The Tea Party looked goofy in 2010, until they turned the midterm. They looked goofy still in 2011 and 2013, until they shifted the face of their party and had built the community infrastructure and energy that would eventually underpin Trump’s 2016 win. Maybe this is an incomplete telling, but I laughed at the Tea Party until I realized that people willing to look goofy can shift politics a lot more than people hiding in their homes. And that’s been true since the Boston Tea Party.
This whole “No Kings” bit is baloney. If they keep this up, there’s no way they will win in 2028. At its root is outrage that Kamala was trounced in a free and fair election by a guy they hate. TDS indeed.
As someone who protested on Saturday: I fully accept that Trump won fair and square. It sucks, it was a bad decision by the American people, but that's the way it is. What I'm protesting is that he's doing terrible and lawless things, not that he won.
Plus, Trump does not have a mandate for his “kingly”actions. Most people who voted for Trump did not vote for him so he could sic ICE on US citizens, recklessly impose tariffs without Congress, take billions in bribes via crypto, defund popular government functions like medical research without Congress, pardon all his allies, and demonize anyone who disagrees with him. They were hoping he’d lower prices, deport some violent criminal illegal immigrants, and bring back a sense of stability. He hasn’t done the first or third, and has vastly overreached on the second.
I think it is also sending a message to other americans and frankly the rest of the world that a large number of americans disagree so strongly with what the trump admin is doing that they are willing to take to the streets to protest.
Also the branding, "No Kings" is specifically pushing back on his authoritarianism, not that he won the election.
So if they instead protested at the capitol, broke inside, and attempted to overturn the electors, would that have been a better way to win next cycle?
You know what, I learned a long time ago that it’s pointless to wish for a better past. We can argue over what happened five years ago and not achieve anything, or we can work for the country. These protests achieve nothing.
You had this awful protest that was widely panned and led to arrests. Pictures of a weirdo in a Viking costume were everywhere. And ultimately the protest failed in anything it wanted to achieve.
But then Trump won
Yet somehow this protest is baloney and is clearly leading to defeat in 3 years.
I protested Saturday and what I was there to protest wasn’t the fact that Trump won a fair election but rather that he has used our political system to bypass any checks and balances to act like a king in a free country where the executive does not have total power.
I would also note for the leftists that mock the earnestness of libs, the most exciting and charismatic leftist star on their side, Zohran Mamdani, is extremely earnest and talks with utmost sincerity.
The underlying issue is that "cringe" as a concept is bad. It doesn't illuminate or explain anything, it's just a term of abuse that communicates nothing.
As my teenager uses it, it means anyone trying to be earnest about anything instead of being aloof and, frankly, so chickenshit you don't ever put yourself out there.
Watching criminals direct our government in open collaboration with the *majority* political party, to compel a depth of judicial and legislative subservience while intimating fascist ambition with each policy and gesture — watching as these same sadistic, vindictive sociopaths annex private institutions using extortion and blackmail, while breaking laws with impunity as they seize control of our *elections*… is palpable horror.
But the simultaneous appearance of *7 million* Americans, in a union of 2700 venues nationwide, showcasing the breadth and enthusiasm of their opposition — confidently inhabiting a freedom to mock and ridicule the cosplay of MAGA authority while genuinely having a good time in the process, was as strong and as effective of a countermeasure to tyranny as you're likely to find.
No Kings was not "cringe". The concerns over its "cringeworthiness" were "cringe", as Jerusalem perfectly states.
I will add that the very use of the term "cringe", in this or any other context — but especially in this context — is cringe. Who would be so foolish and insecure as to diminish either the danger of our counterfeit-populist, proto-fascist government, or else the authenticity of our reply to it, by using such a patently unserious, self-mocking, strictly performative term as that?
Jerusalem's "Cringe is born of insecurity and fear", a few more paragraphs in, is as close to a flawless sentence on the topic as you're likely to find… that is, until you read her final remarks:
"I’m forced to conclude that the fear comes from being labeled as uncool by leftists on the internet. Fear that if you straightforwardly cover the protests as a clarion call in defense of democracy, someone will make fun of you for being a shit lib."
"And what could be more cringe than worrying about that?"
