Thanks for always making me think, Justin. Whenever your posts arrive, I find an excuse to pause, take a deep breath, read carefully, and reflect. And I read these more than once.
Appreciate your thoughts. I’ve been unhealthily obsessed with this election, because I believe Canada and much of the world has skin in the game. We knew the result would cause ripple effects on the future of populism, democracy, foreign interference, geopolitics, and more.
It’s going to be a while before this is all sorted out by the historians and analysts, I think. I agree with you the well-organized right-wing media did a great job of carrying a powerful and unified message. It bothers me tremendously that apparently Fox News is played without exception in all the US military hangouts. WTF?
Trumps’s quote “I love the uneducated “ captured a bunch of slaves right there. Trying to explain Project 25 to a low-information voter could backfire and seem condescending, whereas blasting “They’re eating the cats” needs no explanation and overwhelms facts.
Although the Donald and his ultra-rich CEO friends, “Muskaswamy” and the the rest of his sychophants are as “elite” as you can get, they’ve managed to fool the public that they’re just regular guys.
I have for sone years shared a social psychologist view I got from the author at Rotman. You have to get peopke to make room in their tunnel ue their busy lives just like some of us have for Justin Ling's writing or homeless issues or performing arts. 1. Make it easy 2. Personal contact (Ganz or snowflake organizing, one person at a time) 3 finding common ground by listening to each other and 4 curiousity, asking questions that move people off their emotions. Eg what is carbon pricing? Or your intriguing openings . Many journalists personalize their writing like you do and with public appearances to be accessible. Why questions are better than tossing out facts that jo one is listening too. The goal is to make space in your tunnel to learn more
Thanks, Justin, for the post! Massive fan of your work!!
A couple of quick thoughts… I don’t think we need to create a "left-wing Joe Rogan." Or if that is the goal, waiting around for it to happen is an extremely unlikely and therefore bad strategy.
Democrats already had access to a liberal Joe Rogan: it was Joe Rogan in 2016. He was into Bernie, Yang, universal healthcare, taxing the rich… and yet, instead of engaging with him, Dems pushed him further and further away. Rogan isn’t Limbaugh—he never had crazy, far-right views that justified abandoning him.
Not saying you completely ostracizing Rogan, but many do. Instead, Democrats should actively engage with Rogan and his audience. His listeners already tune in—not because of a political label, but because of his perceived authenticity and curiosity. Waiting for some perfectly aligned "progressive influencer" is a losing strategy. Rogan’s appeal is organic—it can’t be manufactured. Dems need to meet his audience where they are, and going back on Rogan (not just for a one-off Fetterman-in-a-sweater chat) is a must. Too often, Dems let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
I also think this ties into your point about "Newspaper-izing Our Information." Meeting people where they are, with unscripted, respectful conversations, and dismantling myths in real-time is the way to reach disaffected voters. It’s not about pandering—it’s about showing up, talking normal, and offering something equally real.
That said, I don’t think just going on Rogan is the full solution. But I also don’t think we need to build much new infrastructure. It’s already there! The right figured this out. I was sooo impressed with Ezra Klein’s conversation with Vivek Ramaswamy—two people actually listening and not shouting at each other. It was a gold-star example of what Dems could pull off on Rogan, especially because, let’s be real, Rogan is no Ezra Klein.
Similarly, JD Vance’s NYT interview was a bundle of lies but came off as articulate, oppositional, and aimed at reaching new audiences. Dems need more of that energy—opposing, engaging, and reaching 47 million viewers head-on.
I think Rogan, and his viewers can be won back by the Dems and this is a worthwhile investment.
I think you're totally right about Rogan. But I'm not sure that Democrats (i.e. the party) actively engaging with him then would've done much good. The party made the conscious effort to move away from the very things that attracted Rogan (and the Bernie bros, and other constituent groups of progressives, economic populists, technologists, etc.) The problem, in short, was the Democratic Party itself (and maybe the state of liberalism/progressivism more broadly.)
Engaging with Rogan now is still probably worth it, but I think he's been captured by so much bullshit that you'd be left shadowboxing a bunch of insane half-baked takes.
