Very good thread, thanks for weighing in :). We are saying basically the same thing, in different words and formatting. Thanks for pointing out how well the GOP strategy embodies "reactionary" politics, too many folks are unfamiliar with what that word means. The ability of reactionary fascists (because is one possible without the other?) to harbor so much unaddressed cognitive dissonance is a feature of fascism, not a bug. And yeah, the resulting stupidity seems to always eventually lead to destabilization and collapse, but MAGA's still able to get their rocks off today. Are status quo dems losing because of their refusal to react quickly enough to radical reactionaries? I'm sure that the Fed is (perhaps unintentionally) low balling the inflation numbers, but the media seems remarkably susceptible to overly simplistic right-wing messaging, despite all of the accusations that our media landscape is almost entirely left-leaning. Almost every single American seems incapable of understanding that the quantitative easing instituted under Trump are what has led us into hyperinflation under Biden. And it's not like I or many others had better ideas to get us out of the covid pickle without inflation following, besides better targeting of relief funding, I guess. But "it's the economy stupid" is obviously going to rail Biden in 2024, unless things get much, much better very quickly. Not betting on it. And we have no large progressive outlets, of course, because progressivism is decidedly anti-corporations, and America is now a corporatocracy. Also lol yeah, five or six people on SCOTUS may genuinely have no idea about some of the implications of overturning Roe. Still, a very large measure of cruely. On top of the lack of empathy seems to be a related idiocy; the inability to game things out using hypothetical scenarios. How many (tens of?) thousands of women will die before Thomas and Alito begin to feel something akin to regret (I almost typed "remorse", but nah)? Will we see women and/or abortion providers sentenced to death?? Not sure if you heard, but our literally criminal AG (everyone knows this story, I hope) wants to make it so TX can't legally do it in the butt or get a beej (Dear Ken; Hands stuff only and forever is a loathe position. I daresay we intend to make callous the hands of your mistresses). My mom, the other day was like "Oh no, they won't repeal gay marriage. Only Thomas seems to be in favor of that" and I wanted to jump through the phone and shake her by the shoulders. The theocrats are very emboldened, at the moment, and an alarmist perspective is currently yielding the best predictions. And the impetus for action. I hope. Now I'm ranting. edit: How funny is it that Catholic fundamentalists, a superminority of our population, are the majority controlling the GOP's shiny new branch of government, in a country founded by Protestants attempting to escape the Catholic Church, and now the Protestants are firmly aligned with the other radical Christian theocrats against a dangerously bogus perception of The Other? Oh, it's not funny? Oh. I worry that fascism is inevitable, because it's probably the surest way to sustain or even further increase the current wealth disparity, and the wealthy have clearly already seized the American political apparatus. My profileski says I'm a doomer, but I'm still voting, preaching the anti-fascist word afk, and looking to get more involved at the community level.
You, like many liberals, fail to understand conservatism. Your basic problem is here: what if there was no cognitive dissonance Try that on. What if conservatives think conservatively because they have no problems with cognitive dissonance? What would the causes of that be? What would the outcomes be? From a psychological - rather than rhetorical - standpoint, cognitive dissonance is an unpleasant physical sensation caused by two or more ideas that are in conflict. Cognitive dissonance, from a psychological standpoint, is relieved by discarding one or the other of the ideas. This in turn causes a backlash effect whereby the afflicted loses affinity for the entire sphere of ideas adjacent to the conflict. Liberals say "cognitive dissonance" a lot because liberals require a consistent worldview. For example, it is very hard for liberals to appreciate that Dick Cheney legitimately had the country's best intentions in mind when he pushed for the invasion of Iraq because liberals have enough affinity for other people in other countries that invasion requires a threshold of evil. Liberals have difficulty seeing good in the TSA or CBP because liberals see the evils perpetrated by both organizations against others. Liberals require a consistent logical framework they can explain to themselves and explain to others. "I am good, I want good, those who govern in my name must also be good because if they do evil, I am responsible for evil." Conservatives are utterly unmoved by cognitive dissonance because conservatives do not require a consistent worldview. They require loyalty and consistency. Liberals constantly fret about whether liberals are doing evil - conservatives take, as a base condition, that conservatives cannot be evil. If a conservative does it, it is good. Not that they don't have doubts? But "doubt" is not the base condition the way it is with liberals. This is why conservative defenses against cognitive dissonance are so lightweight - they don't need to be any firmer. The "caravan" does not need to be actual if there are pictures