Appreciate the qualified defense, but we need a much more thorough reckoning with the aesthetics of the left-resistance. In their current form, these aesthetics are actively counterproductive. These aesthetics oscillate between unserious larping by upper-quintile urban elites (the pussy hats) and pathetically destructive faux-revolt by their balaclava-clad children. These are not the aesthetics of strength, endurance, vigor, conviction, humility, virtue, and class that you see on display in e.g. photos of the march on Washington or the Edmond Pettis bridge. Your anecdote about the gentleman who decided to wear a suit is quite telling here. The suit not only signals that he isn't a ruffian. It also signals that he takes this moment seriously — something that just doesn't come through with the more casual protestors, and especially doesn't come through with the costumes.
To get at this more thorough reckoning we first have to get one thing out of the way. You say early in the essay that —
> For one thing, claims of cringiness are unfalsifiable — if people feel acutely embarrassed as they watch one of the largest nonviolent protests in American history, who am I to disagree?
But this just misunderstands the relationship between cringe reactions and cringe circumstances, and is in clear tension with what you're doing in writing this post.
Like anger, amusement, shame, and countless other evaluative attitudes, cringe is a feeling which we subject to rational scrutiny. As your title makes clear, you just ARE disagreeing that the protest was cringe, and that (as a result) it merits acute embarrassment as a response. On your view, people are just WRONG to feel acutely embarrassed by these protests because they are not cringe. The rest of the essay oscillates between claims that the protests are not cringe and claims that cringe is not an attitude we should take seriously anyway.
So in their defense, those who feel these protests are indeed cringeworthy will point to the lack of leadership, the unserious / costume aesthetics, the "picnic in the park" vibes, the casualness, the incoherence in messages, the class skew, and the lack of any meaningful connection to a set of concrete demands. They will point to the lack of any meaningful narrative progression from this protest to past or future political action. They will point to the ways that images or videos of the protests will likely be received on the right. They will point to the inability to shake off the protest rituals of the woke era (land acknowledgements!), and the way that these will inevitably be covered by the media. They will say this is just another example of performative politics by urban elites who care more about what their friends think of their political views than doing the serious political work required for their countrymen to flourish.
There's plenty more they could say about this, but the work that actually should be done is to examine the political aesthetics of left and right and ask — which look more appealing? Who do you want to join? Who stirs you? What attracts you? Remember the cover of the New York Magazine in January? There is really something to the MAGA aesthetics that just creams the soft, pearl-clutching, ineptitude that is so often on display in left-political aesthetics. A lot of it is ugly, but not all of it is — and the stuff that's attractive also seems to be winning. We need to be way clearer about this. I'd love to see a follow-up investigation, or recommended reading if anyone is aware of deeper treatments.
I feel, dare I say it, cringe, replying to my own post. But it popped into my head to make a joke about about how “cynicism is cool” is probably just an overgrowth of Gen X making sarcastic ennui a trendy personality trait.
And now I am not sure how much that is even a joke or if it’s just actually correct…
No Kings was my 3rd protest ever, and I will say, it was very dorky! But it certainly felt safer than my previous protest experiences. My son spent an extensive amount of time popping bubbles with other children in the park before we moved on to City Hall.
Possibly more thought needs to go into chant and song selection. We were asked to QR code some alternate lyrics for We Will Rock You, and that didn't work all that well in my opinion. The great thing about "We Shall Overcome" is that it's slow, the words that change repeat themselves so it's easy to pick up after the first line, and the tune is simple. Most of the great protest songs are like that.
Cringe is extremely subjective, and having been to protests, nobody there feels cringe. They understand what they are doing and why. The first one felt a bit cringe, at this point it is understood that our job is to look like a lot of non threatening people. The culture of it is welcoming and exciting, and it is getting people excited to be there.
The chants are cringe though. I say this not to be harsh on them, but to say that people attending the protests don't want to commit to the chants. This is an area where we could be creative and inventive, and get something that people are excited to chant. Getting this better will make the message of the protests louder and reach more people. It will get more people eager to join. We haven't put thought into communication the way we have with image.
it takes every ounce of self-restraint to not give notes to the organizers about the chants. like, why aren't there any about how weak trump is? lots of words rhyme with weak.
"Cringe" is the all-purpose insult for Zoomers to call millennials old without having to actually say why something is bad. At least their Gen X parents have the world Kurt Cobain. Zoomers give the world TikTok brain rot, falling literacy, and being in love with an AI chat bot.
