Liberal Democracy - what's at stake

“Then as today, the world torn apart… In such times the problems of life merge for man into a single problem: How can I remain free?” 

- Stefan Zweig, 1941

It merits repeating and comprehending during these fraught times, what's at stake: Liberal Democracy is the only truly legitimate form of governance. It's the only form of government designed to protect the rights of individuals. And if you believe that the rights of the individual, to speak, to think, to believe whatever he/she may choose, and to pursue whatever path to fulfillment and contentment he/she decides in life, is the essence of life, then you are committed to the principles of liberal democracy. 

Liberal democracy protects the rights of individuals through the mechanism of consent of the governed by free and fair elections. Every other known form of governance protects the rights and interests of either certain privileged groups, or certain privileged individuals (monarchy, autocracy, oligarchy, theocracy, plutocracy etc.) over the general population. 

The ultimate litmus test of legitimacy of any sovereign political entity is the question of when to go to war, because going to war entails the ultimate sacrifice - one's life. Only a liberal democracy can claim to provide adequate consent for the potential sacrifice of the lives of citizens. Only the governed are in a position to be able to decide when making the ultimate sacrifice is warranted for political reasons. This is one of the main reasons democracies do not go to war with each other.  

Another reason is free enterprise. Liberal democracies embrace principles of private ownership and trade. Countries that trade with one another build mutual economic interests, and tend to foster similar values. Even countries that purport to represent different systems of government, will over time, if not philosophically, then for all practical purposes, pursue many of the same values. Take China for example. As it traded globally and increased its economic ties to the west, western values necessarily began to permeate Chinese culture and society to the point where today China is a vastly different country from the rigid one born out of Mao’s cultural revolution only a few decade ago. This does not mean that China will never revert back to more authoritarian tactics, as growth from free enterprise begins to decline, but the link is clear, trade integration tends to promote a harmonization of values, and more international harmony in general. 

The development and spread of liberal democracy has been the most potent and universally beneficial revolution in human history. Unlike other failed political revolutions - think of 20th century communism (Russia), fascism (Germany) or theocracy (Iran) -  the liberal democratic revolution has cost relatively few lives, endured longer and spread wider than any of them. Liberal democracy has proven flexible and durable, because it responds to people where they live first and foremost, as individuals, not as members of a tribe, a party, a group, a religion etc. It allows individuals to pursue their individual paths of fulfillment based on their individual desires, qualities, talents and skills. This does not mean that individuals can not find fulfillment by identifying as members of one or more groups. People need to have a sense of belonging. However, groups do not possess rights. Thinking so is the foundation for tyranny. Rights are the exclusive purview of individuals - whether people identify as part of the minority or the majority. Liberal democratic institutions by definition must protect the rights of all individuals equally, and not favour some individuals because they identify with one group or another.   

Liberal democracy is based on a social pact of mutual agreement and trust. When there is an epidemic of distrust in society, liberal democracy becomes threatened. When people don't believe that institutions protect their individual rights and freedoms, they naturally retreat into groups in order to better exercise raw power. A kind of factionalism ensues and politics becomes a battle between groups, because when there is a sense of disorder and threat, there is safety in numbers. This is the reason that anti-democratic politicians gin up distrust, fear and threat in order to achieve their personal (or group) political objectives. 

A word on the international system. The United Nations was founded on liberal democratic principles, as expressed in and embodied by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is a privilege, not a right, to be a member of the institutions that constitute the international community. The UN can expel members, although it has never done so. Member states who fail to uphold liberal democratic principles should not be treated as equal global citizens. 

The Kids Are Mixed Up

Violent protests in Montreal at a NATO conference. Broken shop windows, cars lit on fire and three people arrested for assaulting cops. They were pro-Palestine and anti-NATO protests joined together. This follows a student strike to ‘free Palestine’ at two of the city’s main universities and a college on Thursday. Chants for a ‘final solution’ were heard. Contrary to the Who song from the 1960s, in 2024 the kids are not alright. 

Most probably have no idea what they’re protesting. For them it’s vaguely understood performative social justice. I mean, anti-NATO? But does it matter? They know one thing: the adults in charge have screwed things up and they’re gonna pay a price for it. The world is overheating, environmentally and politically. The cost of living is out of control. The American dream has turned into a nightmare. As my daughter, a late 20s Justice Department lawyer two years into her career and living in Toronto said to me this week, ‘I talk with my friends. We all feel the same. Like I’ve done everything ‘right’ in my life, worked my butt off, but still have no hope of purchasing a home in the foreseeable future. 

There’s an undeniable sense of frustration veering into anger, and particularly among young people. Partly because there’s the equivalent of a car accident happening on their smart phones every minute. Some tragedy or catastrophe somewhere in the world to keep them worried and watching constantly. For example, a work colleague whose son and grandchildren live in northern Israel has an app on his phone that alerts him every time there’s a warning siren for an incoming rocket anywhere in Israel, meaning dozens and dozens of times a day, every day. I ask him why he subjects himself to this? He answers, I can’t help it, I’m concerned. Is there any wonder he’s a nervous wreck? 

So we're already on edge. The violent protests this week were in some measure spurred on by the sham ICC arrest warrants (see my earlier post) for the PM and former Defence Minister of Israel. No doubt the protesters felt emboldened to lash out and wreak havoc by the support of the so-called 'international community'. It feels like the moral guideposts are falling down around us. The leader of the free world is an adjudicated rapist, criminal felon and fraudster, who was given immunity from prosecution, and now international legal authorities are treating the democratically-elected Prime Minister and Defense Minister doing their utmost to defend their citizens from the threat of a multi-front war, as if they were criminal fugitives. The failures of the UN have been particularly galling to me, someone who did graduate studies in Geneva, and researched at the UN. It’s gotten much worse than I could have imagined. Not just the fundamental legal and moral lapse of the ICJ and the ICC, and not just that UNRWA and UNFIL have been unqualified disasters, but that they’ve actually aided, abetted and provided cover for transnational terrorism to operate. They’ve made a bad situation far worse. The international system of assistance and law are in a shambles, partly because of them. 

So Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau came out with a statement that Canada would abide by the illegitimate ICC warrants, along with Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Finland, Portugal, Australia, The Netherlands and Slovenia, who made similar public statements. Notably Hungary, the Czech Republic and Argentina, said they would not enforce the warrants. Never thought I could be siding with Orban, Milei, and trump for that matter.

I don’t blame the kids for not being alright. And mixed up. It feels like a lot of people are.

An Argument For the Defence

The constant impulse 

to say what you think,

express how you feel—

like an argument for the defence

before the court

of some universal creator,

supposed and abstract,

or one less abstract:

a parent.

And that's what I'm thinking,

standing over an ironing board

in the living room,

focused on not burning myself

with the hot metal boat

that calms the waves

of tomorrow's work shirt.

My daughter sits at the kitchen table,

scribbling algebraic expressions

in a Hillroy,

doodling in the margins

when the answer

doesn't come out right.

"It's not fair," I want to tell her—

the feeling of mistake,

the shadow of unworthiness—

it never leaves you.

But I say nothing;

walk over,

wrap her in a hug,

and she knows why.

How The System Breaks

The system is already broken, to some extent. Here's how we know this. 

Trump ran possibly the worst political campaign in American history. His speeches were rambling, incoherent and dull. His 'policy' statements, insofar as any could be deciphered, were fanciful and provided no actionable details. His debate performance was lacklustre, with his most memorable moment being the bizarre claim that legal Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating the community's pets.

And yet he won the election. That's how we know the system is already broken. 

One clear takeaway from this election is that Presidents today are primarily media figures. We relate to them as we would to characters on television—as avatars for our feelings. It matters little what they say; Trump, in particular, is a master of speaking a lot while saying very little. What truly matters is what they represent and how they make us feel.

Let's just admit one thing, Harris made a lot of people feel uncomfortable. This discomfort stemmed from various factors: her identity as a woman, her racial and cultural diversity, her perceived "unfamiliarity," and her campaign's tightly controlled nature. Yet equally alienating for some voters was her positivity, joy, and celebratory tone, which felt inauthentic or out of touch with their own struggles. This isn’t a critique of Harris herself—there was likely little she could have done differently. However, it underscores how many voters gravitated toward Trump, not for his policies or unimpeachable character (pun intended), but because he embodied their feelings: anger, grievance, and victimhood. In contrast, Harris's nurturing and supportive approach did not resonate with them. 

The core of trump's messaging is really very simple. It has three components: How bad things are, how mad you should be about it, and who to blame for it. Every issue—be it the economy, crime, immigration, or global affairs—is framed in hyperbolic, apocalyptic terms. The world teeters on the brink of World War III. Boys are returning home from school as girls. Immigrants aren’t just arriving—they're invaders, murderers, rapists, and, apparently, pet-eaters. While the specifics are absurd, the hyperbole serves a purpose: it’s not about what’s said but how it’s said. It’s about stirring feelings.

Rally signs reading "Trump Will Fix It" encapsulate his appeal. To fix things, though, Trump’s implicit promise is to dismantle and destroy first. There’s a visceral, almost ritualistic thrill in destruction—bonfires have long been communal bonding events for a reason. Populist autocrats exploit this, portraying themselves as avatars of the public’s desire for destruction. Ironically, when this destruction inevitably brings pain and suffering, it only reinforces the belief that the system is broken and needs further dismantling. For instance, if voters believe the economy is failing, actions that worsen it—like imposing sweeping tariffs—become self-fulfilling proof that the economy doesn’t work, fueling even greater anger and victimhood.

Thankfully, breaking the system isn’t easy. It requires deliberate steps: Step one is appointing unqualified incompetent leadership. Step two is to purge upper and mid-level employees committed to agency missions, replacing them with loyalists or leaving positions vacant. Step three is implementing policy designed to undermine the agencies core purpose and functions. This process doesn't happen overnight, but trump’s cabinet selections reflect this strategy: Tulsi Gabbard (DNI), Pete Hegseth (Defense), and the particularly unqualified, alleged drug-using statutory rapist Matt Gaetz for Attorney General. Trump’s weakness was exposed when the Senate chose John Thune over his pick, Rick Scott, as majority leader. The Senate has historically maintained an independent streak—John McCain’s decisive thumbs-down on ACA repeal comes to mind. However, Gaetz’s nomination will test its resolve. The Supreme Court’s decision implying that criminal actions by a President could be shielded if coordinated with the Attorney General heightens the stakes. 

We should know a lot more about how resilient the system is in the next couple of weeks, even before inauguration. 

__________________________________

PS. Gaetz has withdrawn. That was fast. A positive sign for institutional resilience.

The Sliver Who Decide

I think I'm starting to figure out what's happening in America.

Traditionally, the United States was a 30/30/30/10 electorate: thirty percent registered Republicans, thirty percent registered Democrats, thirty percent registered Independents, and about 10 percent unaffiliated. However, the thirty percent of Independents weren’t truly independent—they usually leaned toward one party or the other. This effectively created a 45/45/10 split, roughly speaking. This balance has become increasingly tribalized since the 1990s, coinciding with the rise of cable news and the segmentation of information consumption.

Over the past 20 years, social media’s algorithmic influence through personal devices has further hardened this fragmentation. Social media ensures that people consume information from sources that reinforce their beliefs, rarely exposing them to alternative perspectives. As a result, the 45/45/10 divide has solidified. The results of the 2024 election bear this out: as of Monday afternoon, Trump stood at 49.94% of the popular vote, while Harris was at 48.26%. As late ballots from California are counted, this margin will likely shrink, but the election, as most polls predicted, was essentially a coin toss.

