Jamel Bouie

I like the Tea Party in a lot of ways was not just anti-establishment, but anti-institutional.

And this is this kind of funny, this is a kind of very funny anti-establishment, you know, pro-fight, but for the purpose of reinvigorating the institutions that they actually work.

Some of this is just going to be hard to answer.

Like, you know, if there's a Democratic trifecta in 2029, I think the big political question is going to be,

Does the Democratic Party push forward on its substantive agenda or does it engage basically in like a cleanup operation?

I think American politics is quite bad at accountability.

We don't like the idea of dwelling on the past.

You know, readers of mine will know that I'm a big like Lincoln head.

And this is I mean, Lincoln is chosen as the Republican nominee in 1860.

In part because everyone's like, well, he's just he's like a moderate guy.

He's a moderate anti-slavery guy.

And he might be easily manipulable by, you know, a William Seward or these other people who will be in the cabinet.

And we can trust that he won't go too far afield.

And no one at the time could really sense Lincoln's own kind of like iron will.

Right.

So when secession starts to happen.

You have.

Even Seward, he was like, maybe we should make some concessions here.

We don't want secession.

And Lincoln is almost, not alone, but close to being one of the handful of people who is like, no, let them secede.