To be fair, it's not the Zoomers themselves who gave the world those things - those are natural byproducts of the pattern of development of AI recommendation engines figuring out how to tweak people's viewing habits. Don't blame the Zoomers for giving us these things - pity the Zoomers for being in the front lines of being hit by them.
I’ve noticed a pattern in right wing characterization of left-wing protests.
Either they’re fiery disturbances full of young antifa thugs, usually of color, or they’re peaceful but boring gatherings of old white people. If you’re paying attention, this is the full gamut of protests and protestors. Young or old. Peaceful or disruptive. White or people of color. In either case you have a ready made excuse to ignore the protesters concern and dismiss protestors as not people worthy of listening to.
Agree entirely. Now the Republicans are the ones doing the single least politically popular thing possible in America (blocking traffic in this nation of drivers, in this case by shooting artillery over a highway) and liberal are bringing out children and families to appeal to our founding principles. There is a lot of work yet to be done, but this is the right track
I take the “cringe” complaints seriously, not literally because, even going back to Trump’s first term and 2020…these sort of protest aesthetics (anti-radical, cos-play costumes, cutesy / humorous signage people spend the vast majority of their time obsessing over) have seemed to be treading water with efficacy and its hard to not look at Trump improving his numbers with key demographic and not see that the protests aren’t broadly working even with some of the most oppressed voter groups who have moved away from the Party of late…
Think it goes back to the “Theater Kid” critique of less radical Democratic leadership …the protests aren’t broadly working designed to appeal to the folks who are already with us…
Eh, I don’t see how minor changes to protest aesthetics would have changed any of that. Do you think this would have been perceived any better if people cosplayed as Edgy Radicals? Or conversely if everyone had worn suits?
I would say anti-Trump protesting in the first term largely worked. Defeating an incumbent is not an easy task, and the 2018 midterms were large Democratic wave. Even though 2020 was close in the electoral college, Biden won the popular vote by 4.5.
We didn’t really see any anti-Trump protesting in 2024, but we did see anti-Biden protesting from the left. I would guess that that contributed to Trump’s normalization in that cycle.
the “concern” Jerusalem had was “is this effective?” and honestly when it matters (in Presidential elections mainly) we keep under performing our own expectations and so…I don’t think it is.
I don’t think a more Radical framing would work any better, but I take serious the whole vibe the Party an it’s non-profit group lead extensions are not capable of being effective at crafting a vibe or atmosphere that is inviting or appealing to the masses and instead just keeps putting off the same one people are “meh” and tepid on expecting it will work this time just because….
I'm all for Democrats being more strategic, strategically moderating, being careful not to alienate normies, and so on. I'm in full agreement the Ezra Klein/ Matt Yglesias/David Shor line on all that. So sure, politicians, activists, big donors, PACs, partisan think tanks, opinion journalists, etc. should think about messaging and aesthetics and reaching out to people Democrats lost.
But I think nitpicking the aesthetics of random people at mass protests, which are inherently decentralized, organic things, isn't really that productive. I think any large-scale, peaceful protests of Trump are probably good, or at least harmless. They make Trump look weaker, and take back control of the news cycle for a few days. That said, I'm pretty skeptical protests will be a big part of the solution to beating MAGA, but I also don't think they're part of the problem.
When the Party has a branding problem overall, you are what the people see you associated with and so you should at least be cognizant of how you look and how normies “read” you if you will be showing up every 2 to 4 years and asking for their vote. Personally, i think leaders should do more to empower more normie coded vibes…but instead we just get kinda testy about the relatively minor critiques on how we might present better and then double or triple down 😒
RE: Trump 1.0 and 2020 protests “working”, it’s worth recalling just how *close* the elections were and to not over index on taking credit for baseline economic or voting pattern factors (Democrats are now the Party of old people who always vote in Mid Terms and Republicans are the “low propensity voters” who don’t show up when Trump isn’t on the ballot) when buttering our own strategic bread
When I grew up people used to call politics show business for ugly people. And for a minute thanks to the Great Recession and the launching of social media making a lot of young people super political along identity lines this faded and now that people can just make a lot of money it’s back to being for extremely serious people which seems well cringe.
The Tea Party looked goofy in 2010, until they turned the midterm. They looked goofy still in 2011 and 2013, until they shifted the face of their party and had built the community infrastructure and energy that would eventually underpin Trump’s 2016 win. Maybe this is an incomplete telling, but I laughed at the Tea Party until I realized that people willing to look goofy can shift politics a lot more than people hiding in their homes. And that’s been true since the Boston Tea Party.
