Federalism

In the United States, states have a long history of being considerably less than united. The Articles of Confederation were so focused on protecting the prerogatives of the individual colonies that they proved unworkable, and were replaced by a Constitution that made its own significant concessions to “states’ rights.”

As the country modernized and experienced increasing economic and social integration, the need for national standards became more obvious. Lawmakers recognized that federal agencies regulating things like health or clean air and water needed to issue regulations that would operate similarly in all the states. The Uniform Law Commission (also known as the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws), was created to draft legislation that would bring stability and conformity to state statutory law in areas where such uniformity is seen as desirable and practical. And there is an obvious need for federal law enforcement to enforce its criminal laws nationally.

But there is still room for considerable variation. Justice Brandeis memorably called the states in our federalist system “laboratories of democracy.”

Americans increasingly operate, live and do business in multiple states–a situation that led me to discount the importance of federalism for a long time. (Different laws in different states, after all, caused some very silly situations; before the Supreme Court found same-sex marriage to be a Constitutional right, people who were married in one state weren’t considered married in others.) I focused on the downside and failed to appreciate the upside.

The Trump administration has reminded me of federalism’s importance. Governors like Jay Pritzker in Illinois and Gavin Newsom in California, among others, have illustrated that importance, and a recent article from Vox called federalism a “hidden constraint” on Trump.

So far, the biggest successes against President Donald Trump’s second-term assault on democracy have come not from Congress and the Supreme Court, but more unusual sources: lower-court judges, “No Kings” protests, a Disney+ subscriber boycott, and Trump’s own indiscipline and incompetence.

After the 2025 elections, we can add the states to the list. And in some ways, this avenue of resistance may prove to be the most consequential one.

The article noted that the United States’ federalist system is unusual among backsliding democracies– and that it creates some “major opportunities for institutional pushback” that aren’t possible elsewhere. It also notes the irony of where we are today, since for most of our history, states (especially in the South) “have been places where pockets of authoritarianism could exist in a nationally democratic society.”

Certain of the powers that are, in our system, remitted to the states — very much including control over the administration of elections — are mechanisms through which we can resist this administration’s authoritarian power grab. We can see this most vividly in Trump’s effort to rig the upcoming midterm elections by asking Red states to engage in improper mid-cycle gerrymanders.

Because election administration is almost entirely devolved to the states in the American system, Trump has very limited powers to actually try and rig elections from DC. Instead, gerrymandering at the state level — threatening and cajoling governors and state legislatures into drawing as many safe seats for Republicans as possible — is his best shot at actually stacking the deck in the GOP’s favor in 2026.

As we are seeing, that effort is currently failing. Not only have Blue states “counter-gerrymandered,” but legislators in Red states like Indiana have (at least so far) refused to go along, deferring to the huge majorities of their constituents who disapprove.

As the article points out, would-be autocrats follow a well-worn path that requires consolidating formal power in their own hands and neutering independent checks on their authority. It’s a lot harder to rig elections or prosecute your political opponents when you don’t control the necessary levels of power. True, strong federalism cannot guarantee democracy: (Our history has ample examples of authoritarianism flourishing at local levels) But that system creates “opportunities for contestation” when the national government is moving in an unAmerican direction.

It’s hard to imagine a more unAmerican–not to mention demented– administration than the one we currently have. In just the last week, our mad would-be King has accepted a bribe from Saudi Arabia, authorized extra-judicial killings of Venezuelan fishermen, called for the death of political opponents who had the temerity to remind our troops that they took an oath to defy manifestly illegal orders, and responded to a legitimate question from a reporter by calling her “piggy.”

Given the fact that we have a Congress of eunuchs and a corrupt majority on the Supreme Court, I have a new appreciation for the role of federalism in America’s system of checks and balances.

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Heritage’s History

Those of us who know about Project 2025–and were properly horrified by it–also know that those 900+ pages attacking everything that makes America America was a product of the Heritage Foundation. (Now we know just what sort of “heritage” that organization was created to protect.)

