Hanging in the Balance

If you’re a reader of this column (your first mistake) who’s in general agreement with the ideas we try to advance here (your second), you’re very likely pleasantly surprised to be quite satisfied with the results of the 2020 election. As Yuval Levin, the American Enterprise Institute fellow who’s one of the country’s top conservative thinkers, writes:

Both [parties] have been rebuked in some important respects by the electorate. And both rebukes are justified. If the parties are willing to learn from them, the result might be good for our politics….The Democrats ran against Donald Trump, and look to have persuaded the electorate to dismiss him. The Republicans ran against the increasingly radical Democratic activist base, and look to have persuaded the electorate to reject them. Neither party has gained a mandate, and both are left wondering how they can build a majority coalition in the coming years. That could end up being a constructive question….

The sheer number of Americans who said no to the president is pretty staggering. This election was a referendum on the incumbent to an even greater degree than a normal reelection race because the challenger was so bland and weak a figure…. And Republicans need to grasp that voters were right to want to reject Donald Trump. Over and over again, Trump has shown himself profoundly unfit for the presidency — and his behavior since Election Day has only added further evidence to the pile….

But voters have also rejected the woke Left and the activist base of the Democratic Party, electing more Republicans to Congress across the country and so diminishing the Democrats’ majority in the House, probably keeping a Republican Senate … Even in California, voters said no to a misguided affirmative-action ballot measure. And Democrats need to grasp that voters were right to reject the extremism of their activists. The radical cultural Left … have very real cultural and economic power. In this election, they have sought greater political power too. But the electorate has rejected them….