This whole “No Kings” bit is baloney. If they keep this up, there’s no way they will win in 2028. At its root is outrage that Kamala was trounced in a free and fair election by a guy they hate. TDS indeed.
As someone who protested on Saturday: I fully accept that Trump won fair and square. It sucks, it was a bad decision by the American people, but that's the way it is. What I'm protesting is that he's doing terrible and lawless things, not that he won.
Plus, Trump does not have a mandate for his “kingly”actions. Most people who voted for Trump did not vote for him so he could sic ICE on US citizens, recklessly impose tariffs without Congress, take billions in bribes via crypto, defund popular government functions like medical research without Congress, pardon all his allies, and demonize anyone who disagrees with him. They were hoping he’d lower prices, deport some violent criminal illegal immigrants, and bring back a sense of stability. He hasn’t done the first or third, and has vastly overreached on the second.
I think it is also sending a message to other americans and frankly the rest of the world that a large number of americans disagree so strongly with what the trump admin is doing that they are willing to take to the streets to protest.
Also the branding, "No Kings" is specifically pushing back on his authoritarianism, not that he won the election.
So if they instead protested at the capitol, broke inside, and attempted to overturn the electors, would that have been a better way to win next cycle?
You know what, I learned a long time ago that it’s pointless to wish for a better past. We can argue over what happened five years ago and not achieve anything, or we can work for the country. These protests achieve nothing.
It’s a weird disconnect though.
You had this awful protest that was widely panned and led to arrests. Pictures of a weirdo in a Viking costume were everywhere. And ultimately the protest failed in anything it wanted to achieve.
But then Trump won
Yet somehow this protest is baloney and is clearly leading to defeat in 3 years.
Don’t see you squaring that circle.
I protested Saturday and what I was there to protest wasn’t the fact that Trump won a fair election but rather that he has used our political system to bypass any checks and balances to act like a king in a free country where the executive does not have total power.
I would also note for the leftists that mock the earnestness of libs, the most exciting and charismatic leftist star on their side, Zohran Mamdani, is extremely earnest and talks with utmost sincerity.
Sincerity is underrated
The underlying issue is that "cringe" as a concept is bad. It doesn't illuminate or explain anything, it's just a term of abuse that communicates nothing.
As my teenager uses it, it means anyone trying to be earnest about anything instead of being aloof and, frankly, so chickenshit you don't ever put yourself out there.
Watching criminals direct our government in open collaboration with the *majority* political party, to compel a depth of judicial and legislative subservience while intimating fascist ambition with each policy and gesture — watching as these same sadistic, vindictive sociopaths annex private institutions using extortion and blackmail, while breaking laws with impunity as they seize control of our *elections*… is palpable horror.
But the simultaneous appearance of *7 million* Americans, in a union of 2700 venues nationwide, showcasing the breadth and enthusiasm of their opposition — confidently inhabiting a freedom to mock and ridicule the cosplay of MAGA authority while genuinely having a good time in the process, was as strong and as effective of a countermeasure to tyranny as you're likely to find.
No Kings was not "cringe". The concerns over its "cringeworthiness" were "cringe", as Jerusalem perfectly states.
I will add that the very use of the term "cringe", in this or any other context — but especially in this context — is cringe. Who would be so foolish and insecure as to diminish either the danger of our counterfeit-populist, proto-fascist government, or else the authenticity of our reply to it, by using such a patently unserious, self-mocking, strictly performative term as that?
Jerusalem's "Cringe is born of insecurity and fear", a few more paragraphs in, is as close to a flawless sentence on the topic as you're likely to find… that is, until you read her final remarks:
"I’m forced to conclude that the fear comes from being labeled as uncool by leftists on the internet. Fear that if you straightforwardly cover the protests as a clarion call in defense of democracy, someone will make fun of you for being a shit lib."
"And what could be more cringe than worrying about that?"
Exactly.
This essay was a pleasure to read.