Earlier this month, Paul Krugman traced the Foundation’s history, in a newsletter he titled “The Decline and Fall of the Heritage Foundation.”

Krugman began with the “fall” part– the recent controversy triggered by the response of Keven Roberts, Heritage’s president, to Tucker Carlson’s interview of rabid neo-Nazi and anti-Semite, Nick Fuentes. In a video, Roberts defended Carlson and attributed the uproar to “the globalist class,” a turn of phrase that–as Krugman notes–is routinely used to attack Jews.

Why did Roberts weigh in on the Carlson-Fuentes controversy? He obviously felt he needed to express support for the right of conservatives to be conspiracy-theory antisemites — despite the fact that Heritage itself has an antisemitism task force. Unsurprisingly, many of the task force members have now resigned.

Media reporting on this story has been excellent and revealing. However, I believe that much of the commentary misjudges the true nature of Heritage, portraying it as a genuine think tank that picked the wrong leader or was corrupted by MAGA.

According to Krugman, Heritage has always been a fraud rather than a genuine think-tank,  “a propaganda mill cosplaying as a research institution.” Its problem now is that its “original scam” was designed for a different time. Back in the Reagan years the Right’s bigotry and intolerance were far more discreet; those prejudices were more subtly employed to elect Republicans who could then be counted on to deliver deregulation and tax cuts. Heritage was there to lend superficial respectability to policies that were regressive and discriminatory, and that overwhelmingly benefitted the rich.

Krugman writes that he first encountered Heritage when the organization was working for repeal of the Estate tax, arguing that the tax was a “massive burden on small businesses and farms, which was simply a lie.”

In 2004 only around 300 small businesses and farms owed any estate tax at all. No, I’m not missing zeroes. And the number has gone down over time. These days basically no small businesses or farms pay the tax.

So Heritage wasn’t doing research. It was just pumping out dishonest propaganda.

Krugman cited another example, this one from 2011, the year Heritage released widely ridiculed projections about the positive effects we might expect of Paul Ryan’s budget proposals–again, producing propaganda rather than economic research.

But telling lies on behalf of the wealthy isn’t enough in the MAGA era. To be a right-winger in good standing you also have to be a sexist, a racist, and an anti-Semite, while promoting QAnon and other conspiracy theories.

Krugman cites the “economists” employed by Heritage as examples of its true purpose. In 2014. it was Stephen Moore, a fixture in right-wing circles, who mainstream economists describe as utterly incompetent.  He was replaced by E.J. Antoni, who Trump tried to install as head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Antoni’s nomination was withdrawn after reports surfaced that his Twitter account was filled with “sexually degrading attacks on Kamala Harris, derogatory remarks about gay people, conspiracy theories, and crude insults aimed at critics of President Donald Trump.” (CNN also reported that Antoni “repeatedly tweeted that liberal economist Paul Krugman was a pedophile, a smear for which there is no evidence – and one he also hurled at former President Joe Biden and former FBI director James Comey.”)

Heritage lists Antoni as its “Chief Economist.”

Krugman is correct when he insists that Heritage’s history is consistent with–and illustrative of– the story of the modern Right as a whole.

Heritage was never a respectable institution doing honest research. It was always in the business of telling lies on behalf of its wealthy supporters. But now it’s trying to turn itself into a MAGA/Groyper institution, less focused on telling economic lies and more focused on bigotry and conspiracy theories.

Krugman’s analyses are amply corroborated by Project 2025, which Wikipedia accurately describes as a political effort to “reshape the federal government of the United States and consolidate executive power in favor of right-wing policies.”

Roberts hasn’t changed the historic character of Heritage. He has merely–and probably accidentally– illustrated its true mission.

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A Refreshing Reality Check

In the wake of the 2024 election, there was no escaping negative punditry. “Expert” political analysts declared the effective end of Democratic election victories, dubbed Trump’s slight incursions into minority voting blocs a “re-alignment,” and issued scathing criticisms of the Democratic Party.