It all comes down to turnout—and not just any turnout, but specifically the turnout of the 10% who decide elections. The question is: who are they, and what motivates them?

This 10% represents the lowest-propensity voters—individuals who are least interested, least informed, and least engaged. They are just as likely to skip voting as they are to participate. These voters often glean information passively from the "informational ether" rather than actively seeking it out. They are particularly susceptible to rumor over fact because rumors spread more easily in today’s fragmented information environment. They are more likely to be influenced by emotional appeals, fear, and anxiety and to favor familiar names over the unfamiliar.

Many commentators point to the educational divide in American politics as a key factor, and while education plays a role, it’s not simply about distrust of elites. Less educated voters are often less likely to seek out diverse information sources. The familiarity of a candidate like trump, combined with his simple, emotionally charged messaging, contrasted sharply with Harris’s substance-driven style. This dynamic favored trump, especially with the low-propensity voters who now hold outsized sway.

Two facts from the 2024 election illustrate this:

Lower Turnout: Approximately 5 million fewer votes were cast in 2024 (153.5 million) compared to 2020 (158.5 million). Lower turnout tends to favor Republicans, partly because of targeted voter suppression efforts in swing states. The turnout numbers suggest that Harris struggled to motivate low-propensity voters.

The Rise of Bullet Ballots: A "bullet ballot" is a vote cast only for the top of the ticket, with no down-ballot selections. Historically, these have accounted for less than 1% of total votes, even in recent elections like trump’s win in 2016 or Biden’s in 2020. In 2024, however, bullet ballots surged in swing states, making up 7.2% of votes in Arizona (123,000 votes) and 5.5% in Nevada (43,000 votes). These numbers are significant enough to determine outcomes. While some suggest foul play, it’s equally plausible that disengaged voters only chose the most familiar candidate—trump—at the top of the ticket.

It’s not that Americans are "getting dumber" as some claim; in fact, this is the most educated and literate population in its history. The issue is that elections are increasingly decided by the least engaged and least informed segment of the electorate. Reaching and motivating this group has become the entire game. This isn’t their fault—it’s the result of systemic polarization. However, the locked and hardened nature of the two major voting blocs creates a "tyranny of the minority." This dynamic poses a serious threat to democracy, paving the way for autocracy.

The challenge is clear: finding ways to engage this disengaged segment is critical to preserving democratic institutions. Without systemic changes, the influence of the least-informed voters will only grow, creating a fragile and volatile electoral system.

No One Turns Me Madder Than You

CLICK HERE TO HEAR THE SONG

You say you love me, 

So why am I blue?

You think you own me,

But that aint true.

No matter what I try to do,

No one turns me madder than you. 

I give you money,

And all of my time. 

But it don’t stop you, 

From all your lyin.

No matter what I try to do,

No one turns me madder than you.

You talk about me, 

To all of your friends.

And what I’m hearing,

Deeply offends.

No matter what I try to do,

No one turns me madder than you. 

I ain’t done nothin,

To cause you pain.

But all your talkin,

Drives me insane.

No matter what I try to do,

No one turns me madder than you. 

So please I’m beggin,

Stop all your games.

Puttin me down,

With your false claims.

No matter what I try to do,

No one turns me madder than you.

I say I’m leaving,

You knew I would. 

And I say this time, 

That it’s for good.

No matter what I try to do,

No one turns me madder than you. 

The Buggy-Whip's Revenge

One of the Allan Lichtman's favourite claims about his 13 Keys to the White House system is that it's robust and time-tested, developed from looking at 165 years of presidential elections, he claims, 'since the days of the buggy whip.' He uses 'the buggy-whip' phrase in response to critics who ask if it's possible whether technology will force him to change the system, for example, because of the way information is conveyed today compared to earlier years. Lichtman has argued that the Keys cannot be changed on the fly. He says, 'the Keys worked before there was radio, before there was television, before there were computers and the internet.' Actually no it didn't. 

The Keys have actually only worked since 1984, Reagan's reelection, the first election he predicted correctly. Exactly forty years later, with the unexpected result of the 2024 election which the Keys (or more accurately Allan using the Keys) got wrong, he is forced to reconsider his position and claims. And I began to think about what he missed and why. 

Lichtman has come to the conclusion that the main reason the Keys failed this time was because of the  impact of disinformation, which he calls 'unprecedented'. His reasoning is that the Keys are based on the performance of the incumbent government not the campaign. But that basis gets called into question when voters are unable to accurately assess the performance of the governing party. If they are besieged by misinformation and disinformation it makes a fair assessment impossible. The speed and pervasiveness of disinformation is why he believes we are living through 'unprecedented' times. 

But are we?  

If disinformation is the problem, then first off, he'd have to admit that his correct predictions going back to at least 2016 were just lucky. Disinformation was certainly prevalent back then. Lichtman has argued that it wasn't as prevalent as it is today, which may or may not be true. But then he'd have to explain exactly when the disinformation tipping point occurred and why.

I began to think that Lichtman actually has it backward. He's wrong today because he is right, in a way. He's right to diagnose the problem of the Keys as being the disinformation environment. But he's wrong to say that it's unprecedented. In fact, disinformation and bias was much worse a hundred years ago, and even worse at the time of 'the buggy-whip'. My guess is that the Keys would not have worked as a predictive system back then. I'd argue that the only reason why his system has worked at all since the early 80s is because most information was consumed in a centralized and more or less homogenous way since the advent of television. The era of mass-media through television was the first time that most Americans got their information in the same way and through only a handful of trusted sources that adhered to journalistic standards. The 'Walter Cronkite' era of news and information has not been the rule in American history, it's actually been more the exception.     

