability to comprehend that patriotism comes in many different colors. True Patriots will show their loyalty to America by removing him from office. Only then can America become great again.
67
One of the most corrosive elements of the American myth is the notion of exceptionalism. Contrary to our national delusion, there is nothing exceptional about America. Like most countries, we have our strengths and our weaknesses. We have no God-ordained right to think that there is something occurring here that doesn't occur elsewhere in some other democracy. In fact, file under one of our delusions, the notion that America is the greatest country. We, like most G-20 nations, have unique aspects to our societies both good and bad. The myth of exceptionalism often prevents us from taking a clear-eyed look at who we really are. Since Americans so like business models, the business that isn't constantly evaluating how to be better often dies.
143
we're exceptional, it means unusual, not typical, unusually good, outstanding. it's mostly due to isolation and unexploited resources (luck), but i see the founding as exceptional, washington as exceptional, etc.
7
@Michael
"Exceptionalism" means many things. For example, I always thought that we were unique in having no national ethnicity or religion, no prescribed national language. Exceptional in that true Americans come in ever color, and from any origin. That we are bound together not by immemorial history, language, and blood, but by our allegiance to certain ideals and principles: that no matter where you were born or who "your people" are, you can become just as American as any 20th generation Mayflower descendant. It is in that way that I considered us an exceptional nation.
This picture may never have been really true, and in this day of mass migrations is becoming less unusual; still, I don't see it as a bad ideal.
This is, of course, world's apart from the "exceptionalism" that claims (in effect) that we are the new chosen people, that we are the world's good guys, that anything we do is right because we are the ones doing it.
13
@bill zorn
Yes - what American exceptionalism really means is "different" as opposed to "better than," although the latter has come to dominate the myth,
But whichever version you choose, it went to our head and became an insidious justification for a ton of bad behavior.
We're America - we never apologize and we never look in the mirror.
25
Some degree of 'nationalism' is necessary for the social cohesion required for a strong social safety net.
If a group of people does not share some pride in group, feel that they are valued members of the group, see that the collective functions for their good as well and that we are all held accountable to the same rules, then what really holds us together and makes up sacrifice or contribute to the general welfare?
11
@CNNNNC
Think of expanding that "nationalism" to cover the world. What then? Hold us humans together? Share pride in our brother and sister humans? Feel we are valued members of mankind? Do good for all; hold all accountable to the same rules? Maybe before the globe dies.
1
@CNNNNC 'humanism'? unless by 'general' you mean 'national'.
@Rea Tarr: yes a one world government.
At least you are honest about your end goal.
It may be that nationalism is a failed idea in this connected world. International corporations operate in a global economy. Communications enable collaboration beyond national boundaries. Migration is challenging national identities in unprecedented ways.
The mindsets of many people lag behind that reality. We don't know how to respond. That's true of a wide spectrum of people with some wanted to retreat from participating in this new world and others wanting to put up walls to keep out changes.
It's ironic that the changes seem to be positive for urban regions and negative for the rural areas: Trump country. This booming economy hasn't raised the boats in the hinterlands and people respond defensively by claiming "exceptionalism."
5
@Betsy S
They fought just as hard to keep strangers out back in man's history as the frightened do today. Those walls always fell. But people still believe building them will work. Poor, silly, confused people.
So Douthat thinks that “The modern conservative movement — at its most idealistic, at least — was organized to defend genuinely distinctive features of American life: our unique mix of commercial dynamism, religious zeal, communitarian affections and decentralist suspicion of the state.”?
No, the modern conservative movement was organized to concentrate wealth into the top 1% of our society, while offering a phony “trickle down economics” theory to justify its actions.
347
@J. Grant Also the modern conservative movement, as promoted by Barry Goldwater and William F. Buckley, placed freedom of association over Congress's authority to ban racial discrimination.
15
@J. Grant
Ross, ever the idealist, where's rose-tinted glasses; he sees only what's "holy" about a cause. All else is mere distraction, unworthy of public focus. As a defender of Roman Catholicism he focuses on an Augustine, Aquinas past devoid of flaws and with American Conservatism he prefers the comforting sentences and paragraphs of its ideological catechism to the reality of the Republican Party since Reagan: a club for the wealthy oligarch that George Carlin reminded us "we aren't in." Thus the Mercers, thus Peter Thiel, thus the Kochs, et al quite satisfied with Mr. Trump and Mitch McConnell's silent, Hermann Göring like partnership with this president.
32
@J. Grant
The genuinely distinctive feature of American life that modern conservatism defends best is our lack of a non-tattered safety net for average citizens affected by disease, economic downturns, or regional decline resulting from changes in technology. This lack makes us exceptional, and our conservatives are proud of it.
9
Very insightful critique of President Trump's re-branding of the Republican party. Absolutely agree with the irony of Trump singling out Progressive Democrats for their criticisms of the country while seemingly conveniently forgetting his inaugural speech decrying the "carnage of the country" which left behind many Americans. Wonder if any of his supporters will feel cognitive dissonance when the President brags about all he's accomplished in his short time in office including enriching his base while they still live lives of misery which family members addicted to opioids, soybean farmers who have lost their livelihoods due to Trump's trade wars, working class voters who gained nothing from Trump's tax cuts for the 1% donor class, no wage increases for their hard labor since he took office, crumbling infrastructure and increased pollution in their communities from environmental deregulation, etc. Trump has beefed up a military only to have military personnel families living on government subsidies to get by including food stamps & medicaid. Creating scapegoats out of immigrants is Trump's only strategy for distracting his disgruntled & angry high school educated white working class hard core base. The Southern strategy cloaked in entertainment reality TV brinksmanship. Escalating Iranian conflicts will either result in another GOP led war in the Middle East to protect oil in the Gulf region while cozying up with repressive regimes like Mohammed bin Salman to sell arms.
32
@Dunca
cognitive dissonance... Whaz dat?... perhaps you give far too much credence to the concept of an intellectual Trump supporter!
1
@Dunca - I think it's ironic that he is now saying that people who don't like their country should pack up and move somewhere else.
I don't think he intends that message to apply to the people of Central America, somehow.
1
Sorry, Ross, but all this hand-wringing over the GOP is akin to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Your big, beautiful boat has sunk. The deck chairs are at the bottom of the ocean.
The only thing to focus on now is rowing back to safety.
102
@Duke
And yes, Ross is in one of the life boats, his apparently comfortably appointed with the furniture of past Conservatism, the veritable "castle in the sky" that psychologists once joked neurotics constructed for themselves to live in.
14
@Duke Understand why you feel that way, but why are so many of the world's population, the bright and talented as well as the poor and desperate, trying to immigrate here? Are they all ignorant fools, or do they believe our faults are way outweighed by our freedom, opportunity, and meritocracy?
2
@Dr B The first one you mentioned!
1