• WaxedWookie@lemmy.world
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    12 hours ago

    I know nothing of his work, but my immediate assumption is that he’s just a contrarian asshole that has no actual principles.

    In media (as in politics), this kind of thing is almost always a product of cynical expediency rather than sincere introspection.

    • pjwestin@lemmy.world
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      5 hours ago

      He’s an old-school Regan conservative who writes a column for the New York Times. He also does a weekly PBS news segment; it used to be with this even older liberal named David Brooks (Mark Shields, what a dumb typo), but he retired, and now it’s with a young liberal who’s so moderate they barely even disagree.

      Funny enough, I actually don’t think he’s being contrarian. He was on PBS Newshour for their election night coverage, and he seemed shook. The next day, he commented on Twitter something to the effect of, “maybe the answer is that the Democrats need to pick someone that makes people like me unconformable.” I think he’s watched his economic outlook completely win American politics over the last 40 years, only to find the prize at the end was fascism.