There have been several distinctive eras when Americans have lived with pervasive disinformation and inside information silos, and they were associated with political and social upheaval:

1. The Era of Radio (1914 - 1945)

The first massive technological shift in the widespread dissemination of information. With the rise of radio, governments and media outlets heavily regulated and censored news to rally public support and maintain morale during the two wars. News outlets leaned into nationalistic and, at times, propagandistic tones. War-time propaganda often left out nuanced perspectives, leaning heavily toward the government’s stance on both domestic and international issues. During World War II, news coverage was patriotic and promoted the Allies’ goals, with critical information about the war effort or allied mistakes often downplayed or omitted.

2. The Era of "Yellow Journalism" (1890s - early 1920s)

Yellow journalism was characterized by sensationalized stories, exaggerated headlines, and little regard for factual accuracy, with newspapers competing for readership, especially in rapidly growing cities. This era’s reporting often shaped public opinion through dramatic and often misleading coverage. For instance, yellow journalism played a significant role in stirring public support for the Spanish-American War in 1898.

3. The Partisan Press of the Early Republic (1780s - 1860s)

Newspapers during the early years of the United States were explicitly partisan. Papers were often funded by political parties or prominent politicians, and their primary role was to advocate for a particular political viewpoint rather than objective news reporting. Partisan newspapers played an essential role in political mobilization, with many acting as mouthpieces for emerging political parties (e.g., Federalists vs. Anti-Federalists, then later Federalists vs. Democratic-Republicans).

Many argue that today’s era represents a peak in news bias due to the sheer speed, reach, and personalization of information through social media and digital platforms. It's perhaps more accurate to say that information bias has ebbed and flowed throughout history. Rather than thinking our time is 'unprecendented', perhaps it's more instructive to take a deep dive into the preceding eras to explore how they have been impacted by information bias, and how they have responded to it.

trump 2.0 - A Good Thing

I'm strangely sanguine about trump 2.0. 

Part of it probably has to do with how in recent days I've become wary of the five-alarm fire mode that I get from my online information sources. Post-election, I'm more attuned to the fact that the outrage machine is as much a phenomenon of the center-left as it is of the far-right, and during the campaign it was on overdrive. These days I have my intellectual filters on. I'm trying to look at things with a bit of perspective.  

Part of it might also have to do with eating humble pie - I was so convinced that Harris was going to win the election, and trump was going to either be fitted with a prisoner monitoring anklet or spend the rest of his days fighting in the courts to stay out of jail. But instead we learned what we already knew, rich people don't often go to jail, and there are two justice systems one for the wealthy and well-connected and one for everyone else. It stings to see it confirmed for the umpteenth time, but in retrospect it's not that surprising. Trump has already achieved his main re-election goal: To stay out of jail. We had hoped otherwise, but we knew it was always very possible. 

I don't think this version of trump means America will sink into full-on authoritarianism. It's true that trump has autocratic aspirations, but let's face it, the guy is an unhealthy, disinterested octogenarian. He's got golf on his mind, not absolute power. He's not an ideologue with a strategy and program, like Victor Orban in Hungary. He covets all the trappings of success, wants money and fame and the image of power. But I think he's too venal and lazy to want the responsibilities and hassles associated with actually wielding power. You can already see this in his first picks for his Cabinet. A hodge-podge of characters, most of whom have no or little experience for their positions. Their main qualifications are that they look good on television (Peter Hegseth, Kristi Noem), straight out of central casting, as trump likes to say, and they were lapdog loyal to trump. It's always about image with trump, never substance. Substance is too much work. With trump there is always sure to be a lot of incompetence. And that's a good thing.

Don't get me wrong, I think trump 2.0 is going to be bad. Probably worse than his first term, but maybe only a little bit worse than Dubya Bush, who sunk America into a war from which it could not extricate itself for two decades. Bush was probably the most ignorant President of my lifetime until trump. He did a lot of damage. But unlike Dubya, trump is positively allergic to war. He is certainly capable of fumbling into one, that's true. He'll get a lot of pressure from his buddy Bibi to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities, but I think he'll resist. On the foreign policy front, Putin will make a fool of him (it's already started), and the instant peace he claimed he could achieve in Ukraine and the Middle-East, will be exposed for the nonsense it always was. But hey, if trump is capable of bringing peace and security to the world, I'm all for it. That would be a good thing.

Trump's second objective this election, after staying out of jail, was always the grift. He will do whatever he can to leverage his office to make money in whatever way he can. This will likely mean selling access to foreign leaders, compromising national security in any number of ways, further enriching his friends and coterie of loyalists. This presidency will far exceed the corruption of his first term. But I suspect it will be on full display, or at the very least, easily uncovered. And that's a good thing.

Where trump will do his most damage is domestically, and especially to the people who voted for him. He's already effectively signaled his intention of handing the keys to the administration to Elon Musk who will be in charge of something called the Department of Government Efficiency, a non-governmental 'agency'. Elon views government as a bloated inefficient corporation. His objective, in the words of Speaker Mike Johnson, will be to 'take a blowtorch' to the adminstrative and regulatory state. Of course that means getting rid of, or severely cutting back on, all of the programs that benefit the most disadvantaged citizens. To quote Elon from the campaign, 'it will mean hardship in the short term'. I trust that Elon (and his partner in crime Vivek Ramaswamy) will do what he says they will do. I also expect trump will go full steam ahead on the deportations, the tariffs, and the tax cuts for the rich. The more successful the implementation of all this is (which is doubtful), the more it will effect and alienate a large part of trump's constituency and present a gaping opening for the Democrats. That's a good thing.

So all in all, a lot to be sanguine about. Of course, there are always surprises, and four years is a long time. Actually, I expect it will be two years that trump has full control of government and can do his most damage. I'm in a sit-back-and-watch mode, because I'm feeling like the more damage he and his crew do, the better it will be politically for the Democrats. And that's a good thing.