Most of this was click-bait hogwash, and a “Never Trump” Republican recently cited data demonstrating just how far afield these “analyses” were. In a recent essay, Stuart Stevens has done just that. (After quoting some of those pontificating headlines, Stevens snarkily writes “This is how societies end up worshipping volcanoes. There’s a drought, the volcano belches, and it rains. Next thing you know, you’re sacrificing virgins to honor the Volcano God.”)

Donald Trump won the 2024 election by one of the smallest margins in modern history– a cumulative 230,000 votes, or 0.15% of the total. Furthermore, in polling right before the election, when Americans were asked whether they thought America was heading in the right direction” only 27% said yes. Stevens notes that no incumbent party has won a presidential race when the number choosing “right track” was below 45%.

2024 was a great year for a challenger to run against an incumbent president. It is entirely delusional to interpret Trump’s narrow victory as an endorsement of Trumpism. Any credible challenger would have done considerably better than Trump. Polls showed that Nikki Haley overperformed Trump by five to seven points.

The less-reported results of recent elections confirm Stevens’ thesis. In addition to Democrats winning statewide offices in Georgia, Republicans in Mississippi losing their legislative super-majority, Moms for Liberty losing every single one of their 31 contests– Republican margins dropped by 50% in Florida’s Congressional races, and Wisconsin saw a 12-point shift toward Democrats.

And when it comes to policy?

Turns out, Americans actually like the constellation of basic social net programs that ketamine-fueled weirdo Elon Musk is trying to slash. Nearly four in five Americans (79%) oppose any reductions to Social Security benefits. For all the hate MAGA piles on the Americans who depend on SNAP, Medicaid, and housing assistance, 41% say that the government should do more to help those in need; 27% say the government does too much.

How about those tax cuts? Guess what? Cut taxes for billionaires sucks as a political rallying cry. This isn’t some Bernie Sanders niche “eat the rich” issue. In 2020, only a quarter of voters thought the Trump tax cuts were positive. A recent Navigator survey found that by a 10-point margin, Americans believe that Trump’s tax plan will “hurt people like me.”

Not only is the Trump administration on the wrong side of major policy positions, the utter ineptitude of the clowns in the administration is enraging Americans daily. As Stevens writes,

Does anybody other than the MAGA faithful believe that gutting the Centers for Disease Control make their lives better? Or that a former heroin addict nutcase should be in charge of America’s public health?

Stevens calls the 2024 election the “Pickett’s Charge of MAGA. They were given the keys to the kingdom, controlling three branches of government. They squandered the opportunity with a train wreck of nutty policies implemented by a Star Wars bar of unlikeable freaks.”

Trump’s “policy” announcements, like making Canada the 51st state, or invading Greenland, certainly didn’t help. Neither did his far more serious efforts to weaken the West in favor of Putin, like pulling the US out of NATO and betraying Ukraine. Granted, MAGA folks aren’t typically interested in policy unless those policies are intended to marginalize those they consider “Other,” but the rest of us know stupidity (and graft) when we see it. As Stevens writes, the numbers don’t lie.

In 2020, Trump’s coalition was 85% white. Sure, he did better with the non-white vote in 2024. This time, only 84% of his vote was white. In a country that is 59% white. Republicans are celebrating that only 86% of African Americans voted against them and that only 63% of Asians and 54% of Hispanics voted Democratic. The base of Trump’s support is still non-college-educated whites. In 2000, that was 60% of the electorate. Now it’s 38% and is America’s fastest declining large demographic.

None of this should make us complacent. Americans appalled by the chaos and destruction, the overt criminality, the effort to turn America into a semi-fascist autocracy still have a ton of work to do. If nothing else, we need to motivate a significant faction of those who stayed home in November of 2024 to do their civic duty by pointing out how their lives have been worsened by the gang of incompetent grifters who–by a very slim margin–gained control of our government.

But the data should definitely encourage us. Happy Thanksgiving!!

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We Ain’t Buying It

Boycotts can be hard to organize, especially in a digital age when consumers find shopping at large, national retailers so easy and convenient.

