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This is it. In 2016, leftist freaking out was mostly a performative way of calling for the managers to take care of a problem, according to Victimhood culture rules. Progressives (and indeed, most everyone) saw Trump v1.0 as a passing blip who won due to Hillary Clinton being a uniquely unelectable candidate, and whose administration would be smothered by "institutional checks and balances".
Cultural leftists did not really feel like they might actually be losing grip on the country until recently. Probably the last twelve months.
Nitpick: no, progressives generally weren't that introspective (the Berniebros were, but not the mainstream). They saw Hillary as the rightful winner, and her having being robbed of her victory by Russian interference and the Electoral College system. Hence the hashtag #NotMyPresident, which literally denies that Donald Trump won.
This actually strengthens your argument, but I felt it's important to keep the record straight.
How are you defining "progressive" that people who supported Hillary over Bernie fit into that category?
The SJ set of views on societal norms and the culture war, as opposed to the liberal set (which generally isn't trying to enforce a paradigm) or the conservative set (which is trying to enforce a very different paradigm), and separate from any set of views on economics (you can be a progressive free-market capitalist, and Hillary very much was).
I'm pretty sure Hillary Clinton was a progressive crony capitalist.
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That doesn't quite fit for me, because if you tasked me with ensuring the arrival of the Thousand Year JD Vance Reich, I don't know if I could do a better job than what the Dems are doing.
All they need to do is regroup and wait for the next recession, though I suppose "letting something slip out because you didn't want to lose grip" is a pretty old story.
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