The Party of Radicals

So the Democrats are no longer the party of the working class. That seems to be the worrisome consensus of the political mavens and pundits. If they want to win elections they have to learn how to speak to working class voters again. It was always thought that wealthy and upwardly mobile people who have an interest in maintaining the status quo would vote Republican, and the working classes who are more interested in progressive policies that contribute to economic redistribution would vote Democratic. We're being told that has now reversed. Let's look at the evidence from recent elections: 

#1: Until this election, Democrats won the popular vote in every election since 2004. 

#2: Democrats won the working class vote in 2020 against trump.  

#3: Democrats received the endorsement of most major unions in 2024. 

You can slice and dice the results in any number of ways, but these data points suggest that it's not a 'working class problem' per se. Maybe we need to take a step back to get proper perspective. 

Traditionally, the Republican Party stood for promoting government restraint ie. less involvement in the lives of citizens, less taxes and less government regulation. They want more free-market enterprise, barrier-free international trade, and culturally more traditional (family, religious) values. The Democratic Party stood for the principle that government could be a force for good in society. They support government programs that make society more equitable and just, programs that help the economically disadvantaged and promote the rights of minorities. In the last 100 years it was the Democrats who were responsible for the two greatest efforts to re-shape American society; the 'New Deal' under FDR in the 1930s, and the raft of legislations under the banner of the so-called 'Great Society' of the 1960s enacted by LBJ (civil-rights etc.) In sum, the Republicans were deemed conservatives, the party associated with a go-slow, cautious approach to governance, and the Democrats were pegged as progressives, pursuing social and economic transformation. But is that actually the political dynamic? I think there may be another way to understand it. 

FDR's elections in the 1930s was a response to the excesses, scandal and economic mismanagement of the 'roaring' 1920s, a decade of Republican administration (Harding, Coolidge and Hoover) which led to the economic catastrophe of the Great Depression (1929). Similarly, Obama's improbable election as the first African-American President in 2007 was preceded by the Great Recession financial crisis of 2007 after 8 years of the Republican George W. Bush administration. Even Reagan ran up huge budget deficits in the 1980s, and Clinton balanced the budget and ran surpluses. Historically-speaking, Republicans almost always make the economic messes that the Democrats find themselves having to clean up. In the process of political and economic housecleaning that follows the drunken Republican frat-party of spending and tax cuts, Democrats used their opportunity, not just to sweep the floor and throw out the trash, but also to re-arrange the furniture and put the house properly back in order. Democratic policies and programs have never been the political, economic and social engineering they are made out to be. They ensure greater systemic stability. 

Take Biden's victory in 2020 for example. I've argued that trump would have romped to victory in 2020 if not for the unforeseen economic disaster created by the Covid pandemic. Biden certainly didn't win the election because he ran a stellar campaign from his basement. It was a case of the American voter turning out in record numbers to mandate the Democrats, led by the supremely competent and experienced Joe Biden, to clean up the mess left by a Republican. Same old story. And he did a magnificent job. What was the Democrat's reward for putting the house back in order? The re-election of trump and the Republicans sweeping back into power. This is the ebb and flow of American politics.

Time and again, the Republicans have won elections by branding the Democrats as 'radicals'. It's classic projection. In truth, the Democrats have always been and remain the party of the working-class, the party of stability, the party of fiscal responsibility, and it's been the Republicans who have been the radicals. Trump isn't a break from that, he's a continuation, an updated version. The radicals are the ones who want to impose 200% tariffs on all imports. The radicals are the ones who want to deport 12 million 'illegals'. The radicals are the gun-toting cowboys who want to take away the bodily autonomy of women. The radicals are the ones who will pardon the mob that violently attacked the US Capitol and called for the hanging of the Vice-President. The radicals are the ones who want to put an anti-vaxxer in charge of national health policy, and do away with the Department of Education. The radicals are the jurists who confer an unconstitutional 'presumed immunity' on the President. The radicals are the ones who would elect a convicted felon to hold the highest office in the land, in charge of preserving and protecting the Constitution. The radicals want to implement Project 2025. 

And when the dust settles the Democrats will once again have to clean up the mess. If they are given the opportunity, that is. 

The Enemies List

As with so much in your personal life, so often politics comes down to mood. 

There was an inevitably about this election. One that I admittedly refused to acknowledge (because I don't believe we should be governed by mood). The Democrats and Harris (or Biden) were never going to win no matter what they did. It didn’t matter that they passed historic legislation on infrastructure, manufacturing and lowering drug prices. Legislation to relieve student debt, and historic investments in clean energy. It doesn’t matter Biden led the world in a coalition to help Ukraine fight against Putin's illegal war of aggression, and he strengthened and expanded NATO. It doesn't matter that Biden inherited an economy in total collapse, and notwithstanding the dire predictions of most economists that a recession was inevitable, piloted it to a soft landing, creating record numbers of American jobs. He is handing his successor an economy that is the envy of the world. He never got credit for any of it. The highest approval rating of Biden's presidency was the day he was inaugurated and basically dropped after that (it actually started dropping six weeks later, in mid-March). Biden had the shortest 'honeymoon' period in presidential history. Today his approval rating stands dismally in the mid thirties, almost historically low.   

The pandemic had a lot to do with it, and still does. I agree with Vlad Vexler (belatedly) that this election was the second term election that trump would have won handily had Covid not intervened. Biden rode pandemic anger and fear against trump to victory in 2020. The American people remained angry throughout the Biden administration, and trump has now rode that post-pandemic anger to victory in 2024. There was nothing the Democrats could do about it.

