If I understand correctly, your chief proposition is that liberal rationalists who are shocked and appalled by Trump 2.0 should check out the leftists who actually predicted that Trump 2.0 would be shocking and appalling, rather than just being a new flavor of business as usual. And you hope for adversarial collaboration with a “right-of-center rationalist” who will take the other side of the argument.
The way it’s set up, you seem to want your counterpart to defend the idea that Trump 2.0 is still more business-as-usual, than a disastrous departure from norms. However, there is actually a third point-of-view, that I believe is held by many of those who voted for Trump 2.0.
It was often said of those who voted for Trump 1.0, that they wanted a wrecking-ball—not out of nihilism, but because “desperate times call for desperate measures”. For such people, America was in decline, and the American political class and the elite institutions had become a hermetic world of incompetence and impunity.
For such people—a mix of conservatives and alienated ex-liberals, perhaps—business as usual is the last thing they want. For them, your double crux and forward predictions won’t have the intended diagnostic meaning, because they want comprehensive change, and expect churn and struggle and false starts. They may have very mixed feelings towards Trump and his people, but still prefer the populist and/or nationalist agenda to anything else that’s on offer.
I don’t know if anyone like that will step forward to debate you, but if they do, I’m not sure what the protocol would be.
edit: Maybe the most interesting position would be an e/acc Trump 2.0 supporter—someone from the tech side of Trump’s coalition, rather than the populist side. But such people avoid Less Wrong, I think.
Oh I am actually speaking to both sides here. I’m also speaking to Republicans who voted for Trump expecting him to make positive changes in all of these areas and they’ve utterly failed. He has kept zero promises while at the same time raising the national debt and weakening our national security.
Also very honestly the wrecking ball argument has always seemed to me very lazy. It’s always easier to break stuff than it is to rebuild it so if you want to be a wrecking ball I need to know what you’re going to try to rebuild it with. Right now it looks like the philosophies of Curtis yarvin and project 2025 are the things they’re going to try to use to rebuild the country and that’s horrifying
If I understand correctly, your chief proposition is that liberal rationalists who are shocked and appalled by Trump 2.0 should check out the leftists who actually predicted that Trump 2.0 would be shocking and appalling, rather than just being a new flavor of business as usual. And you hope for adversarial collaboration with a “right-of-center rationalist” who will take the other side of the argument.
The way it’s set up, you seem to want your counterpart to defend the idea that Trump 2.0 is still more business-as-usual, than a disastrous departure from norms. However, there is actually a third point-of-view, that I believe is held by many of those who voted for Trump 2.0.
It was often said of those who voted for Trump 1.0, that they wanted a wrecking-ball—not out of nihilism, but because “desperate times call for desperate measures”. For such people, America was in decline, and the American political class and the elite institutions had become a hermetic world of incompetence and impunity.
For such people—a mix of conservatives and alienated ex-liberals, perhaps—business as usual is the last thing they want. For them, your double crux and forward predictions won’t have the intended diagnostic meaning, because they want comprehensive change, and expect churn and struggle and false starts. They may have very mixed feelings towards Trump and his people, but still prefer the populist and/or nationalist agenda to anything else that’s on offer.
I don’t know if anyone like that will step forward to debate you, but if they do, I’m not sure what the protocol would be.
edit: Maybe the most interesting position would be an e/acc Trump 2.0 supporter—someone from the tech side of Trump’s coalition, rather than the populist side. But such people avoid Less Wrong, I think.
Oh I am actually speaking to both sides here. I’m also speaking to Republicans who voted for Trump expecting him to make positive changes in all of these areas and they’ve utterly failed. He has kept zero promises while at the same time raising the national debt and weakening our national security.
Also very honestly the wrecking ball argument has always seemed to me very lazy. It’s always easier to break stuff than it is to rebuild it so if you want to be a wrecking ball I need to know what you’re going to try to rebuild it with. Right now it looks like the philosophies of Curtis yarvin and project 2025 are the things they’re going to try to use to rebuild the country and that’s horrifying