But what sets Rogan apart from Klein is that the former has broad appeal. Klein's thing is "I'm a liberal political columnist with some heterodox views." That's great! That's why I like him. But he doesn't have broad appeal like Rogan does. Klein isn't interviewing standup comics, porn stars, etc.
Maybe we don't need a left-wing Joe Rogan. Maybe we need a new Howard Stern. There's an idea.
I agree that the big puzzle is why many Democrats stayed home. But I can't make the math square with " millions of undecideds and independents broke for the Republicans, and millions of non-voters turned out for Trump." He beat his 2020 vote by only about 1.7 million. Unless he LOST a lot of his core, his totals should have been much higher if all those millions of undecided, etc voted for him. Do you have an explanation?
(As to Third Parties: The Green party was up, but only by a couple hundred thousand. The libertarians were WAY down. RFKj--who knows who he drew votes from?)
So I see a WAY bigger problem in why the Dem ticket didn't appeal to its usual voters. I don't think it was her voice. I didn't feel she talked down to folks. I'm agnostic on things like her connection to Cheney. I do think that there are way more people out there--both Dem and GOP, both men and women--who just have the kinda cultural feeling that women should be respected and all and have many virtues...but being a leader isn't one of them. (Add black to this and it gets worse). This isn't what I think of as active misogyny. It isn't hating women. It is just something that still haunts our society, also reflected in the glass ceiling, lack of equal pay for equal work at ALL levels, including professional, and the remarkable amount of mansplaining, talking over, TAKING over a woman's ideas one finds even in a nice blue state full of nice liberal educated men. I have lived that life.
The other thing that would have explained the popular vote, more than the electoral college, is the feeling in many states that either your vote doesn't matter (you will lose whether you vote or not) or that it is not NECESSARY (your side will win because of the color of your state). I can see this clearly in WA.
Yes, the economy and misinformation paid a role. But I think the two issues I raise speak more to a CULTURAL problem in the US that will continue to haunt us till we figure out how to deal with it. For the near future, not having a female candidate seems the best way, to my increasing despair as one coming of age in the 60s.
So on the math: We've been discussing this with a bit of missing data, because some states are *still* counting. But let's take Florida, where all the votes are in. They had a shade over 11 million votes overall in 2020, about 5.7 million went to Trump. This time, turnout declined a smidgen to 10.8 million, but Trump turnout went up to 6.1 million. That's about 500,000 more votes with turnout decline of about 200,000. That's a pretty similar trend across the other states that are reporting full totals.
But you're right that my language was a bit imprecise: I meant he won millions of undecideds, non-voters, and frustrated democrats — not that he won multiple millions of each category.
I understand your point entirely, because it's correct! Many Democrats *did* stay home. But if you look at the (final) 2024 totals for Michigan, Wisconsin and Georgia: Trump got more votes there (amidst lower turnout) in 2024 than Biden won in 2020.
But anyway, you can split the numbers until you lose your mind.
I totally agree with you that an innate feeling that women can't be leaders played aggressively against Harris. But I disagree that it did her in. There's a point I made, above, that I may flesh out into a longer piece at some point: It's about the politics of surprise.
Very few things Harris did during the campaign surprised anymore. The "I've got a glock in my purse" was absolutely one of them. If you can't surprise people, then you can't change their baked-in assumptions about you. I think if voters could've seen Harris being in command and in control — without being scripted, without having her staff around, without it being a neatly-choreographed campaign event — they might be surprised by her. Unfortunately, her campaign seemed designed to prevent surprises, and thus it gave up trying to change people's minds about her. To that end, I think a woman absolutely *can* run again, but she would need to find a way to break that stereotype more forcefully. (But also, I predict the first female president will be a Republican.)
Not sure Florida is the best example because it is it seems that a lot of voters are either migrating in or leaving in disgust, so it's hard to say its balance was the SAME group of voters. And given where most of the uncounted votes are, I doubt the totals will be up a whole lot more. But I do agree that there is no "one" thing that did Harris in. I'm just looking at underlying things that our society needs to fix to be anywhere close to its ideals.
By the same token of course, the vote for trump is nowhere close to a mandate, not just because of the low turnout but because so many don't seem to have been all in on his policies--a lot of people chose their personal sense of the economy over personal distaste for one or more parts of the culture wars, for example. And the economy is likely to be the most spectacular and most immediate failure unless somehow the tariff idea is squelched.