The 'To-Do List' versus the 'Enemies List' - a line from the Harris campaign that sums it up perfectly. Democrats always naively believe that Americans want their president to work on their behalf. But that premise is wrong, particularly in the post-pandemic period. If the Democrats failed at anything in this campaign, it's a failure of imagination: they could not imagine that Americans would prefer an Enemies List over a To-Do List. But they did. This election showed that Americans want a president who will be an avatar for their mood. One who expresses the anger, victimization and hostility they are feeling. It's not more complicated than that.  

I hope the Democrats, who are now going through an election post-mortem and 'soul-searching', don't draw the wrong conclusions. I've been hearing all sorts of nonsense from talking heads and pundits about how Democrats are no longer the party of the working class, or how they are out of touch with the average American. They ran a positive campaign that offered hope, optimism and solutions. A campaign that was supported by the largest unions in the country and addressed the concerns of the average family. But that campaign was beaten by a campaign that was underwritten by billionnaires and expressed anger, grievance and victimization. 

So what is to be learned from soul-searching? For one thing, I hope the Democrats learn that in this election there was nothing they could have done differently to win. 

I also hope the Democrats learn one important lesson from the Republicans, and that's to double-down on exactly who they are. The one thing I know about voters is that they hate inauthenticity. Democrats fundamentally believe that government can and should work to benefit the collective good. They believe government can solve problems. They are all about the To-Do List, and I hope whatever changes they decide to implement to fight future elections, it involves adding to that list. There will come a time soon when Americans want a President who enters the Oval Office carrying a To-Do List instead of an Enemies List.  

Getting it Wrong

Pretty much everyone got it wrong, terribly wrong. 

CNN released 7 battleground state polls in the last 48 hours before the election: 

Wisconsin - Harris 51%-46% (+6)

Michigan - Harris 48%-43% (+5)

Arizona - Harris 48%-47% (+1)

North Carolina - Harris 48%-47% (+1)

Pennsylvania - Harris 48%-48% (tied)

Nevada - Harris 47%-48% (-1)

Georgia - Harris 47%-48% (-1)

All very wrong. CNN was not alone.

All the professional pollsters got it wrong, some very very badly. Most, like Nate Silver, said it was essentially a coin toss. It wasn't a coin toss. In the final analysis the respected 538.com aggregate of polls had Harris ahead nationally by a little more than one percent. I know that this doesn't sound like much, and is well within the so-called statistical 'margin of error' - a euphemism for it could be off by as much as 6-8 points in either direction ie. pretty much useless. Turns out it was.   

J. Ann Selzer the lauded pollster whose forecasts of Iowa elections have been uncannily accurate for decades, got it horribly wrong. She came out with her final poll for the Des Moines Register on the weekend before the election showing Harris up by 3 points in a deep-red state trump won in 2020 by 8 points. The result sent shock waves through the pundit class. Trump ended up winning Iowa by more than 13 percent, a difference of 16 from Selzer's result.   

Another state maven Jon Ralston, editor of The Nevada Independent, is respected for understanding and accurately forecasting Nevada's unique voter patterns. He doesn't use mathematical modelling like Selzer, nonetheless, he wasn't shy to predict the outcome of this election to the tenth of a percent, with Harris winning 48.5 percent to trump's 48.2. His reasoning was that it all depended on how non-major-party voters break, and he believed they would break for Harris. He was way off. So far, trump is beating Harris by more than 4 percent in Nevada (the race hasn't been officially called yet).

Top data gurus got it terribly wrong too. Analyst Tom Bonier who runs a website called TargetSmart specializes in analyzing the early vote numbers. He said that the hard data of actual votes (not models of 'likely voters') showed a significant gap between women and men in voting, and the numbers indicated that the abortion issue was probably a huge motivator that could make the difference for Harris. It didn't. The gender gap was more or less a wash for both candidates.

So scientific modellers, the data analysts and the pundit/journalists got it completely wrong. Surely academics fared better. Well, a certain very prominent one didn't.

Allan Lichtman is the renowned historian some have called the 'Nostradamus of US elections'. He developed The 13 Keys to the White House which had an unblemised record of predicting the final result of presidential elections since the early 1980s (with one exception in 2000, the so-called 'hanging-chad' election decided by the Supreme Court that ended when the count was abruptly ordered stopped with a 536 vote margin in favour of George W. Bush). Lichtman brashly says that we can throw the polls in the trash because they aren't worth a damn thing. He was right about that. He claims that it's governance that matters, not the candidates - except a once in a lifetime superstar like FDR, Kennedy, or Obama - or campaigning. On the face of it, his method sounds questionable, because that would mean, in theory, campaigning could never change the outcome of an election, so what's the point of wasting all that time and resources? But his method, developed by examining 165 years of presidential election history - 'from the days of the buggy whip' as he puts it - ensures the robustness of his system over time. In September, before the debate (because debates don't matter) he announced that according to the 13 Keys, Harris was a shoo-in. This time his method was just as wrong as those useless polls. 

Notably, the online offshore betting markets turned out to be more accurate than the professional pollsters. I consider this purely serendipitous. 

The one respectable commentator who got it right was a fellow from the UK on YouTube named Vlad Vexler, who calls himself 'a baby public intellectual'. I started following him at the start of the war in Ukraine because he has a special interest in Russian politics and great insight into what makes Putin tick. Vexler said he thought trump always had the advantage, even after Biden left the race, and never wavered from his belief that trump would win. At one point, he even looked at Lichtman's 13 Keys and showed how the inventor could be mis-using his own system. He said he believed that the Keys actually predict a trump victory. As a social scientist/political philosopher, Vexler takes a broad historical view, believing that there are identifiable and undeniable trends that compel events. These forces cannot be easily taken off course (except by cataclysm, for example, a world war.) The salient political trend we are seeing for decades now, he argues, is 'democratic backsliding' precipitated by a retreat of the US from the global order it established after 1945. The force of this trend has been accelerating due in part to profound changes in the information environment. He calls the period we are experiencing, Post-Truth Populism. In 2020 he believed trump would be re-elected easily, if not for the global pandemic. But the pandemic didn't halt the historical trend of democratic backsliding. Rather it was a bump on the road, and therefore he predicted, failing another such major event, trump would handily win in 2024. He nailed it.  

