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Notes -
Why political revenge narratives don't make sense to me.
It essentially implies the difference between the right wing and left wing argument about things are about morals and not about the effectiveness of policy or economic ideas for the good of our country and our citizens. If "your rules fairly" includes doing things that you think are stupid, inefficient, counter-productive and extra prone to corruption then doing it back would be strange.
Presumably if you hold an idea like "smaller governments are generally better for a country's growth" or "the state taking ownership in companies leads to bad incentives" or "free speech benefits the country's citizens and the country as a whole" then it would make little sense to abandon them once you've taken power if you want the best for the nation.
After all if you care about the country, I would assume you want good and effective policy. If you see the left's policy ideas as bad and harmful to our future, it's not a great idea to join in on the self-harm. Unless you're a traitor and hate the country, you would be pushing for what you think is the best policy. Now people might disagree on what is best for growth, what is best for the people, and what is best for the country but we should expect them to pursue their ideas in the same way if they care about America, towards ideas they think are good.
This is part of why principled groups can stay principled so easily. An organization like FIRE truly believes that free speech is beneficial. Suppression and censorship when their side is in power would be traitorous to the good of the country in their mind, even if done out of a desire for revenge. A person like Scott Lincicome of CATO truly believes that government taking equity of private enterprise is bad policy, and thus it's easy for him to critique it.
They aren't "turning the other cheek", they just actually believe in the words they say and the ideas they promote. They want good policy (or at least policy they think is good) for the benefit of the country. Sometimes you can see this in politicians, like how Bernie Sanders supports the plan to take equity in Intel. He believes government ownership of corporations is good for the country so he supports it even when the "enemy" does it. I think he's a stupid socialist but it's consistent with what I expect from a true believer. And you see with libertarian Republicans like Ron Paul, Justin Amash and Thomas Massie criticizing the Intel buy.
Counter to this, the "revenge" narrative comes off like the advocates never believed the words they were saying. It suggests their stated beliefs don't reflect what they think is good for the future of the US, but rather personal feelings and signaling to their in-group community. If they changed their minds it would be understandable, but if that's the case then the revenge narrative is unnecessary to begin with, they can now argue on the merits.
For a lot of political principles, you'll have a coalition made up of people who sincerely endorse that principle, and people who contingently endorse it so long as it's convenient for them and will abandon it at the drop of a hat when it no longer is. Annoyingly, the members of the latter group often masquerade as members of the former and even do such a good job that members of the former group are taken in by them.
I'm a principled free speech absolutist, as a consequence of which I sincerely believe that Mahmoud Khalil should be able to disseminate Hamas propaganda on college campuses without the federal government weighing down on him (or Kneecap waving Hezbollah flags, for that matter). During the period 2009-16 (and to a lesser extent 2021-24) I was under no illusions about the conservatives railing against "cancel culture": I knew full well that a significant proportion (perhaps even an absolute majority) had no interest in free speech as a general principle and just wanted to be the ones doing the cancelling. I'm old enough to remember when the boot was on the other foot and the Red Tribe held enough institutional power that the
DixieChicks could face lost earnings owing to their criticisms of George Bush. It's a lonely life being a principled supporter of free speech: there aren't enough of us to be a real political movement on our own, so until a political leader comes along who shares our values, we're forced into alliances of convenience with whichever group isn't currently holding the whip: Democrats when Trump is in the White House, Republicans when Newsom is; Tories when Labour are in power, Labour when the Tories are. It's all the harder to be a free speech absolutist when prominent organisations which used to share our values (e.g. the ACLU) faced a choice between sticking to their guns and going under, or staying alive by skin-suiting themselves, and opted for the latter.(I will cop to a bit of Schadenfreude about how short-sighted many of the arguments progressives were making in defense of censorship between 2009-16 were. I routinely pointed out that the "it's a private company, they can do what they want" argument was bound to come back to bite them in the ass sooner or later - this was several years before Musk's Twitter buyout. A lot of self-identified Marxists really do not seem to grasp the concept of the veil of ignorance.)
The Dixie Chicks were not cancelled in any meaningful sense. What happened to them was:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixie_Chicks_comments_on_George_W._Bush
Pretty much any cancelled conservative would have been extremely happy to receive this treatment. From what I can tell, George Bush is right - this is basically how freedom of expression should work. Say what you want but don't complain about a moderate decrease in sales.
For comparison, Milo was:
Kanye suffered all this, in addition to having his bank accounts closed (retaliation for saying Jews control the banks, which they obviously don't).
I agree with your general point, but Milo's problem in particular was that he alienated his base with his comments about homosexuality age-gap
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