My exposure to U.S. politics is limited to whatever is on the evening news, and my impression during the lasts 2 weeks was that she had nothing to offer.
That’s interesting. Nothing to offer to the country, or nothing to offer to you? Is it that she ACTUALLY had nothing to offer or just that the news didn’t convey what she did have very well? She had a lot of specific policies but I didn’t see much about them on the news I myself consume—including MSM of the print/pixel variety. I don’t watch TV news at all, so I have not idea what they were preaching.
I should have mentioned that I only watch Canadian news shows. Maybe they did her a disservice. She was hobbled somewhat since she couldn't deviate significantly (and implicitly criticize) from the outgoing administration of which she was VP.
Re. glass ceiling, etc.: I've worked in quite a few organizational environments, and some of the female management I've seen exhibit the "alpha male" behaviour, whether inherent or chosen career-enhancing technique. Harris didn't have that, so some voters may not have perceived her as a strong leader, "commander-in-chief" more specifically.
And what do Canadians think of the "strong" commander in chief-to-be with his collection of kakistockic band of administrators? The Faithful think this is fine because tRump will be "commanding all." Tulsi Gobbledlegook? HagSith? Don't forget fallout blows across borders.....
There is a big part of me that says Bring On the Turbulence. MSM is paying attention, at least NBC: “Matt Gaetz, Trump’s pick to oversee Jan. 6 cases, backed rioters and spread conspiracy theories”
I am hoping Smith will wind down the cases before Gaetz gets his grubby paws on them so that Garland will release the full report of what we COULD have seen at trial.
Great piece. Lot to think about. I wonder if Americans really are tired of War or if what we are seeing is a resurgence of American Isolationism. We, or at least me, tend to forget that Isolationist were in the majority until 7 Dec 41. It is plausible that without the attack on Pearl Harbour or the U-Boat campaign the US would have stayed out of both wars.
Thanks for always making me think, Justin. Whenever your posts arrive, I find an excuse to pause, take a deep breath, read carefully, and reflect. And I read these more than once.
Thank you Dave! It's genuinely nice to hear that people read the whole thing. I know I try people's patience a bit with these looooooong dispatches.
Appreciate your thoughts. I’ve been unhealthily obsessed with this election, because I believe Canada and much of the world has skin in the game. We knew the result would cause ripple effects on the future of populism, democracy, foreign interference, geopolitics, and more.
It’s going to be a while before this is all sorted out by the historians and analysts, I think. I agree with you the well-organized right-wing media did a great job of carrying a powerful and unified message. It bothers me tremendously that apparently Fox News is played without exception in all the US military hangouts. WTF?
Trumps’s quote “I love the uneducated “ captured a bunch of slaves right there. Trying to explain Project 25 to a low-information voter could backfire and seem condescending, whereas blasting “They’re eating the cats” needs no explanation and overwhelms facts.
Although the Donald and his ultra-rich CEO friends, “Muskaswamy” and the the rest of his sychophants are as “elite” as you can get, they’ve managed to fool the public that they’re just regular guys.
What a world.
I have for sone years shared a social psychologist view I got from the author at Rotman. You have to get peopke to make room in their tunnel ue their busy lives just like some of us have for Justin Ling's writing or homeless issues or performing arts. 1. Make it easy 2. Personal contact (Ganz or snowflake organizing, one person at a time) 3 finding common ground by listening to each other and 4 curiousity, asking questions that move people off their emotions. Eg what is carbon pricing? Or your intriguing openings . Many journalists personalize their writing like you do and with public appearances to be accessible. Why questions are better than tossing out facts that jo one is listening too. The goal is to make space in your tunnel to learn more
Thanks, Justin, for the post! Massive fan of your work!!
A couple of quick thoughts… I don’t think we need to create a "left-wing Joe Rogan." Or if that is the goal, waiting around for it to happen is an extremely unlikely and therefore bad strategy.
Democrats already had access to a liberal Joe Rogan: it was Joe Rogan in 2016. He was into Bernie, Yang, universal healthcare, taxing the rich… and yet, instead of engaging with him, Dems pushed him further and further away. Rogan isn’t Limbaugh—he never had crazy, far-right views that justified abandoning him.
