Republican Apostate
B.B.: I think that’s true. I like to think that it’s not pervasive, but I can’t say for sure. But I think there’s more of an attitude on the right that the ends justify the means. I think conservatives more so than liberals have a view that it’s not just right versus left it’s right versus wrong, it’s good versus evil. A lot of conservatives have that point of view. Therefore, anything goes. I mean, if it’s God versus Satan, you should use whatever weapons you have available, even if they would be otherwise considered reprehensible, because the magnitude of the threat is so great that it’s justified. This kind of worldview permeates a lot of conservative strategy that has led to the destruction of norms that kept things under control, so to speak. And have led to a coarsening of debate and lawmaking. I don’t think we fully appreciated the extent to which a lot of the rules that governed political debate were never written down, they were just understood. I think Republicans, conservatives, have taken advantage of that, and have pushed the limits of what they could do legally, and even what is not legal but which they could nevertheless get away with. I don’t know how you put the toothpaste back in the tube.
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