July 8, 2021
ALWAYS BET ON THE dEEP sTATE:
Marxism, soccer and Trump's demise: Tom Holland and Francis Fukuyama in conversation: 'I do think that with the rise of this really crazy right, you have to turn to social psychology for an explanation' (The Spectator, July 8, 2021)
TH: You say that Trump turned out to be even worse than you had anticipated?FF: Well, I think his worst sin was contesting the legitimacy of last year's election. We thought eventually he'd give in to reality, but here we are seven or eight months later, and he's still going strong. The whole virtue of a liberal democracy is it gives you a means of transferring power peacefully, and the United States has criticized many defective democracies around the world for not transferring power. Our moral authority to do that now has, I think, been considerably damaged.TH: There is also a hint though in the book that perhaps this has been a stress test for American democracy, that actually it has passed. Trump is the worst nightmare of the Founding Fathers, and the institutions have stood firm.FF: On the whole I do think there are some grounds for optimism. Trump wasn't reelected and the government is continuing to function. Certainly in foreign policy the United States has returned to a sort of status quo ante.
Posted by Orrin Judd at July 8, 2021 8:58 AM