During the past several months, we’ve seen the power of grassroots resistance to Trump and MAGA (I’m sure Jimmy Kimmel would agree), but getting people to forego a streaming channel or participate in a No Kings rally is easier than asking them to disrupt their daily shopping routines for weeks or months.

We Ain’t Buying It may have hit on a middle ground–a limited-time boycott that will send a message without requiring participants to engage in long-term withdrawals. As the Contrarian recently explained, a group of resistance organizers are promoting a brief consumer boycott over the Thanksgiving holiday. The boycott is focused on three companies: Amazon, Home Depot, and Target. The intent is to send a pointed and unmistakable message to three companies that have been identified as Trump regime enablers.

We Ain’t Buying It proposes to mobilize the collective power of the grassroots this Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday. As the alliance announced,

President Trump and his corporate allies continue to relentlessly attack our communities—from mass firings of federal workers to corporate pressure to dismantle DEI to ICE raids targeting our neighbors to a government shutdown that left 42 million people without needed food….

Together we will hold accountable corporations like Target, Home Depot, and Amazon, that continue to enable and profit from this administration’s relentless and cruel attacks on working people and our families.

As a co-founder of Black Voters Matter explained, “We’re watching corporations bend over backwards to appease an administration and gain tax breaks, even when it hurts their own customers.”  As she also pointed out, they’ve ignored a significant fact: “tax breaks don’t matter when sales collapse.”

Choosing Thanksgiving weekend through Cyber Monday will give ordinary people an opportunity to send a very pointed message–that they have the power to direct their patronage and dollars to companies that have demonstrated a commitment to the people who build their bottom lines. And brief boycotts can be very effective.

In the case of Disney/ABC, “Data from research firm Antenna found that during September, the number of U.S. consumers who canceled their Disney+ subscriptions averaged 8%, which is double the 4% estimate for the prior two months,” The Street reported. Also, Hulu’s average cancellation rate was “twice the 5% rate for the previous two months.” (Among all its streaming services, Disney reportedly lost 1.7 million subscribers.) In addition, Disney suffered a dip in market capitalization of $4.2 billion at one point.

The article describes how, through our history, various boycotts have changed corporate conduct and publicized citizens’  grievances. They’ve given ordinary people a sense of personal agency, at the same time “incentivizing” companies to think twice before enabling an autocratic regime.

Indivisible, which is one of the organizations sponsoring the boycott, has a website devoted to the effort. Their “ask” is simple: “Target, Home Depot, and Amazon must stop undermining our democracy by collaborating with, and enabling, the Trump administration. Reinstate their DEI policies, refuse to cooperate with ICE, and withhold funding to Trump’s authoritarian regime. ”

The collective action they endorse is equally simple:

Join us for a full Thanksgiving black out. From Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday (11/27 – 12/1), don’t buy anything from Target, Amazon, or Home Depot. Don’t give any money to the companies that are undermining our democracy.

Instead, support small, local businesses or mutual aid efforts in your community.

We Ain’t Buying It chose Thanksgiving weekend for an obvious reason; it’s a peak shopping time. As the site recounts, more than 196 million Americans shopped over last year’s holiday weekend, making it a perfect opportunity to send a message– to notify Target, Home Depot, and Amazon that collaborating with Trump imposes a cost. We won’t shop with you. If they don’t get the record numbers of shoppers they’re anticipating, they’ll notice!

I stopped shopping at Target when they gave in to Right-wing criticisms and limited their Gay Pride merchandise. I haven’t shopped at Home Depot since I learned their founder was a huge Trump donor. Admittedly, I’d find it very difficult to entirely stop shopping at Amazon, but I can certainly refrain from visiting that site for the few days of the boycott. And I can–and will– also refrain from buying my Christmas and Chanukah gifts there, something I’ve done for the past several years.

We can all shop local this holiday weekend, helping smaller, local retailers and sending a very important message!

