Getting Real About Why This Happened
Dark times are here.
They’ve been here, actually, but—as the above picture captures perfectly—many Democrats weren’t yet willing to realize it.
Readers of this newsletter are smarter than that (flattery gets you everywhere, I’m told). But if you know anyone who convinced themselves that the last four years were a continuation of American greatness, the “end of history” resurgent, maybe check in on them.
We had a once-in-a-century chance to future-proof the world the past four years and we blew it. When I spoke to Biden-aligned progressives in Washington earlier this year, that was my main message and almost nobody wanted to hear it.
I’m planning to look forward and work out what this means for foreign policy, because in an epochal emergency that’s what needs to happen. But there are a few…undiplomatic…things that need to be said before I do.