Not saying you completely ostracizing Rogan, but many do. Instead, Democrats should actively engage with Rogan and his audience. His listeners already tune in—not because of a political label, but because of his perceived authenticity and curiosity. Waiting for some perfectly aligned "progressive influencer" is a losing strategy. Rogan’s appeal is organic—it can’t be manufactured. Dems need to meet his audience where they are, and going back on Rogan (not just for a one-off Fetterman-in-a-sweater chat) is a must. Too often, Dems let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
I also think this ties into your point about "Newspaper-izing Our Information." Meeting people where they are, with unscripted, respectful conversations, and dismantling myths in real-time is the way to reach disaffected voters. It’s not about pandering—it’s about showing up, talking normal, and offering something equally real.
That said, I don’t think just going on Rogan is the full solution. But I also don’t think we need to build much new infrastructure. It’s already there! The right figured this out. I was sooo impressed with Ezra Klein’s conversation with Vivek Ramaswamy—two people actually listening and not shouting at each other. It was a gold-star example of what Dems could pull off on Rogan, especially because, let’s be real, Rogan is no Ezra Klein.
Similarly, JD Vance’s NYT interview was a bundle of lies but came off as articulate, oppositional, and aimed at reaching new audiences. Dems need more of that energy—opposing, engaging, and reaching 47 million viewers head-on.
I think Rogan, and his viewers can be won back by the Dems and this is a worthwhile investment.
Hey Dylan — thanks for subscribing!
I think you're totally right about Rogan. But I'm not sure that Democrats (i.e. the party) actively engaging with him then would've done much good. The party made the conscious effort to move away from the very things that attracted Rogan (and the Bernie bros, and other constituent groups of progressives, economic populists, technologists, etc.) The problem, in short, was the Democratic Party itself (and maybe the state of liberalism/progressivism more broadly.)
Engaging with Rogan now is still probably worth it, but I think he's been captured by so much bullshit that you'd be left shadowboxing a bunch of insane half-baked takes.
But what sets Rogan apart from Klein is that the former has broad appeal. Klein's thing is "I'm a liberal political columnist with some heterodox views." That's great! That's why I like him. But he doesn't have broad appeal like Rogan does. Klein isn't interviewing standup comics, porn stars, etc.
Maybe we don't need a left-wing Joe Rogan. Maybe we need a new Howard Stern. There's an idea.
I agree that the big puzzle is why many Democrats stayed home. But I can't make the math square with " millions of undecideds and independents broke for the Republicans, and millions of non-voters turned out for Trump." He beat his 2020 vote by only about 1.7 million. Unless he LOST a lot of his core, his totals should have been much higher if all those millions of undecided, etc voted for him. Do you have an explanation?
(As to Third Parties: The Green party was up, but only by a couple hundred thousand. The libertarians were WAY down. RFKj--who knows who he drew votes from?)
So I see a WAY bigger problem in why the Dem ticket didn't appeal to its usual voters. I don't think it was her voice. I didn't feel she talked down to folks. I'm agnostic on things like her connection to Cheney. I do think that there are way more people out there--both Dem and GOP, both men and women--who just have the kinda cultural feeling that women should be respected and all and have many virtues...but being a leader isn't one of them. (Add black to this and it gets worse). This isn't what I think of as active misogyny. It isn't hating women. It is just something that still haunts our society, also reflected in the glass ceiling, lack of equal pay for equal work at ALL levels, including professional, and the remarkable amount of mansplaining, talking over, TAKING over a woman's ideas one finds even in a nice blue state full of nice liberal educated men. I have lived that life.
The other thing that would have explained the popular vote, more than the electoral college, is the feeling in many states that either your vote doesn't matter (you will lose whether you vote or not) or that it is not NECESSARY (your side will win because of the color of your state). I can see this clearly in WA.
Yes, the economy and misinformation paid a role. But I think the two issues I raise speak more to a CULTURAL problem in the US that will continue to haunt us till we figure out how to deal with it. For the near future, not having a female candidate seems the best way, to my increasing despair as one coming of age in the 60s.