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Observations Worth Quoting

I do a lot of “wordsmithing.” One of the consequences is that I appreciate –and am jealous of–examples of superior writing. I’ve referred before to Lincoln Square, and recently I’ve been absolutely gob-smacked by the excellence and clarity of that site’s prose.

I’m going to cede most of today’s blog to some of the most perceptive paragraphs–but I urge you to click through and read both essays in their entirety.

On November 20th, the essay was titled “The Party That Forgot How To Blink”

Trump didn’t bother courting the middle; he declared war on it. The man didn’t run a campaign — he ran a group-therapy session for people allergic to accountability. If you were broke, it wasn’t automation — it was immigrants “stealing jobs.” If you were single and couldn’t get laid, it wasn’t your personality — it was feminism. If you were uneducated, it wasn’t disinterest — it was “the elites.” If you didn’t get promoted, blame DEI. If you lost an argument online, blame CRT. His rallies were motivational seminars for men who think foreplay is a liberal conspiracy. Somewhere in that stew of insecurity, the manosphere — that digital wasteland of fragile masculinity and podcast mics — found its messiah.

On November 19th, from an essay titled “How the Monster Turned On Itself.”

The smiles are tighter. The knives are increasingly out, not for the hated “socialists” but for one another.

The people who once lived to “own the libs” spend more of each day subtweeting each other, accusing one another of being disloyal to MAGA, of being globalist plants, Soros puppets, or, worst of all in that ecosystem, insufficiently devoted to Dear Leader.

This is what happens when you build a movement on raw power and loyalty checks instead of principle, paranoia instead of policy, vibes instead of values.

Eventually, the purity tests get so extreme that no one can pass them. The circle keeps getting smaller until the last three guys in it are accusing each other of being communist Deep State sleeper agents.

As the essay then notes, MAGA has done incredible damage to America. It has also wrecked the GOP and hollowed out conservative institutions.

But once you train everyone to think in terms of enemies and traitors, of obedience and betrayal, they can’t stop when the Democrats are out of the room.

All the 2028 aspirants are shanking one another. The influencers are attacking the think tanks. The Groypers attacking the “respectable” right. The populists are attacking the donor class. The donor class is on an extractive sprint before Trump dies. The online true believers are attacking the politicians who actually need to win elections. It is a five-alarm, all-hands-on-deck circular firing squad.

It began in the Obama years.

They told themselves it was about deficits, the Constitution, and small government. It was not. It was about the pissy grievances of suburban and rural dudes with fake Oakleys and erectile dysfunction who are just positive their job was being taken by a Mexican, not a McKinsey consultant and a private equity firm.

It was about cultural panic. It was about race. It was about people who felt the country drifting away from them and wanted someone to promise they could roll history back to 1958 (or perhaps 1858) by yelling at immigrants on Fox.

Then Trump came down that escalator.

He distilled every bitter little resentment on the right into a single-malt of wretched hatred. Overnight, all the old constraints of Republican politics, the donor class, the gentry conservative think tanks, the “serious” media ecosystem, and the alleged principles of the religious wing went out the window.

The old Republican Party did not die on election night in 2016. It died in stages, slow, humiliating, and for some, lucrative. You’ve heard the tale by now: sure, everyone knew better, but they decided to play along.

There was no neutral ground. There was no “agree with him on policy, disagree on tone.” Remember those days? “I didn’t see the tweet” became “I read the tweet and had it tattooed on my back to show how much I love Donald Trump.”

You either wore the red hat or you were a traitor.

And here is the important thing: once you teach people that loyalty to a person is the highest good, they never stop hunting for disloyalty.

They started asking who is secretly a RINO. Who is secretly woke. Who is secretly “controlled opposition.” They started by looking sideways at one another and wondering who was going to be the next one thrown off the sled.

They trawled through millions of tweets, parsing every word, every connection, every bit of writing, peering with intent for any sign someone might not be true to the Dear Leader and the cause.

That is the DNA of the MAGA civil war. A movement built on loyalty, grievance, and paranoia eventually runs out of external enemies and starts eating its own.

I couldn’t have said these things half as well.

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