In 2016, I wrote a long essay on the American right’s ingrained suspicion of democracy, which enables the majority to gang up on the rich at the ballot box and redistribute their rightly-earned wealth:https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2016/10/the-gops-age-of-authoritarianism-has-only-just-begun.html …
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The intellectual right’s relationship with Trump is complicated by a snobbish disdain for the masses, which inflected NR’s view of Trump all along, as a crass demagogue. This is how Buckley viewed segregationists.
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NR supported Jim Crow and opposed the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act. NR was critical of crude, low-class racism, but believed the solution was less democracy, not more. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/everybody-shouldnt-be-voting-republican-vote-suppression-national-review-history.html …pic.twitter.com/WPnjydYy7s
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It lost the fight to defend Apartheid in the American South, and then lost again in South Africa, but National Review has been making the case for winnowing the electorate throughout its history: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/04/georgia-vote-suppression-baseball-all-star-atlanta-boycott-republican-jim-crow.html …pic.twitter.com/Ky8FF3Hrog
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It’s bizarre NR angrily denounces charges that the GOP agenda is to discourage people from voting. This is exactly what they want! They’re still making new arguments for it today: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/04/mitch-mcconnell-and-the-agony-of-the-corporate-republican.html …pic.twitter.com/DMdXHIN8B3
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Voter suppression has been standard-issue Republican policy since 2010. Elite conservatives who had reservations about Trump (NR, McConnell, the WSJ edit page) expected their “normal” conservatism would not be shunned as Trump was.
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In their mind, there’s a huge difference between highbrow conservative opposition to democracy and Trumpism. But the difference largely amounts to manners and style.
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Trump’s personal authoritarianism accelerated the trend, but the GOP’s evolution into an authoritarianism reflects the conservative movement’s longstanding ascent within the party.
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I didn’t agree with a thing Wm Buckley said, but he was smart. I don’t read
@NRO as I was blocked when I suggested re a column@charlescwcooke wasn’t as funny as MelBrooks. True,so everyone will excuse me if I think NR belief they are superior is also flawed. - Show replies
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