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Culture War Roundup for the week of May 4, 2026

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Many MAGA optimists don't gauge things by what is happening around them. It's exactly like you say. Their barometer is what Trump does. If he does X, then X was the best thing to do because they trust Trump. Their gas prices going up or their jobs moving away or their farms going bankrupt is just not accounted for as a counterfactual.

I'm not sure what you're intending. Most people don't reason in the sense you're describing. There is no mass reserve of people who "gauge things by what is happening around them". Most people get their opinions from life experience, and most life experience is consuming media. There's nothing novel about MAGA here except that we broadly trust Trump's judgment. So that, if gas prices go up, I assume this was judged relative to other options and found to be the best course of action. It's not even that mysterious. It's not hard for me to make a case for why Trump went to war with Iran or how this is potentially a good thing. I don't have to appeal to mysterious subrational forces.

HBD has no place in mainstream conservative politics. The functional reason for the existence of the dissident right is to be a right winger that can acknowledge HBD.

Respectfully, conservative politics has moved way far beyond whether conservatives can talk about race.

From what I can tell the Trump we have now is so far removed from the 2016 Trump it's not comparable. If one wants to say that every decision that he has made that has removed him from his original brand has been the best course of action, then I'd ask, best course towards what? Draining the swamp, building a border wall and kicking all the foreigners out and give jobs to Americans? Or the best course of action for Trump to stay in power?

Well we are building a border wall and this is the first administration in generations that has seen more foreigners leaving America than coming in. As for draining the swamp, Trump has politically defeated a lot of powerful people in his attempt to reform the American government. To me this reads like making the perfect the enemy of the good, and declaring that, since Trump hasn't accomplished everything he must have moderated. But I don't know anyone, not a single person, who has ever accomplished everything they intended.

You describe the exact process I'm talking about. We both agree that MAGA optimists judge things by whether or not Trump did the thing or not. We both agree that this is novel.

Where we seemingly don't agree is whether or not a relevant amount of people care about 'things', like gas or housing prices, or something similar. I think a lot of people see or feel something that personally affects them like that and therefor want to vote for those things in specific. Expecting a solution and positive change. Using those things as the barometer. I think you understand and agree with this dynamic insofar as you understand that it's important to maintain that Trump is keeping his promises, like you do below.

I guess my point comes down to the question of how you determine values. It feels like we are doing a lot of outsourcing to Trump. My perspective is that MAGA optimists are going the way of the Dodo. They are politically a minority, their children will be a racial minority. I feel like I'm watching the sky fall and then I see them happy as clams because Trump is in charge.

It's not even that mysterious. It's not hard for me to make a case for why Trump went to war with Iran or how this is potentially a good thing. I don't have to appeal to mysterious subrational forces.

But you are appealing to a very limited force. Mainly just yourself and your faith in Trump. You making a case and then asserting that the course of action being taken is the best because Trump took it isn't particularly rational. Apologies if this sounds too dismissive but I'm starting to feel like you're just constructing a rhetorical fun house of sorts, where you can make assumptions and assertions yourself but preclude others from doing so at any time if they disagree with Trump. Since Trump is smarter and has more information and such. Like, not to rehash things but what is the current state of the Iran war? At what point can we state that the war has been a failure and that Trump made a bad choice? Or is that even possible?

Respectfully, conservative politics has moved way far beyond whether conservatives can talk about race.

Not really. The small contingent that was bullied into white advocacy, like Charlie Kirk or Tucker Carlson, talked some about whites as a group. But they all defaulted back on individualism, culture and values when push came to shove. Which is the same song and dance they've been doing since they ostracized Peter Brimelow and similar voices from the mainstream.

To me this reads like making the perfect the enemy of the good, and declaring that, since Trump hasn't accomplished everything he must have moderated. But I don't know anyone, not a single person, who has ever accomplished everything they intended.

Yeah, that sounds more true than not. So what is perfect?