Appreciate the qualified defense, but we need a much more thorough reckoning with the aesthetics of the left-resistance. In their current form, these aesthetics are actively counterproductive. These aesthetics oscillate between unserious larping by upper-quintile urban elites (the pussy hats) and pathetically destructive faux-revolt by their balaclava-clad children. These are not the aesthetics of strength, endurance, vigor, conviction, humility, virtue, and class that you see on display in e.g. photos of the march on Washington or the Edmond Pettis bridge. Your anecdote about the gentleman who decided to wear a suit is quite telling here. The suit not only signals that he isn't a ruffian. It also signals that he takes this moment seriously — something that just doesn't come through with the more casual protestors, and especially doesn't come through with the costumes.
To get at this more thorough reckoning we first have to get one thing out of the way. You say early in the essay that —
> For one thing, claims of cringiness are unfalsifiable — if people feel acutely embarrassed as they watch one of the largest nonviolent protests in American history, who am I to disagree?
But this just misunderstands the relationship between cringe reactions and cringe circumstances, and is in clear tension with what you're doing in writing this post.
Like anger, amusement, shame, and countless other evaluative attitudes, cringe is a feeling which we subject to rational scrutiny. As your title makes clear, you just ARE disagreeing that the protest was cringe, and that (as a result) it merits acute embarrassment as a response. On your view, people are just WRONG to feel acutely embarrassed by these protests because they are not cringe. The rest of the essay oscillates between claims that the protests are not cringe and claims that cringe is not an attitude we should take seriously anyway.
So in their defense, those who feel these protests are indeed cringeworthy will point to the lack of leadership, the unserious / costume aesthetics, the "picnic in the park" vibes, the casualness, the incoherence in messages, the class skew, and the lack of any meaningful connection to a set of concrete demands. They will point to the lack of any meaningful narrative progression from this protest to past or future political action. They will point to the ways that images or videos of the protests will likely be received on the right. They will point to the inability to shake off the protest rituals of the woke era (land acknowledgements!), and the way that these will inevitably be covered by the media. They will say this is just another example of performative politics by urban elites who care more about what their friends think of their political views than doing the serious political work required for their countrymen to flourish.
There's plenty more they could say about this, but the work that actually should be done is to examine the political aesthetics of left and right and ask — which look more appealing? Who do you want to join? Who stirs you? What attracts you? Remember the cover of the New York Magazine in January? There is really something to the MAGA aesthetics that just creams the soft, pearl-clutching, ineptitude that is so often on display in left-political aesthetics. A lot of it is ugly, but not all of it is — and the stuff that's attractive also seems to be winning. We need to be way clearer about this. I'd love to see a follow-up investigation, or recommended reading if anyone is aware of deeper treatments.
This is a really thoughtful response.
There’s something in this cringe dynamic about this mistaken but very powerful idea that being cynical is cool.
I don’t know where that came from, how old a dynamic it is, or anything. But it’s definitely something.
I feel, dare I say it, cringe, replying to my own post. But it popped into my head to make a joke about about how “cynicism is cool” is probably just an overgrowth of Gen X making sarcastic ennui a trendy personality trait.
And now I am not sure how much that is even a joke or if it’s just actually correct…
No Kings was my 3rd protest ever, and I will say, it was very dorky! But it certainly felt safer than my previous protest experiences. My son spent an extensive amount of time popping bubbles with other children in the park before we moved on to City Hall.
Possibly more thought needs to go into chant and song selection. We were asked to QR code some alternate lyrics for We Will Rock You, and that didn't work all that well in my opinion. The great thing about "We Shall Overcome" is that it's slow, the words that change repeat themselves so it's easy to pick up after the first line, and the tune is simple. Most of the great protest songs are like that.
Cringe is extremely subjective, and having been to protests, nobody there feels cringe. They understand what they are doing and why. The first one felt a bit cringe, at this point it is understood that our job is to look like a lot of non threatening people. The culture of it is welcoming and exciting, and it is getting people excited to be there.
The chants are cringe though. I say this not to be harsh on them, but to say that people attending the protests don't want to commit to the chants. This is an area where we could be creative and inventive, and get something that people are excited to chant. Getting this better will make the message of the protests louder and reach more people. It will get more people eager to join. We haven't put thought into communication the way we have with image.
it takes every ounce of self-restraint to not give notes to the organizers about the chants. like, why aren't there any about how weak trump is? lots of words rhyme with weak.
Good piece. I'm not in high school anymore, do I still have to care about doing cringey things?
"Cringe" is the all-purpose insult for Zoomers to call millennials old without having to actually say why something is bad. At least their Gen X parents have the world Kurt Cobain. Zoomers give the world TikTok brain rot, falling literacy, and being in love with an AI chat bot.