that can support the idea of a caravan. George W Bush may have only won the 2000 election by 538 votes but he won. Liberals can't say there was zero voter fraud of any kind whatsoever in the 2020 election, therefore there was widespread voter fraud. This is the principle reason all the ex-republicans - the Lincoln Project, Joe Walsh, George Conway, etc - whinge about like a bunch of goddamn ex-mormons. Conservatives aren't immune from cognitive dissonance, it just takes a lot more of a push to get them to question a worldview whose central tenet is "leadership is always correct." This is also the principle reason the Republicans spent 2015 and 2016 decrying Trump from the rooftops and 2017-2022 licking his boots: it's not about what's done, it's about who does it. That, by the way, is the simplest definition of fascism, as pointed out by Hannah Arendt, as described by Mussolini: unity over ideology. Mussolini didn't go all the way to L'etat, c'est moi but he implied it. Arendt defined fascism as belief in the individual over belief in the idea. I've read two or three people argue in print that Republican fascism started at Nixon - a Republican political establishment would freely argue that the President is not above the law; a fascist political establishment would argue that the President is the law. Which, incidentally, is William Barr's guiding legal theory. Only reason he got out of there is his thinking is "the president is in charge" rather than "Donald Trump is in charge." I keep harping on this: The strength of the Republican Party is directly proportional to the strength of Donald Trump. It will be that way until they pick a new leader. This is the fundamental political struggle of our time: will the Republicans find someone to rally around who believes in someone other than themselves? Will the Democrats (and let's be honest - the bureaucrats; I'm a big fan of the deep state) be able to paint Trump red enough that he piddles off into nothing? You're right - it's a feature not a bug. But you persist in thinking about it in terms of "I think like this, therefore they're not thinking". The Fed exists to keep businesses businessing. if you ask Wallerstein the country doesn't matter, what matters is the economic system - from a cultural perspective, modern American society extends back to the Dutch in like 1550, passes through English mercantilism and shifts to the United States around WWI. Strauss-Howe Generational Theory also counts generations back to 200 years before the founding of the United States. And that there represents a fundamental problem: in a capitalist system, it's the capital that matters. The Fed? The Fed is the interface between the money and the people who want to tear it all down in order to stop the cotton gins. Of course they gerrymander the shit out of the statistics. And look - this is an important insight. The Republican Party has been the party of business since its inception in 1854. Missouri Compromise set a line north of which slavery was banned, south of which slavery was permitted. Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise because Northern industrialists knew industrialization had an edge over manual labor but not one over slave labor. Republicans came about to ban slavery everywhere not because it was immoral (not entirely because it was immoral) but because a slave economy will never make profits the way an industrialized economy will. These are the same guys picking fights with Disney now. Democrats grabbed the Civil Rights mantle in 1964 and lost the south. Republicans have been about wedge issues ever since. Eventually they would land on wedge issues so wedgy that not even Exxon Mobil can back 'em. We're lookin' at it, boyo. The Supreme Court wants to ban gays. 20% of GenZ identifies as LGBT. How's that gonna work out? And I mean, you have to consider what "law" means to the privileged white. It means "thing I can be charged with if I fuck up, and then I'll have to hire a lawyer or something." Death penalty against abortion providers? Yeah there'll prolly be a show trial or two. It'll be the same culturally-poignant, legally-irrelevant misadventure as the Scopes Trial or Jammie Thomas. These things matter to liberals, they fucking don't to conservatives. This is why "owning the conservatives" isn't a thing - conservatives know that logical inconsistencies bug the shit out of liberals and don't bother conservatives in the slightest. Implications of overturning Roe? Liberals give a shit about that. Conservatives just know their team wins. And that's literally all that matters. Democrats, in their current incarnation, are never going to win. If you look at it, the Democratic Party is the party of rich white people who can tolerate poor people. The Republican Party is the party of rich white people who can't. Eventually, though, the poors rise up. We're at an inflection point. The Democrats have been shown to be utterly ineffectual. Their past 40 years have amounted to nothing. The Republicans, on the other hand, have been shown to be too effectual. Their past 40 years have amounted to a massive cultural isolation and a business climate that's hostile to business. If you aren't Charles Koch you want a healthy EPA because they're the thing that levels the playing field between you and Charles Koch. But we all fight the last war. So very few people are paying attention to what's going on because they're all preoccupied with what happened.to harbor so much unaddressed cognitive dissonance