Notwithstanding his expertise in Russian politics, I thought Vexler was completely off base. There was no way you could apply analytical tools about historical world events to the particularities of this US election. Turns out I was wrong, he could, and with accuracy.         

This is the 3rd election in a row  - 5th if you count the 2018 and 2022 mid-terms, especially the one where the 'red wave' never materialized - when the polls were inaccurate. Is it something about trump that makes his candidacy unique and difficult to model? Is it something about our unique information (and disinformation) environment that makes gathering accurate responses to polling unusually difficult? Is it a psycho-social phenomenon, like a herd mentality, in which analysts and pollsters are afraid to be too far outside the margins from their competitors, so they adjust their approach to be similar to others? Is it all of the above?

Whatever the answer(s) - and I don't have one - I can only say that in my experience, the social media algorithm seems to have a lot to do with the skewing. This election was a sort of litmus test for me. A test of my ability to stay objective and seek out accurate information on the state of the race so I could make up my own mind about the outcome. I failed the test miserably. I was caught in my own information bubble. All of my sources of data and analysis reinforced my hopes and beliefs about what I thought would happen. My opinions hardened. When one of my favourite commentators, someone who I respected tremendously for his insight, voiced a dissenting perspective, I thought he was off his rocker and paid him no further heed on the subject (although I'm still an avid watcher of his channel). He was right and I was wrong. The experience has taught me something meaningful about myself, and about the subtle and not so subtle dangers of the world we live in.

Deep Breath

The first time around, I thought the American people had chosen change, and that felt like explanation enough. Trump was the shiny new object, a relative unknown (except as a third rate celebrity), and there was a clear sense that people were willing to take a chance on someone different and entertaining over someone who’d been around a long time and seemed unappealing. But now, nine years later, that can’t be said. This time, the choice was as clear and stark as possible. No hedging, no excuses. Voters knew exactly who and what they were supporting—and they did so with more enthusiasm and in greater numbers than ever. And that’s what makes this election so difficult to swallow.

This time, the American people knowingly and enthusiastically endorsed hatefulness and division over joy and unity. They endorsed anger and grievance over positivity and hope. They endorsed vulgarity and dishonesty over civility and decency. They endorsed blame over personal responsibility. They endorsed the crass pursuit of wealth and power over humility and service. They endorsed selfishness over selflessness. They endorsed fear over optimism. They endorsed authoritarianism over freedom. 

And they rationalized their endorsements in a variety of banal ways. Some said it’s because they thought the price of eggs was too high. Others said it’s because he is better for Israel. The choice reveals very little about the chosen and a lot about the chooser. 

Expect a lot of hand wringing and blame over the next few days and weeks. Some will say the loss was attributable to strategy. Others will say it was the candidate and her performance. A friend of mine explained to me that the Democrats lost because they were too arrogant and didn’t listen. So I asked him, what part of their policy demonstrated they weren’t listening? Was it the tax breaks for the middle class? Was it the help for a down payment on a home? Was it childcare and healthcare assistance? Lowering prescription drug prices? Enhancement of the Affordable Care Act? I said to him, better yet, can you name a single policy that showed Trump was listening? 

I don’t buy any of it. 

I believe Harris ran a great campaign, nearly flawless. One of the best I have seen in my lifetime, second to Obama in 2008. I believe her message was pitch perfect and her policy proposals were well conceived and attractive to exactly the people they were designed and needed to reach; the middle class. I also think her opponent ran one of the worst, most appalling and distasteful campaigns in history. Fumbling and listless and disorganized. Second only to his terrible 2020 campaign. So what was the problem?

Well, today I’m thinking of Allan Lichtman, for whom I have particular sympathy. He, of the famous 13 Keys to the White House, who, after more than 40 years of nearly flawless prediction, finally got it wrong. Maybe, as Lichtman says, campaigns and candidates don’t really matter. Elections are ultimately about the performance of the governing party. And maybe that’s precisely what changed in unprecedented fashion this time. There was a paradigm shift (happening over the last few election cycles) that rendered his infallible system fallible. In effect, Lichtman was wrong by being right. It wasn’t the performance of the governing party that was missed, it was the perception of the performance of the governing party. By almost every metric that supposedly matters to voters, many that are measured by the 13 Keys, the Democrats have performed exceptionally well. While we were told a recession was inevitable after Covid, the Democrats managed a soft economic landing. Inflation is moderating, wages are up, unemployment is down, and the stock market is booming. Biden had a number of remarkable legislative achievements. So why do Americans think the country is going in the wrong direction? Why do they rate Biden so unfavourably? It’s almost as if huge chunks of the electorate are living in an alternate reality.

The one thing I heard over and over again during the campaign was ‘We don’t know enough about Harris’, ‘we don’t know her policies and agenda’. Strange considering that she’s been the Vice-President for four years, and was on television daily for three months during the campaign, including at a nationally televised debate in which she performed very well while her opponent acted like a doddering incoherent fool ranting about immigrants eating pets. She spoke at massive rallies in front of hundreds of thousands of people, and did all manner of media interviews. But I believe them when they say ‘we don’t know enough about her’.

Because in all likelihood, on their media ‘feed’ (the word always reminds me of pigs at a trough) she was nearly absent, while her rival was nauseatingly ubiquitous. And that’s the nature of our information environment. Trump was covered by every media outlet all the time. While Harris was only covered by the center-left half and intentionally either ignored or covered negatively by the others. Anecdotally - and I’m sure someone has done or will do a more scientific survey - Harris garnered a fraction of the media attention that Trump did during the campaign.