So on the math: We've been discussing this with a bit of missing data, because some states are *still* counting. But let's take Florida, where all the votes are in. They had a shade over 11 million votes overall in 2020, about 5.7 million went to Trump. This time, turnout declined a smidgen to 10.8 million, but Trump turnout went up to 6.1 million. That's about 500,000 more votes with turnout decline of about 200,000. That's a pretty similar trend across the other states that are reporting full totals.
But you're right that my language was a bit imprecise: I meant he won millions of undecideds, non-voters, and frustrated democrats — not that he won multiple millions of each category.
I understand your point entirely, because it's correct! Many Democrats *did* stay home. But if you look at the (final) 2024 totals for Michigan, Wisconsin and Georgia: Trump got more votes there (amidst lower turnout) in 2024 than Biden won in 2020.
But anyway, you can split the numbers until you lose your mind.
I totally agree with you that an innate feeling that women can't be leaders played aggressively against Harris. But I disagree that it did her in. There's a point I made, above, that I may flesh out into a longer piece at some point: It's about the politics of surprise.
Very few things Harris did during the campaign surprised anymore. The "I've got a glock in my purse" was absolutely one of them. If you can't surprise people, then you can't change their baked-in assumptions about you. I think if voters could've seen Harris being in command and in control — without being scripted, without having her staff around, without it being a neatly-choreographed campaign event — they might be surprised by her. Unfortunately, her campaign seemed designed to prevent surprises, and thus it gave up trying to change people's minds about her. To that end, I think a woman absolutely *can* run again, but she would need to find a way to break that stereotype more forcefully. (But also, I predict the first female president will be a Republican.)
Anyway, good note! Thanks for reading!
Not sure Florida is the best example because it is it seems that a lot of voters are either migrating in or leaving in disgust, so it's hard to say its balance was the SAME group of voters. And given where most of the uncounted votes are, I doubt the totals will be up a whole lot more. But I do agree that there is no "one" thing that did Harris in. I'm just looking at underlying things that our society needs to fix to be anywhere close to its ideals.
By the same token of course, the vote for trump is nowhere close to a mandate, not just because of the low turnout but because so many don't seem to have been all in on his policies--a lot of people chose their personal sense of the economy over personal distaste for one or more parts of the culture wars, for example. And the economy is likely to be the most spectacular and most immediate failure unless somehow the tariff idea is squelched.
My exposure to U.S. politics is limited to whatever is on the evening news, and my impression during the lasts 2 weeks was that she had nothing to offer.
That’s interesting. Nothing to offer to the country, or nothing to offer to you? Is it that she ACTUALLY had nothing to offer or just that the news didn’t convey what she did have very well? She had a lot of specific policies but I didn’t see much about them on the news I myself consume—including MSM of the print/pixel variety. I don’t watch TV news at all, so I have not idea what they were preaching.
I should have mentioned that I only watch Canadian news shows. Maybe they did her a disservice. She was hobbled somewhat since she couldn't deviate significantly (and implicitly criticize) from the outgoing administration of which she was VP.
Re. glass ceiling, etc.: I've worked in quite a few organizational environments, and some of the female management I've seen exhibit the "alpha male" behaviour, whether inherent or chosen career-enhancing technique. Harris didn't have that, so some voters may not have perceived her as a strong leader, "commander-in-chief" more specifically.
And what do Canadians think of the "strong" commander in chief-to-be with his collection of kakistockic band of administrators? The Faithful think this is fine because tRump will be "commanding all." Tulsi Gobbledlegook? HagSith? Don't forget fallout blows across borders.....
The way it's being reported here is that Thune (and his secret electors) represent a damper to the turbulence.
I wonder if a lone weirdo is being groomed.
There is a big part of me that says Bring On the Turbulence. MSM is paying attention, at least NBC: “Matt Gaetz, Trump’s pick to oversee Jan. 6 cases, backed rioters and spread conspiracy theories”
I am hoping Smith will wind down the cases before Gaetz gets his grubby paws on them so that Garland will release the full report of what we COULD have seen at trial.
Great piece. Lot to think about. I wonder if Americans really are tired of War or if what we are seeing is a resurgence of American Isolationism. We, or at least me, tend to forget that Isolationist were in the majority until 7 Dec 41. It is plausible that without the attack on Pearl Harbour or the U-Boat campaign the US would have stayed out of both wars.