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Feb 11 • 4 tweets • 3 min read
If right-wing anti-vax truckers do the Canada thing here, including flagrant lawbreaking, would liberal government at any level have the mettle to disband them? I have my doubts. us19.campaign-archive.com/?e=4b66a7e85f&…
In some ways, January 6 was the exception that proved the rule. They can get away with a ton of lawlessness and illegitimate intimidation before authorities will intervene, and often the intervention is conciliatory. eepurl.com/gQH7lz
Trump, in his characteristically unsubtle fashion, is trying to apply the same hostage-taker’s veto to anti-corruption forces, and there’s at least some indication it’s working.
Add it all up and it becomes pretty clear that liberals in positions of power can either fight back or lose (both elections and the whole democracy) because there’s no sign the public’s gonna give them brownie points for being “reasonable.”

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More from @brianbeutler

Brian Beutler Profile picture
Feb 9
And then if a new variant of concern emerges, scaling interventions back up will be very hard, as will responding to bad-faith attacks on Biden for losing the fight against the pandemic.
First, the administration wanted to proclaim victory over the pandemic after vaccine uptake began to stall; now, it’s hiding from its own shadow. But both cases were really just rolling the dice that new variants wouldn’t set us way back. Maybe this time it’ll work out better?
What might actually work is preparing people for the possibility that we’ll have to demobilize and remobilize for some time, and communicating to people what that might look like.
Read 4 tweets
Brian Beutler Profile picture
Feb 6
Lot of people deserve a lot of snark over this, but in all seriousness, Democrats should launch an investigation, wholly separate from 1/6, to get to the bottom of what Trump sought to conceal by destroying documents.
(They won’t.)
Like it really would be straightforward to get the press to treat Trump’s document destruction as breathlessly as it treated EMAILS, but if Dems don’t pursue the information, reporters will move on.
Read 6 tweets
Brian Beutler Profile picture
Feb 4
Despicable as they are, Donald Trump's escalating threats against investigators, political enemies, and democracy make perfect sense if you put yourself in the shoes of a sociopath who's fighting for his freedom, future, and ego. mailchi.mp/crooked.com/bi…
In this pure contest of truth vs. lies, he is all passionate intensity, but the forces of truth lack…well, not all conviction. But there’s a gap. eepurl.com/gQH7lz
It reminds me at least a little of when Emily Murphy (remember her?) abused her authority to block the Biden transition, and instead of raining hell down on her, Dems sat back and hoped good sense would prevail. It kinda worked…but it’s a poor, risky model for the bigger fight.
Read 4 tweets
Brian Beutler Profile picture
Feb 3
This seems way overstated given that Spotify surely already has one-strike-and-your’re-out rules (written or unwritten) that bind their content creators.
Rogan would be out on his ass if he encouraged violence against specific individuals or political figures or became an avowed Nazi. Just add discouraging vaccine uptake to the list of intolerable social harms and call it a day. Grandfather Rogan in, even.
“But then when the pandemic ends, they might try to censor him for some other wacky ideas he has!” Probably not in fact.
Read 4 tweets
Brian Beutler Profile picture
Feb 1
It’s really not hard to understand. If the entire population were vaxxed, some fraction would still get sick, fewer would die. Multiply by > 300 million and (with current tools and variants) it’s easy to imagine a “pandemic of the vaccinated” that still kills 50-100k a year.
Of course all else is not equal. We’re nowhere close to 100 percent uptake, particularly RE boosters. On the other hand, we have more natural immunity than before, next gen vaccines and therapeutics are also nearly here. So it’s a bit of wait and see how deadly the next wave is.
But if we get yearly death on that order (which would make us very lucky) I don’t know what the right course of action is. On one hand, prior to COVID, seasonal flu would occasionally be that deadly, and I never gave it a second thought. On the other…that seems bad in hindsight!
Read 5 tweets
Brian Beutler Profile picture
Jan 21
New newsletter! Since we can’t know what it Means For The Election, let’s instead think through where Democrats’ inability to reform the filibuster and pass democracy reform in a post-Trump, Big Lie world leaves us, in historical context. mailchi.mp/crooked.com/bi…
The Freedom to Vote Act wouldn’t have fixed everything—not nearly. But its failure means Dems’ procedural radicalization will have to *accelerate*. That’s why the calls for them to curb their ambitions now are misguided. A timid party can not fix this. crooked.us19.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=88…
And that’s exactly why episodes of timidity these past 5 years have been so excruciating. The only way to tear down the autocratic system Republicans have built for themselves is hard-nosed partisanship, but today’s Dems still cling to narcotizing myths about what the GOP is.
Read 6 tweets

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