To be fair, it's not the Zoomers themselves who gave the world those things - those are natural byproducts of the pattern of development of AI recommendation engines figuring out how to tweak people's viewing habits. Don't blame the Zoomers for giving us these things - pity the Zoomers for being in the front lines of being hit by them.
I’ve noticed a pattern in right wing characterization of left-wing protests.
Either they’re fiery disturbances full of young antifa thugs, usually of color, or they’re peaceful but boring gatherings of old white people. If you’re paying attention, this is the full gamut of protests and protestors. Young or old. Peaceful or disruptive. White or people of color. In either case you have a ready made excuse to ignore the protesters concern and dismiss protestors as not people worthy of listening to.
"Cringe is born of insecurity and fear." That right there. And I think relatedly, cynicism is born of unoriginality.
Agree entirely. Now the Republicans are the ones doing the single least politically popular thing possible in America (blocking traffic in this nation of drivers, in this case by shooting artillery over a highway) and liberal are bringing out children and families to appeal to our founding principles. There is a lot of work yet to be done, but this is the right track
I take the “cringe” complaints seriously, not literally because, even going back to Trump’s first term and 2020…these sort of protest aesthetics (anti-radical, cos-play costumes, cutesy / humorous signage people spend the vast majority of their time obsessing over) have seemed to be treading water with efficacy and its hard to not look at Trump improving his numbers with key demographic and not see that the protests aren’t broadly working even with some of the most oppressed voter groups who have moved away from the Party of late…
Think it goes back to the “Theater Kid” critique of less radical Democratic leadership …the protests aren’t broadly working designed to appeal to the folks who are already with us…
Eh, I don’t see how minor changes to protest aesthetics would have changed any of that. Do you think this would have been perceived any better if people cosplayed as Edgy Radicals? Or conversely if everyone had worn suits?
I would say anti-Trump protesting in the first term largely worked. Defeating an incumbent is not an easy task, and the 2018 midterms were large Democratic wave. Even though 2020 was close in the electoral college, Biden won the popular vote by 4.5.
We didn’t really see any anti-Trump protesting in 2024, but we did see anti-Biden protesting from the left. I would guess that that contributed to Trump’s normalization in that cycle.
the “concern” Jerusalem had was “is this effective?” and honestly when it matters (in Presidential elections mainly) we keep under performing our own expectations and so…I don’t think it is.
I don’t think a more Radical framing would work any better, but I take serious the whole vibe the Party an it’s non-profit group lead extensions are not capable of being effective at crafting a vibe or atmosphere that is inviting or appealing to the masses and instead just keeps putting off the same one people are “meh” and tepid on expecting it will work this time just because….
I'm all for Democrats being more strategic, strategically moderating, being careful not to alienate normies, and so on. I'm in full agreement the Ezra Klein/ Matt Yglesias/David Shor line on all that. So sure, politicians, activists, big donors, PACs, partisan think tanks, opinion journalists, etc. should think about messaging and aesthetics and reaching out to people Democrats lost.
But I think nitpicking the aesthetics of random people at mass protests, which are inherently decentralized, organic things, isn't really that productive. I think any large-scale, peaceful protests of Trump are probably good, or at least harmless. They make Trump look weaker, and take back control of the news cycle for a few days. That said, I'm pretty skeptical protests will be a big part of the solution to beating MAGA, but I also don't think they're part of the problem.
When the Party has a branding problem overall, you are what the people see you associated with and so you should at least be cognizant of how you look and how normies “read” you if you will be showing up every 2 to 4 years and asking for their vote. Personally, i think leaders should do more to empower more normie coded vibes…but instead we just get kinda testy about the relatively minor critiques on how we might present better and then double or triple down 😒
RE: Trump 1.0 and 2020 protests “working”, it’s worth recalling just how *close* the elections were and to not over index on taking credit for baseline economic or voting pattern factors (Democrats are now the Party of old people who always vote in Mid Terms and Republicans are the “low propensity voters” who don’t show up when Trump isn’t on the ballot) when buttering our own strategic bread
When I grew up people used to call politics show business for ugly people. And for a minute thanks to the Great Recession and the launching of social media making a lot of young people super political along identity lines this faded and now that people can just make a lot of money it’s back to being for extremely serious people which seems well cringe.