I suspect this is why the message never penetrated. Half the country lives in an impenetrable and self-reinforcing hardened information silo. Trump, the spotlight hog that he is, has mastered the recipe for being a magnet to all types of media all the time. Normie politicians like Harris may as well exist in this world as apparitions.

Of course, it still comes down to voters making choices. Making an informed choice always took some effort. Nowadays, the effort is Herculean. Wading into the turbulent seas of lies and disinformation takes extraordinary breath-holding effort and stamina like oyster diving for pearls. 

Scared and In Shock

Today I am in shock and I'm scared.

I am in shock because Americans chose to give an overwhelming mandate, including a victory in the popular vote, to the oldest president in US history, who is clearly suffering from a form of dementia, not to mention malignant narcissism, which will undoubtedly progress into his 80s. A lying, twice-impeached, indicted insurrectionist, convicted felon, fraudster and adjudicated rapist. Competence and character seem to mean nothing to Americans when they elect individuals to fill 'offices of public trust'. He was running for office principally to evade legal accountability, and he has succeeded.  

I am scared because if Trump does in his second term half of what he says he will do it will be devastating to America and to the world, politically and economically.

He says he will be a fascist on day one.

He says he will replace the administrative state with loyalists.

He says he will send the military after 'the enemy within'. 

He says he will deport 12 million immigrants (effecting up to 40 million family members).

He says he will impose 200% tariffs on all imported goods.

He says he will destroy the ACA putting millions of people off healthcare.

He says he will appoint billionaire Elon Musk to take a blowtorch to the regulatory system which will mean 'hardship' for the middle class.

He says he will appoint anti-vaxxer crank RFK Jr. as healthcare czar.

He says he 'knows nothing' about Project 2025, yeah right. 

He says he will end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours. I wonder what that looks like.  

I'm scared.

The Women Rule

“Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK?” Trump said at a rally in Glendale, Arizona yesterday. “And let’s see how she feels about it, you know, when the guns are trained on her face.” His election campaign has come down to this: Execution of a political opponent, a woman. 

Five days before the US election and what has happened in the last few weeks is that the battle between Harris and trump, between the Democrats and the Republicans, has devolved and been distilled down to its very essence: A battle of the sexes. 

There was always going to be an element of that. It was determined with the Dobbs Supreme Court decision that stripped American women of their universal right to an abortion. But until Kamala Harris became the Democratic Party nominee in unprecedented fashion, no one could know how central to the election campaign that issue was going to be, and how motivating to American women. But a few things have happened in the last few weeks and months that crystalized this war of the sexes. 

I'd argue the very first thing that happened, post-Dobbs, was the chutzpah of a woman, Nikki Haley, to challenge trump for the Republican nomination. Although she was a very far longshot from the start, Haley's campaign against trump gave him all kinds of headaches, and created an anti-trump permission structure within the Republican Party that may ultimately play a major role in his downfall. Haley eventually endorsed trump unenthusiastically, but did not campaign for him at all (because he didn't want her to, like a scorned ex-lover, which I'm sure came as a relief to her). She effectively released the almost 4.5 million supporters she amassed in the primaries to vote against him in the general, and it appears that a significant number are doing just that. 

The second key event was the reintroduction of Michelle Obama to the national political scene. The former first lady has been the most popular Democrat for many years, and her stirring speech at the DNC reminded us why. Many felt it was the best speech of the entire five-day gathering, and maybe even one of the best speeches ever. She has been an extremely effective surrogate for Harris, as evidenced by trump whining about her - 'She made a big mistake by being so nasty'. 

Third, was Liz Cheney's endorsement of Kamala Harris and the two campaigning together. The effectiveness of Cheney as a Harris surrogate is what brought out trump's ire against her. Cheney's sober response was pitch perfect, “This is how dictators destroy free nations. They threaten those who speak against them with death. We cannot entrust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.” It must have been so hard to hide her glee.

And finally, in the last week we have had even more (26 at last count) accusations of sexual assault against trump, these by SI swimsuit model Stacey Williams, and former Miss Switzerland competitor Beatrice Keul. And to jog everyone's memory of the October surprise from 2016 (the infamous Access Hollywood tape) trump obliged by telling a Wisconsin gathering yesterday that he will protect women "whether they like it or not." 

But most important of all, trump has been doing his part by increasingly leaning into his sexist boys-club base. It's part of the strongman routine he is so desperate to project. And his desperation has been getting worse with each humiliation he suffers on the campaign trail at the hands of women. It started when Harris wiped the debate stage with him and forced him to back out of a second debate. The coward that he is, trump has had to resort to denigrating and insulted her personally, her intelligence and her ethnicity, which is a sure sign of the degree to which he's being embarrassed by her. Harris's massive crowd sizes are emasculating him, so he has turned to his cigar-smoking podcaster buddy Joe Rogan and washed up wrestler Hulk Hogan to restore his sense of manhood and Bro-cred. It won't work electorally.  

The best chance trump ever had of winning the election was to keep the focus on the failures of the Harris/Biden administration, such as they are perceived, and to talk about immigration and the economy. The Harris campaign was hoping that trump would do what trump always does - make everything about him. True to type, it's exactly what happened. His misogyny could not be kept in check. The lady's played him like the very tiny fiddle he is. 

As 2020 has become known as the election in which Blacks saved democracy, this one will be remembered as the election that women finally won, and I expect that it will represent a tectonic shift in the political landscape. If the Republicans learn anything from it, and it's questionable, expect Nikki Haley to be their nominee in 2028. Wouldn't that be something, a choice between two women for President. And a much needed and missed return to political civility.   

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Post Script - November 6th 2024

Turns out my post was just a dream.